The P-51D Conundrum

[Raw Kryptonite]

Originally Posted by MorgothNL

are you saying, that if I would take a P-51 mission, and first flew for hours, and then tried to dogfight. It will actually fly like it is going to be flying after the update?

Do you reallly notice that much difference from the burning fuel in this game?
And if it was a full tank, like the devs said, it would take about 6 hours to burn the fuel to a nice combat amount

Maybe, but I wouldn't want to bother testing it. I guess you could start a strike round with unlimited time but limited fuel to find out, but I don't think it's worth it.

[Cwl]

well no wonder the plane sucks- if its a flying gas tank it's not going to be a good dogfighter until most of it's fuel is gone.

[rocketassistedllama]

Howdilli...the mustang's my favourite plane [did'nt give a damn about it, 'till this game]-I love the way it handles, and its bite!
I have no trouble shooting down enemy planes using the 360 controller on realistic, although the Mustang has, admittedly; killed me more times than the enemy;0)
It's a big, heavy, hotrod of an escort fighter-with similar flight/handling characteristics to that other great escort fighter; the p-47 [so I'm told.] That sounds about right to me; the size hence weight of these planes were dictated by the amount of fuel they had to carry....add a big 2000hp plus Merlin, and a 4th fuel tank behind the pilot, up high....] I can believe the plane really handled like this.
The secret to turning seems to be; #1;do an immelmann-to twist 180 degrees, and #2;I sort of 'jerk' the plane round, looks like my plane's bunny-hopping....I'm guessing the energy bleeds off it quickly...hence the 'hopping around.' Turning smoothly, just seems to make it stall. Speaking of which; you can tell when you're about to stall-'cause the plane [any plane] feels like it's balanced on the tip of a needle...
Handles much like the Fw.190 d9....

[trk29]

It's good that they are working on this plane, but I have been flying this bird more often now, mostly in training and setting the AI to Veteran I know it's not the same as flying against a human but since I have turned down the sensitivity 3 notches I have only stalled and crashed once out of about ten flights, so I think I am getting the hang of it.

I'll try it more tomorrow on MP.

[Antinko1]

Hmm, ok so I did some additional testing and I must admit that the full fuel load idea didn't occur to me. In FB I never fly with more than 50% fuel in the P-51.

Anyway, I've just been playing in sim mode a lot more and I realised what I was doing with trim - the tutorial is misleading because it made me think that simply tapping 'trim' would trim the plane. Now I know that you have to move the sticks too (nice idea), it's easy...very easy.

Subsequently, I've found flying the P-51 easy now, and now I know that you can trim it the way you want to, I'm finding it just fine to fly. All you need to do is stay fast, trim frequently and not be too forceful on the stick.

I'm still using the 360 pad and I think I'll stay with it for a little while. I can't afford an AV8R right now.

I haven't stalled/spun the P-51 ever since I realised that trim was implemented the way it is, as opposed to the simple 'one button press fixes all' job I thought it was.

[Marchochias]

Originally Posted by Antinko1

Hmm, ok so I did some additional testing and I must admit that the full fuel load idea didn't occur to me. In FB I never fly with more than 50% fuel in the P-51.

Anyway, I've just been playing in sim mode a lot more and I realised what I was doing with trim - the tutorial is misleading because it made me think that simply tapping 'trim' would trim the plane. Now I know that you have to move the sticks too (nice idea), it's easy...very easy.

Subsequently, I've found flying the P-51 easy now, and now I know that you can trim it the way you want to, I'm finding it just fine to fly. All you need to do is stay fast, trim frequently and not be too forceful on the stick.

I'm still using the 360 pad and I think I'll stay with it for a little while. I can't afford an AV8R right now.

I haven't stalled/spun the P-51 ever since I realised that trim was implemented the way it is, as opposed to the simple 'one button press fixes all' job I thought it was.

What exactly do you do with the sticks to trim it? I thought you just angle the aircraft the way you want it, and then hit the trim button to set it there.

The P-51D for me is a horrible dogfighter, you can't take any risks with it since it will always spin, and is much harder to recover from a spin than most other aircraft.

[Ancient Seraph]

Originally Posted by Marchochias

What exactly do you do with the sticks to trim it? I thought you just angle the aircraft the way you want it, and then hit the trim button to set it there.

In Arcade and Realistic the aircraft is trimmed automatically. In Sim you just press A (on Xbox) to trim it to the attitude you are maintaining at that moment.

[Marchochias]

Originally Posted by Ancient Seraph

In Arcade and Realistic the aircraft is trimmed automatically. In Sim you just press A (on Xbox) to trim it to the attitude you are maintaining at that moment.

Yeah, that's what I've been doing. I thought he meant that there was something more to it.

[Xx RTEK xX]

The only way I can fly the mustang without it going out of control is to lower the sensitivity on both the aeirlons and elevators down to only 8 notches. I'm definately going to have to get a flight stick though, playing with the gamepad sucks because you barely move the stick and your maxed out.

My opinion goes along with ya'lls, the mustang should be tweaked because this does not fly, nor handle anything like a mustang.

[SgtPappy]

Has anyone here managed to fly a real P-51 with fuel tanks fully loaded before?

The plane carries 92 US gallons in each of two fuel tanks in the wings plus an additional 85 US gallons in the rear fuselage behind the pilot. With that thing full, the P-51D's CoG goes out of whack and is VERY hard to handle.

P-51's had a HUGE wing loading; they were relatively heavy for their size and did not have much wing area to pull all that weight around unlike a Zero which easily does so.

Like mentioned, P-51's were flown high and fast, not low and slow, and they carried larger, heavier equipment (radio transmitters, receivers, rear fuel tanks) which most of current, restored P-51D's do not carry.

That said, I have something random to bring up: the P-51 "B" shown on the site is a Mustang Mk.Ia... it's got 4x 20 mm cannon in its wings and an Allison engine, identified by the top intake. P-51B's were Merlin-equipped planes with 4x .50 cals. Has anyone else noticed this?