[Robotic Pope]

Originally Posted by winny

You can tell that his right arm is forwards and his left isn't from his shoulders. He also waves at one point, and his arm comes from the side not in front.

P-38 was a big Aircraft, maybe heavier..?

Also, the reason British Aircraft had a spade grip was so that they could use 2 hands, so it was obviously thought that 2 hands may be needed at times.

I still don't think you'd sacrifice a such an important control as the throttle unless you had to. To be not on the throttle in combat would be dangerous, getting from stick to throtle under high G can't be easy and, there's a delay.

Also if you're using 2 hands because it's heavy then when you let go, to go to the throttle, you're gonna invoulantarliy lose control, like I already said, it makes no tactical, or physical sense to believe that, as you said, "warbird pilots mostly flew hands on stick, especialy in combat."

Just realised that the Paths of hate trailer perfectly shows how I imagine a dogfight inside the cockpit. Watch how the pilots use both hands on the stick, the spitfire guy swiching hands to look over his right shoulder. I'm assuming the creator of this film did his research of course.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZn65LA2w90