Hurricane Roll Rate

[Kwiatek]

Major Werner Mölders, JG 51, compared the British fighters to his own prior to the Battle:

It was very interesting to carry out the flight trials at Rechlin with the Spitfire and the Hurricane. Both types are very simple to fly compared to our aircraft, and childishly easy to take-off and land. The Hurricane is good-natured and turns well, but its performance is decidedly inferior to that of the Me 109. It has strong stick forces and is "lazy" on the ailerons.
The Spitfire is one class better. It handles well, is light on the controls, faultless in the turn and has a performance approaching that of the Me 109. As a fighting aircraft, however, it is miserable. A sudden push forward on the stick will cause the motor to cut; and because the propeller has only two pitch settings (take-off and cruise), in a rapidly changing air combat situation the motor is either overspeeding or else is not being used to the full.


The RAE reported: "At 400 m.p.h. the Me.109 pilot, pushing sideways with all his strength, can only apply 1/5 aileron, thereby banking 45 deg. in about 4 secs.; on the Spitfire also, only 1/5 aileron can be applied at 400 m.p.h., and again the time to bank is 45 deg. in 4 secs. Both aeroplanes thus have their rolling manoeuvrability at high speeds seriously curtailed by aileron heaviness."

[chappy]

those are the same graphs ive managed to find today .

1: the 109 is superior in roll rate below approx 280mph (ias or tas not specified), comparable in the 280-310mph bracket, while the spitfire is marginally superior above 320mph

2: Unless im reading the legend wrong, kinda a rough image, the spitfire and hurricane are comparable in roll rates at IAS of 200mph and above.

experience for me thus far is the hurricane is 30-50% slower in the roll at various speeds above 200mph to the spitfire.


the subjective accounts are varied, the one you quote contradicts other accounts.(and the images posted)

While working out this Hurricane roll thing, see if there is ANY difference in initial roll rate between full ammo and no ammo. In previous IL-2 engine initial roll rate was not modeled.

Just curious ...

[Space Communist]

Well I am no expert, and I know that the original IL-2 isn't exactly a historical source, but I always found hurricanes to roll like pigs.

Of course I never flew them that much and my memory isn't great and I might well be remembering flying a IIc with the huge heavy cannon wings so take this with a grain of salt.

[b101uk]

Be wary of info from the RAE produced during war, the British were very good at misinformation and smoke and mirrors so are generally on the conservative side of true figures when it comes to publishing spec for British stuff, so I would suggest that 45deg roll in >1.9sec or more is misinformation when there is no end of footage of 360deg rolls in ~5sec during gentle air display in 60+ year old aircraft.

[madrebel]

well then its a good thing the RAE weren't the only ones to write down their test results then isn't it?

[b101uk]

You will find almost all performance characteristics documented for British military equipment is on the conservative side of what its true value is and that has been the ethos long before ww2, this is also true for no end of different countries military equipment.

Perhaps if you wanted more true values you would perhaps use the RAE ME109 times then find the test by the war time German equivalent of the “RAE” on captured spitfires, given there is no need for the British to occlude true performance figures of ME109 test results & the same is true of the Germans with true spitfire performance figures.

Also with respect to very heavy ailerons etc at speed (spitfire and hurricane), what may be heavy or physically limiting during testing over the relative safety of your own country soon becomes much lighter at the same speed when in combat as the adrenalin is racing threw your system, so the implication is a physically strong pilot engaged in combat will achieve better roll rates at high speed than a weaker pilot in the same situation BUT both will achieved better comparative roll rates than the “tests flights” due to the adrenalin of combat giving strength.

[Kurfürst]

Originally Posted by Kwiatek

This is for a Spitfire Mark VA, with metal ailerons, tested by NACA in 1941. Not a Mark I with fabric ailerons.

I have a British mid-1940 report for the Spit I/Hurri I, basically it says the Hurricane is much better with regards to aileron control, though both are 'locked in cement' at high speed. Couldn't upload it yet..

[Kwiatek]

Originally Posted by Kurfürst

This is for a Spitfire Mark VA, with metal ailerons, tested by NACA in 1941. Not a Mark I with fabric ailerons.

I have a British mid-1940 report for the Spit I/Hurri I, basically it says the Hurricane is much better with regards to aileron control, though both are 'locked in cement' at high speed. Couldn't upload it yet..

Not true. These chart above is for SPit MK1/ Hurri MK1 with fabrics ailerons.


Here is roll rate for Spitfire with metal ailerons:

[madrebel]

kwiatek what relevance does that chart have on the game? it only shows spitVs. when there is a late 41/42 africa or channel mod with LF spitVs and 190A2s/3s then we can worry about that.

iirc the first test of metal ailerons were done on a spit2 in early 41.