REQ Seperate engine magnetos

A couple of points.

If the mags are ON but the engine isn't turning over (the prop is feathered, for instance) then the mags aren't doing anything. They're generators and have to be turning to produce any current (and the engine has to be turning to trigger the pulse).

Back in high school I owned an Aeronca Champ (airknocker) that had NO mixture control or electrical system (other than mags) much like its vintage peers, so turning the engine off/on by the mags was the norm. I can't begin to count how many times I propped (that's OLD AIRPLANE for "started") that baby.

I find fire relights a bother, but the horribly unrealistic stalls ... the un-modeled roll inertia ... the what-in-the-world-is-this-supposed-to-be spin characteristics ... it goes on ...


I do love the game!

[Romanator21]

That's the first time I've heard about shutting off an engine by flipping the mags. Usually it leaves a bunch of unburned fuel in the cylinders. Did your plane have a fuel cut-off seeing as it had no mixture control?

I agree about roll inertia. One of the saddest sights to see is a de-winged bomber fluttering about like a leaf. One looses the impression of scale, and mass and gets the idea that they're watching a toy plane fall.

However, considering its age, Il-2 has pretty decent stall modeling (even stock FSX planes fall short). You can't rely on the "Stall!" HUD message though. I've performed stalls without the message coming on, and for a sim it felt pretty good. The "Stall" message seems to only indicate spins which may be why every "stall" looks like a canned "slip on a banana peel" spin (as one member puts it).

It feels like the CG slips back six feet at the stall. There are a number of planes in the game that had rather mild stalls with little or no tendency to spin that - like every other plane in the game - snaps right into a spin at stall, regardless of coordination.

Yeah- my old bird had a fuel cut off valve, akin to a selector because it was somewhat upstream of the carb, but I tried shutting the engine off with it once and it took about a minute and a half - lol. Shutting the mags off is really no different than switching off the key in a car, though, and we all know the ramifications of doing that ... I also tried using the fuel switch as a mixture control with ineffective results. I was by myself with just over a half a tank (about 35% useful load) and decided to see how high I could go. Got up to about 9000ft (basically a standard day, severe clear) and was smelling the raw gas dripping out of the exhaust stacks when I decided to try nearly closing the valve but it didn't do anything until it nearly shut down the motor. I continued on up to 12700ft, significantly above ceiling as I was only climbing at about ten feet a minute ... what a view! I then decided to chop throttle and kick it into a spin (left) and see how many turns I could get in. After about thirty-five or so I found I had lost count so I quickly leveled out and kicked it to the right to "unwind" -lol. At about 2500ft I leveled and decided to try gliding (I was a bored kid who was bored of flying) and shut off the mags but couldn't get the prop to stop windmilling until I nearly had the plane stalled. It was fun gliding around, then I tried to spin the prop up (no starter, remember) and I kept dropping the nose without getting the prop to move. Finally, I was pulling out of the bottom of a VERY steep dive at about 350ft and 135mph (Vne 127) the prop suddenly cranked a half turn, paused a second, cranked a whole turn pausing a quarter second, then started windmilling and fired right up with me on the deck ...

... ahh, those were the days ...