FW-190A vs Spitfire, Me-109G, P-47D in dogfights

[David603]

I was intrigued by your description of the Anton as a low speed turner, so I decided to try some rough tests in Il2 to see if this supported the idea.

They are by no means perfect, but I did my best to keep conditions the same throughout the test and the results are averages of the good turns (ie if I stalled the aircraft or found myself more than 100m above or below my starting altitude I discarded the results).

I used the Fw109A-5 and the Spitfire LF MkIXc for the tests.

Technique used was a flat turn, using rudder where needed to keep the aircraft's nose up, and just trying to see the tightest turn that I could produce, regardless of speed.

Full throttle @ 500m (left turn)
MkIX 17.1 sec
A-5 22.4 sec

80% throttle @ 500m (left turn)
MkIX 16.0 sec
A-5 18.7sec

As you can see, while the Spitfire only gains 1.1 sec by downthrottling, the A-5 gains 3.7 sec, halving the gap from 5.3 sec to 2.7 sec, and the difference between a down-throttled A5 and a full throttle MkIX is only 1.6 sec.

The A-5 turns on a similar radius but at a lower speed, and is noticeably easier to stall, especially if you try to change direction once you have slowed down in the turn. Since both aircraft have props that rotate to the right, I didn't try repeating the tests with right turns.