Quote:
Originally Posted by Soviet Ace
Having 4 Hispanos would put a serious damper on your planes speed and maneuverability. I mean if you've ever held a real 20mm round, it's not light. So going up against a Me-109G-2 or maybe a FW-190A-5 would be dangerous, unless you were good enough to get on their tales first. And basically do some hit and run attacks.
But nothing can beat the maneuverability/handling of my Yak-3   |
I did say the Spitfire
XIV, the Griffon engined version, which has enough speed and climb performance not to need to get into a turning fight, and even then it is a pretty good turner. Anyway a Hispano 20mm cannon is only 10 pounds heavier than a .50cal M2(same amount for a pair of .303s too), and the 20mm ammo is heavier but this is balanced by not carrying as many rounds (20mm=120 rpg vs .50cal=250rpg) so the overall weight gain is not that much. At a guess (I'm not working out how much each ammo and gun option weighs in my head), an XIV with 4 Hispanos would be around 20-30 pounds heavier unloaded and about 50-60 pounds heavier with ammunition than one with 2 Hispanos and 2 .50cals, which seems worthwhile to me considering the firepower.
When flying the Spitfire XIV, I will mostly just rely on BnZing my enemies because the combination of a 448mph top speed and an instantaneous climb rate of more than 5000ft per min (4580ft per min sustained climb at sea level) is just about unbeatable, but if engaged at a disadvantage the XIV is still a good enough turner to beat out the Fw190 and Bf109 (same goes for any American fighter with comparable straight line performance) with little difficulty, and there isn't a prop engined fighter around that can follow the XIV in a steep, climbing turn.
Anyway, like you said, hit and run is the way to go. Erich Hartmann got 352 victories that way, and I have probably got even more using similar tactics in Il2, though I have definitely "died" a lot more times than he did
08-16-2009, 04:01 PM
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