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Staying fast vs staying to fast?


Campbell

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I often here people say stay fast. Well I’ve been experimenting lately on MP server. What exactly is staying fast? Today for example I stayed fast but I also spent more time fighting blackouts then successfully maneuvering into position for a gun solution. How do others deal with this? Is there an optimum speed to try and maintain for best energy/ maneuverability or just stay as fast as possible and do very little maneuvering so as not to black out?

 

 

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so long as you don't get mired down into the realm where you perform worse than the other guy ("getting slow") whether you choose to go for optimum maneuverability or max speed is your prerogative. there are scenarios where you don't necessarily need to maneuver, ex. multi-element bnz chains, but if your consideration is the 1v1 maneuvering fight, then yes, there is such a thing as "too fast" as all airfoils are designed for a particular speed band.

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There's a concept called "corner turning speed," the exact definition of which I'm not entirely sure of, but it generally means the speed at which your airplane turns the best.

 

It's different from best sustained turn speed, which I know to be clearly defined: the speed at which a 360-degree sustained turn (a turn that neither gains nor loses energy) takes the least amount of time to complete. This is the quickest sustained turn you can make, not necessarily the tightest.

 

Corner turning speed, on the other hand, is about instantaneous turn, not sustained turn. In a WWII fighter, you can only keep up a "corner turn" as long as you have altitude with which to sustain a diving turn. If you dive too steeply, and your speed exceeds corner speed, then you turn worse. If you dive to shallowly, and your speed drops below corner speed, then you turn worse. You need to find the sweet spot, and that sweet spot is what pilots call "corner turning speed." This speed is always going to be higher than your best sustained turn speed.

 

Also note that "unloading" (pulling back less on the stick, to reduce G-forces and increase speed) to maintain corner turning speed, instead of diving to maintain it, won't work; even though you're technically at corner turning speed, you won't be turning at well as you would be if you were diving (and pulling back harder) at the same speed. Indeed, if you aren't losing altitude, then you'll turn worse at corner speed than you would at best sustained turn speed. You can't have your cake and eat it as well; either you need to burn altitude for a corner turn, or you need to switch to a sustained turn. Trying to execute a sustained turn at corner speed simply won't work; the other guy will out-turn you even in a worse-turning fighter, by doing a sustained turn at his best sustained turn speed.

 

In a "mirror duel," a fighter with a better sustained turn will beat a fighter with a better instantaneous turn, if the fight is prolonged or begins at low altitude. The instantaneous turner will initially do better in an energy-positive situation, than the sustained turner will do from the same position; however, it takes more gunnery skill to take advantage of superior instantaneous turning ability than it does to take advantage of superior sustained turning ability. If you get one shot opportunity in a sustained turner, chances are you'll get plenty of more opportunities if you miss. But if you get one shot opportunity in an instantaneous turner, chances are you won't get another opportunity if you miss that one.

 

Here's a related post I wrote a while back, comparing sustained and instantaneous turns, in real life and in the virtual sky:

 

In real life, speed is life, and you usually don't want to slow down to sustained turn speeds in air combat. It's a quick way to get killed by another fighter you don't see, and minimizes your options for disengaging if things don't work as planned. So, usually, IRL, they had loads of altitude and loads of speed, and were in no hurry to burn either one. If they couldn't get a good shot right away, they'd often try to extend, or to maneuver defensively (staying fast, rather than burning E to try to get on the enemy's tail) while waiting for a friendly to help out.

 

Thus, the nature of real air combat, with greater fighter saturation and real consequences, was such that "burn E to get on his tail ASAP and finish the fight at sustained turn speed" wasn't the order of the day, the way it often is in multiplayer sims. Most simmers put a greater priority on potential kills, and a lower priority on personal survival, than real fighter pilots. After all, we respawn each time.

 

For this reason, I believe, real air combat tends to happen at much higher speeds (as well as altitudes), on average, and thus takes far longer to get down to sustained turn speed. So, IRL, instantaneous turn often matters more than sustained turns. The 109F model had better instantaneous turn than the 109G, but I expect most G variants to have better sustained turn (because of the power increases).

 

So, a simmer might rightly consider the G-10 more maneuverable than the F, because we're more concerned with sustained turns, because our burn-E-to-make-the-kill duels at low altitude get down to sustained turn speeds very quickly. But a real fighter pilot might rightly consider the F more maneuverable than the G-10, because he's more concerned with instantaneous turns, because he has a lot more E to work with.

 

For these reasons, in real life, if given the choice between two fighters, one of which had better instantaneous turn and the other of which had better sustained turn--well, I'd take the one that was faster, but if speed wasn't the deciding factor--I'd take the one that had better instantaneous turn. However, in a sim, I'd take the one with sustained turn, rather than the one with instantaneous. The overly-aggressive (good for kills/hour, bad for survival chances) way that we simmers behave ... we spend most of the fight at sustained turn speeds. In a duel to the death, sustained turn beats instantaneous turn, because when both pilots perform maximum-effectiveness maneuvers to get a killshot, very little of the fight is spent at corner turning speed and most of it will be at sustained.


Edited by Echo38
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Above 250mph IAS is a good rule of thumb for the altitudes of multiplayer combat. At that speed you have options and won't get caught up by someone who just made a high-g turn to avoid your attack.

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There's a concept called "corner turning speed," the exact definition of which I'm not entirely sure of, but it generally means the speed at which your airplane turns the best.

 

It's different from best sustained turn speed, which I know to be clearly defined: the speed at which a 360-degree sustained turn (a turn that neither gains nor loses energy) takes the least amount of time to complete. This is the quickest sustained turn you can make, not necessarily the tightest.

 

Corner turning speed, on the other hand, is about instantaneous turn, not sustained turn. In a WWII fighter, you can only keep up a "corner turn" as long as you have altitude with which to sustain a diving turn. If you dive too steeply, and your speed exceeds corner speed, then you turn worse. If you dive to shallowly, and your speed drops below corner speed, then you turn worse. You need to find the sweet spot, and that sweet spot is what pilots call "corner turning speed." This speed is always going to be higher than your best sustained turn speed.

 

Also note that "unloading" (pulling back less on the stick, to reduce G-forces and increase speed) to maintain corner turning speed, instead of diving to maintain it, won't work; even though you're technically at corner turning speed, you won't be turning at well as you would be if you were diving (and pulling back harder) at the same speed. Indeed, if you aren't losing altitude, then you'll turn worse at corner speed than you would at best sustained turn speed. You can't have your cake and eat it as well; either you need to burn altitude for a corner turn, or you need to switch to a sustained turn. Trying to execute a sustained turn at corner speed simply won't work; the other guy will out-turn you even in a worse-turning fighter, by doing a sustained turn at his best sustained turn speed.

 

In a "mirror duel," a fighter with a better sustained turn will beat a fighter with a better instantaneous turn, if the fight is prolonged or begins at low altitude. The instantaneous turner will initially do better in an energy-positive situation, than the sustained turner will do from the same position; however, it takes more gunnery skill to take advantage of superior instantaneous turning ability than it does to take advantage of superior sustained turning ability. If you get one shot opportunity in a sustained turner, chances are you'll get plenty of more opportunities if you miss. But if you get one shot opportunity in an instantaneous turner, chances are you won't get another opportunity if you miss that one.

 

Here's a related post I wrote a while back, comparing sustained and instantaneous turns, in real life and in the virtual sky:

 

 

 

I already knew all that! However it was still good info and I do appreciate you taking the time to post it. Thanks for adding good info to the discussion.

 

 

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Above 250mph IAS is a good rule of thumb for the altitudes of multiplayer combat. At that speed you have options and won't get caught up by someone who just made a high-g turn to avoid your attack.

 

 

 

Thank you, I think part of my issue is not really sensing the speed in the 51. I’ve been flying Spits for a long time and I’m so used to being run down really quickly. I need to relax and realize I have more time in a pony because I have speed. I have no issue being fast and staying fast, just not very good at energy fighting maneuvers . I’ve spent years doing angle and turn fighting.

 

 

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I often here people say stay fast. Well I’ve been experimenting lately on MP server. What exactly is staying fast? Today for example I stayed fast but I also spent more time fighting blackouts then successfully maneuvering into position for a gun solution. How do others deal with this? Is there an optimum speed to try and maintain for best energy/ maneuverability or just stay as fast as possible and do very little maneuvering so as not to black out?

 

The whole point of dogfight is that you need to get close to get other one killed or scared.

And in air combat you don't need to kill a another, it is good thing to get other aircraft knocked off the enemy roster so you can slow their air combat in long run, but for a protective missions etc it is enough to just get a fighter drop their fuel tanks or payload when starting to defend themselves, as it is better than them completing their sortie.

 

So, you can stay fast and force other to cancel their sortie never achieving a position to shoot other down. Just as a radar lock can be enough to stress target or keep it knowledging your possibility to engage them in a better position for that matter.

 

depending from a many variables, staying fast can often be that gets you killed more often than not. And best situation is that you have capability to stay fast, as capability to slow down or even stop. Just staying fast aint good.

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