Fighting Irish Forums

Wee Thunks Illustrated

In the hazy skies over the Pacific visibility can be a bigger problem than usual. One way to minimize losing your mates is to slow down and fly parallel to your charges. If your ego can't handle that or if you must move 'round simply to stay awake, make your turns level and standard rate. Here's the formula for standard rate turns. It just takes a few minutes to calculate ...

~~~

Angle of Bank formula for a specific True Airspeed (TAS) is:

\tan(bank)=\frac{TAS^2/r}{g}

where r is the radius of the turn and g is the acceleration due to gravity. For a rate one turn and velocity in kt (nautical miles per hour), this comes to

\tan(bank)=\frac{TAS(kt)}{364}.

A convenient approximation for the bank angle in degrees is

Angle\ of\ Bank \approx \frac{TAS(kt)}{10} + 7

Radius of Turn formula

To calculate the radius of a Rate 1,2 or 3 turn at a specific TAS.

Radius\ of\ turn\ in\ NM = \frac{TAS(kt)}{rate\ of\ turn\ (1\ or\ 2\ or\ 3) \times 60 \times \pi}

Use this formula to calculate the radius of turn in feet given velocity in knots and angle of bank:

Radius\ of\ turn\ in\ feet = \frac{velocity^2}{11.29 \times \tan(bank)}

This is a simplified formula that ignores slip and returns zero for 90 degrees of bank.

The constant 11.29 is calculated:

11.29 = \frac{9.8 \times 3600 \times 3600}{1852 \times 6076.12}

9.8 = gravity\ in\ metres\ per\ second\ per\ second

3600 = seconds\ per\ hour

1852 = metres\ per\ nautical\ mile

6076.12 = feet\ per\ nautical\ mile

...

...

or just use ~ three degrees/sec,~180 degrees/minute or ~20-22 degree bank,

whichever is easier for you.

~~~

Base your turns on the bombers course and maintain two headings; 45 deg to the right and 45 deg to the left of bomber course.*



Leads should wake up their fli ... erm, notify their flight when the turn is made. (Ex: "... to the left now ...")


Falcon


* Your results may vary, open at your own risk, many will enter, few will win, some parts are edible, not available in Montana, Florida or North Malden.

Thanks mate, hopefully I'll be able to keep eyes on in future

Everything's clear now!!!

Thx Stu!!!:)

M

You mean that 'escort'

Good lecture, great job.

Ah bejezus I just watch them and follow.... thats what I'm doing wrong.

Is fishing allowed in these forums? Good cast!


The historical reason for fighters not dropping to bomber speed was that they be slow and have zilch energy when enemy fighters appear. So they go fast and weave. I followed Vin on Wednesday and it was shocking the lack of proper angles he kept as I checked my protractor while we weaved over Gregs canoe. But my great skills of actually watching him rather than blab on comms kept me able to see and follow his plane 500 m in front of me ( amazing isn't it?). However following someone 500m in front of you this is a Grandmaster skill requiring years of practice.

I got 3 hooks on my line

Gaj,

I'm responding to several squad mates' gripes about their ability to see much of anything at different distances. These aren't all pilot skills. In most cases it's real world monitor/software issues they're having. Also, with all the weaving we're doing over long periods of time there's bound to be an inordinate amount of time spent on keeping their eyes on everything. If lead and flight mates are all aware of these difficulties they can adopt some procedures to help. Leads, don't clog the radio, but let your dozing, diligent or over-stressed wingmen know that you're changing altitude or course. The picture above might provide a good reference as to what that course may be. That's all I'm doing here. Slow speed on fighters? Sure it's not the best practice, but on long trips in an area where there is less of a chance of activity, where pilots are reporting difficulty with visibility, it's better than losing the bombers and the other fighters altogether. If you are at a higher altitude than the bombers and they are clearly visible, nicely stuck to your wingtip, you can gain some of that energy back diving on that Zero that is coming up on their tail.

We have pilots here of all levels of ability. Constant practice isn't going to help folks with resolution limitations, but knowledge of a few real-world procedures may.


Falcon

Hi,
It's very interesting information about ecscort. I flew last time in rescue mission... In general we had enough fighters for defence in spite this we lost the Catalina May be you not believe me it was my first cooperate flight (team work) exept two flights before as a gunner. I tried to keep my lider in sight it was sometimes not easy... and of course I haven't real ability for scan air to find enemy planes. Later in track I find out that in attack moment on the Catalina all fighters were far. So I think at least one group should be very close to bomber(s), then one group should be higher and possible one fighter group lower (depends on bomber level). Also when each groups will have its level we can know that we haven't other planes on this level => if I will find other planes I be sure they are enemy. As I said I haven't expirience in coop flights but I have small expirience in free hanting (in different servers) - often pilots fly on very low level and you cann't find they from high altitude.

very comprehensive guide there Stu.


but you forgot one thing.....


" May contain nuts! "

Stu's gone technical on us.

Everyone back away slowly, no sudden movements or loud noises please.

Fair enough Stu

Still makes me think you should take a flight on Sunday, do your thing and see if it helps those that wish to follow this more....eh professional course to flying.

Re the monitor res thing. I hear this alot not just here but in other IL-2 forums (I'm a forum tart)
I just got a LCD screen 24incher two weeks ago. Prior to that I had a 6 year old 19'' CRT. I'm now running at 1920x 1200 before 1024 x768. Although I can see dots on the lcd ok, it was easier on the old crt. I think this is because its said the game was designed to run at the lower res. So maybe if your having problems and your monitor can do so, drop your res down a bit and see if that helps. Your meant to run lcd's at their native resolution but mine looks fine dropped down to 1024x768 but not as pretty of course. Then again I try to turn up the Situation Awareness button to full, I find that helps most.

The distance you keep from your lead is important too. IMO too close and its easier to lose sight as he might dip below you, you panic....etc,etc crash!. Too far away his LOD becomes difficult to see. So choose what you find best. For me its 500-700m. But thats that dreaded 'loose deuce' anarchy thing.

Mike and I often fly 5km apart going into a merge . Monitor res maybe part of the problem but SA practice is needed definitely.

Just a supplemental thunk ...

All this is to help the new guys and those mates who don't fly every day stay interested and get some positive results. The last thing I want to do is alienate the Old Ones. Use what you want, fly like you like. If something is starting to rub you the wrong way, let it out. Part of being a squad is the responsibility of looking after all its members. Don't look at these pictures and procedures as non-FI or too organized. Look at it as stuff to add to the knowledge base. Sorry, very sorry if this seems anathema to some.

Deyneko, very good. I thought that the first group of fighters would stay closer to the Cat and the second, higher group would watch the first group. From what little I saw of you from the nose of the doomed PBY, you did great. Hang in there. These long flights are very challenging. If you can handle these, you will be in good shape to handle the shorter ones to come.

Snee, those aren't nuts, they're the bones from the finest baby frogs, dew picked and flown from Iraq, cleansed in finest quality spring water, lightly killed, and then sealed in a succulent Swiss quintuple smooth treble cream milk chocolate envelope and lovingly frosted with glucose.


Falcon

PS: I hate to lead ... but all this mouthin' off I'm doin' should be followed up by some action. If no one has a boner to lead Sunday, I'll do one. Gah!