Stuge

Two words: no escape :) Flanker cannon was and still is laser accurate up to 1,5 km. I very much doubt one could disengage from such slow speeds and build enough separation.. and even if they could, the chaser is still in an advantageous position, closing distance with every single move the escapee is making, be it guns defense or random maneuvering. Resetting the fight is I would say impossible.

Nice vid Flank, I think I've seen before yeah... Back in the days of the old flight model ("standard flight model") the Su-27 was extremely stable at slow speed + high angle of attack like in the vid. Consequently, these long spirals did occur quite frequently. The best ones came from contrail altitudes all the way down to the deck :) Supermutt's deck transition, even if it didn't involve accelerating, seemed smoother somehow and Zerol lost valuable angles there, I think the outcome was decided after that. It's hard to come back from such a big angles disadvantage and psychological pressure also plays a part here, you "give up" subconsciously, even if you don't want to, and that's it. With the new flight model these spirals don't occur so much anymore because you can do funky things with direct control that break the "balance" of the spiral.

Perhaps what you mean is an overshoot in the vertical axis..? This is possible if the spiral is very tight and steep with extremely low airspeeds. In this case one can force a vertical overshoot by "floating", as Flankerator said, meaning trying to slow down your descent rate without sacrificing your turn rate too much. Thinking about deck transition is not very relevant here, forcing an overshoot is the thing to do , and obviously you will overshoot yourself if you attempt to accelerate when flying steeply downhill. I heard someone draw a line of approximately 30 degrees steep speed vector - if your descent angle is more than 30 degrees downhill then overshooting becomes an issue. The situation in practice does not allow for a proper deck transition. Once the ground has been reached and the pilots are forced to pull up before crashing, they will both be slow. Here they will have to try and very slowly accerate to get a better turn rate, while taking care they don't let up the turn too much as this could expose one to weapons fire. The spiral I was referring to I meant a pretty wide and shallow-descending one, with somewhat faster airspeeds, perhaps around 300 kts, but still below corner speed since corner speed is too fast for a descending turn. Here the deck transition is wise to make since the descent rate is shallow and the separation between airplanes is large - thus in practice no overshoot of any kind can happen, and the pilots can accelerate freely to optimal speed by the time they reach the ground, as long as the fight is relatively neutral (neither has a decisive angles advantage which would allow instant weapon use by the pilot who does not accelerate but instead bleeds airspeed to turn the nose for a kill shot) Of course these two spiral types are "black-and-white" -type extremities, and in reality the situation could be any shade between these two, changing dynamically with time... it is actually a vertical descending rolling scissors situation... with a big wall that is the ground or sea to stop it at some point :)

You're right Blaze you can also add a little vertical component to your turn to bleed speed and it is a good way also :) but for a minimal speed excess a yank on the stick is enough.

Not automatically, Eagle has superior thrust so it can perform a good deck transition. And remember what I said, a very light Eagle will outperform a very light Flanker in a sustained turn on the deck! Deck transition is about letting the plane accelerate to a nice speed for sustained turn before reaching the deck. This is achieved by a combo of diving steeper and loosening the stick pull slightly. For Eagle this is the corner speed that varies greatly depending on weight, roughly 350-500 kts. As the fight prolongs, fuel burns, or maybe you are dumping the fuel, and you get lighter, you will notice the corner speed starts to decrease as you are unable to maintain the current speed without either blacking out or accelerating - this is a cue to pull the stick sharply(as opposed to cutting throttle which wastes energy) to decrease your speed a little and find the correct corner speed "balance" where you are pulling 7-8 G(there are beeping sound cues for this from the cockpit) and your airspeed stays constant. For the Flanker is the region of 600-800 km/h, and interestingly whether you fly 600 km/h or 800 km/h doesn't seem to have much of an impact on the sustained turn performance. Having that 200 km/h extra just gives you a little more leverage energywise. Not sure about what you meant by the overshooting part.. there's no overshoots involved in two-circle fights, at least not until one guy gets on the other's six.

Hmm now that I bounced this off you...it could be a useful move against a fast(600+ kts) bandit going for energy. But maybe horizontally initially... to regain quick tally against the pretty sky...yes...good...good...also I guess you're right it could work against a "regular" bandit but you would still need to be somewhat slower than him, interesting geometry yes :)

Flanker is better at rolling scissors, Eagle's crazy roll doesn't save it ;) The two oblique turns are likely to develop into a descending spiral, ending up in a two-circle fight on the deck. Whoever makes a better deck transition (reaching optimal airspeed by the time there's no room to descend anymore) will gain advantage.

I always felt that lead turning too early is the equivalent of dropping the soap in prison... if you get lucky the guy behind you doesn't take advantage :) But hey it's good to explore unconventional options... :D

Yeah, you can also change a straight pull up into an oblique one at any moment if you see the bandit is going to threaten you with weapons.. What's really nice about this is that if you survive this second merge and do a second pull-up from slow speed! Most people can not counter this well (they should follow you up) but instead either directly dive down for speed or stay horizontal at a low airspeed. Once you come over the top, on the verge of stalling, by using your roll control you can choose which direction your nose will fall, swing the nose down and take the kill shot at the bandit down below who is still gathering airspeed! This technique is extremely powerful with Flanker's direct control which allows surprisingly good control at even almost zero airspeeds, with some practice of course ;) And oh yea I love to fly both Eagle and Flanker. They both have great personalities :):)

You can see that in this fight I purposely went oblique to prevent being shot in the face. Trying to lead for a shot would have exposed myself to a shot also, thus I just took a pot shot without aiming :) But this was before Flanker had breaking wings, now the dynamics are different...

The overstress risk depends a lot on speed. High speeds mean high risk. Max speed BVR maneuvering is most dangerous, you have to be aware of what you're doing, making smooth inputs and avoiding fast rolls + high G. In a turn fight there is rarely need to go faster than 800 km/h (except the energy fight I mentioned). At <800 km/h you can turn pretty confidently already. At <600 km/h you can do pretty much anything without risk of breakage, including using that direct control for maximum nose authority and that minimum radius! In fact what many people don't realize is that if you don't use direct control in low speed one circle fights, ESPECIALLY FLAT SCISSORS, the Eagle will actually beat the Flanker in minimizing radius!!! Alternatively you could maybe use the wheel brake button to tighten your turn I guess but I find it inferior to direct control so I never use it. Direct control is also beyond awesome when you find yourself on top of a loop at slow speed (<400 km/h). You can use it to quickly swing your nose down and gain lots of angles with minimal energy loss... otherwise your nose has a tendency to resist coming down, the computer controlled system performs poorly here. The Eagle indeed has a significant thrust-to-weight advantage over the Flanker. However, your reasoning that the Flanker must perform worse in vertical turning is...false :) This is because: -Flanker may accelerate less, but it also bleeds less speed in turns, probably has to do with the aerodynamic design of the thing.. -Flanker is also less speed sensitive than Eagle, it performs best anywhere within 600-800 km/h, and suffers less from lower speeds, thus having maximum performance in a very large portion of the vertical loop, while the Eagle does not like variable speeds and instead prefers the exact corner speed, making it more efficient in the horizontal where this corner speed can be maintained. When flying a <50% fuel Flanker I am absolutely confident in following an Eagle into any maneuver whatsoever, knowing that my beloved Flanker will match or exceed the Eagle's turn performance. The only exception to this is a low altitude sustained two circle fight against a very light(running on fumes) Eagle.. here problems can arise when Eagle becomes more of a missile in itself than an aircraft with ridiculous thrust to weight and consequentially ridiculous sustained turn rate exceeding 20 degrees per second, outperforming the Flanker :D About the merge again... your reasonings are correct! The Flanker pilot can start at a slower airspeed, let's say 600-700 km/h, and use direct control at an early point in the loop to guarantee first shot with R-73. However, should this attack fail the Flanker will be left floundering very slow, and the Eagle may come around screaming with guns. This could be avoided by the Flanker pilot by starting the pull up from a faster speed, matching the Eagle's performance, while going slightly oblique to try avoid weapons at the second merge at the top of the loop. This is the most dangerous part for the Flanker. After the second merge at the top of the loop the Eagle will be slow and after that the Flanker can dominate and win the fight. R-73 guarantees that Eagle cannot run away anymore :)

I read your first post again with thought. A point system like you describe could surely be implemented in mission design, in fact I've seen several multiplayer servers that use such systems ;)

Very interesting! Actually, part of the reason I think vertical is better is that for vertical you need, compared to horizontal, a faster initial airspeed, thus also having higher specific energy / total energy / whatever you want to call it (airspeed + altitude) So the vertical opening would actually be an energy conserving move, not an energy expending one. Regardless, I would gladly challenge your F-15-flying cousin to show that conserving energy is a good idea.. I strongly believe it is not, due to the deadliness of both the AIM-9M and the 20mm gun in high aspect encounters, meaning that angles is everything and energy is less important. Now I am talking about same aircraft vs same aircraft cases. Having different aircraft with different weapons makes for a much more complex scenario. When facing a superior opponent it is of course smart to keep and use any escape window you can in case you lose your advantage.

Thanks and not exactly sure what you mean in the last part but it sure sounds fun :D How can a lead turn be disrespectful! :D:D:D

In case of eagle vs flanker where flanker has potentially smaller radius you do your best and hope he doesn't kill you within 180 degrees of turn with R73. In fact this is the best time to kill a sloppy flanker pilot by pulling a smaller radius turn yourself! It is also a good idea to try to gun the flanker head-on after 180 degrees, since Eagle is a better gun platform currently. After 180 degrees you hope that the flanker is heavy, or unskilled, otherwise you are in trouble ;)

Higgeh coming from you I appreciate the comments since youve been one of my worthiest opponents in recent years ;) 500 kts is a rough estimation that works most of the time and gives you better follow up energy than a lower speed. I sometimes use even 520 kts. Lower speed gives a better radius but also exposes to gunfire. Higher speed allows for better head on jink, this affects the overall equation of probabilies :)

Yes Shurugal, the move is all about the gravity assist that you get after passing through 1/4 of the loop ;)

Chief I'm looking forward to you making missions and providing a server to remedy these problems you presented! :)

If I remember correctly the manual does not recommend performing snap rolls because they cannot be performed reliably.

Blaze I never said it's super easy to pull off :) But it's the best move when done correctly. It gives you first shot with heatseeker, and good energy to continue if the heatseeker misses etc. Few pointers: -starting speed so that you almost black out when pulling up at max performance (stick pulled fully to the balls, about 500 kts for Eagle.) -once you're past 1/4 of the loop, lift vector goes exactly on the bandit A corner speed loving horizontal turning opponent will be destroyed within 10 seconds of the merge...

Haha thx for the referral JunMcKill :):) Here's something you probably won't read from any guide... I know I haven't... and it's so simple it's almost dumb: I firmly believe that as long as you have control over your airspeed at the merge, and there is no significant separation between the fighters at merge, the single best move at merge is almost always to pull straight up into the vertical, unless going for energy tactics (which is viable only in a guns fight anyway). I believe all those dogfighting guides recommending things like slice turns or horizontal ones or whatever, are wrong and anyone attempting a horizontal move against a well executed vertical one will be instantly disadvantaged in angles :) This applies to pretty much any fighter aircraft. Now if someone disagrees with this and wants to prove me wrong... send me pm, we can fly, record on tacview and post here how things really are ;)

I understand :)

Well, surely at the same airspeed there is an attitude difference whether flaps are up or down...

Actually I'm just misleading everyone... I will of course take Su-33 and this will happen: [ame] [/ame]

Yes to all from 104th.