In close range air to air combat i have been using the pipper to hit a non maneuvering/low-g maneuvering target. I found it to be really weird that even though i am placing the pipper right on the target at a range to the target that corresponds to the mode i am in (automatic or manual mode) my bullets are way off target.
So i did some testing shown in the following figure:
In Figure a and c the aircraft is in a level flight at IAS =1000 km/h (a) and IAS = 500 km/h ©. In Figure b and d the aircraft is in a stable turn at IAS corresponding to a and c. In all figures the IAS (top), g load (middle), AOA (bottom) gauges are displayed. The track where i took the screenshots from can be found in the attachements.
ASP settings
Gun / Missile-Rockets
Shooting / Bombardment
Auto / Manual
Missile / Gyro
Wingspan set to 17m
Level flight
At 1000 km/h and almost 0 AOA the trail of bullets are below the pipper and the position of bullets shortly after exiting the gun with respect to the fixed net (called Boresight in the figures) is below the 1. cross (see Figure b).
When decreasing the IAS to 500 km/h the situation changes. Now the piper is below the trail of bullets and the Boresight is at the position of the 1. cross.
Turn flight
When turning the effect becomes more visible. In Figure b at 1000 km/h you can see that the bullet trail is only slightly above the pipper. But in Figure d at 500 km/h the bullet trail is significantly above the pipper.
This leads to a situation where you dont hit the target when using the pipper for aiming (especially at low IAS).
This dependency of the Mig21bis pipper on IAS is not present in the P51 (gyro mode) and F86F (gyro mode).
PS:
Using the Manual mode instead of Auto shows the same behaviour. Mig21bis_gunsight_test.trk
