Corner Speed for the F5-E

[flywaldair (Skynet dev.)]

Hi Guys,

 

I spent some time reading about BFM and tactics over Christmas. The term corner speed popped up a few times.

 

I have some experience flying cessnas as a private pilot. From what I understand the corner speed relates to the maneuver speed in civil aviation.

 

I understand flying at the corner speed gives you maximum turn performance.

 

I looked in to the F5 charts. My example is at 15'000 feet, where some of the encounters take place in the BFM campaign.

 

Is my interpretation correct that at 15'000 feet the sustainable corner speed would relate to mach 0.8 and give you a turn rate of 9.5 degrees per second (1 in the diagram). Mach .8 strikes me as rather high.

 

Also for a brief moment I could turn at Mach 0.65 and achieve a turn rate of almost 18 degrees per second (2 in Diagram). However this would not be sustainable, so I would loose airspeed or I would have to enter a dive to sustain my airspeed.

[Sabre-TLA]

I think your reading the chart right but I don't know how closely that maps to in game.

 

For example you don't have the 2 x AIM-9s as used in the test which would add drag and weight so you should be able to turn tighter however the environmental conditions also weigh into it (air density, temperature, etc).

 

Also I'm not sure how closely the flight model is mapped to real world charts.

 

0.8 mach is ~530 knots which is about half it's max speed of ~1.6 mach.

 

This article https://fightersweep.com/129/flying-the-f-5-tiger-ii/

says

It’s often mentioned that the F-5 is used as an adversary because it is a perfect simulator for the Mig-21, and it’s true: the V-n diagrams superimposed show almost identical maneuvering performance characteristics.

Maybe check out the MiG-21 charts to get some additional info.

 

It's a 4 part article so read all the parts to get a good appreciation for this aircraft. :thumbup:

 

Hopefully others can chime in with more performance specifics.

[mia389]

surprised charts are using mach and not ias at 15000ft.

[probad]

520kt? m.8 @ 15k is more like ~400kt which is pretty spot on for the f-5.

[BRAVO_16]

Not specific to the F5, but this video gives a good overview on the aspects around corner speed.

 

Edited January 10, 2017 by ZoRPA
*I tried to embed the video but it does not want to.

[flywaldair (Skynet dev.)]

Thanks for your replies!

 

Probab: ok I unterstand. The speed of sound decreases the higher up you go.

 

ZoRPA: Thanks for the vid, it nicely explanes the difference between sustainable and non sustainable corner speed.

 

Sabre-TLA: Thanks the article was an interesting read. I will move on to the MIG-21 once I master the Tiger ;-)