TEST: are German fighters too tough?

[PL_Harpoon]

TL;DR No, but their machine guns are possibly a bit too powerful (though that's up for debate). Below is the proof.

 

To find out I performed a series of semi-scientific tests. I've set up a mission where I'm shooting at an AI fighter flying straight and level.
The test parameters were:
I'll be matching each weapon type of each fighter against every fighter. This later turned out to be unnecessary. I'll explain why below.
I'll perform 5 tests per match. This is to rule out a lucky shot or unlucky hits.
I'll be shooting from behind, at convergence or from a distance of about 1000 feet so that the maximum number of bullets shot would hit the target.
The AI plane will be flying straight and level to make sure aiming isn't an issue.

 

The theory was: if the German planes are tougher than Alliance ones they will require more hits from the same weapons.

 

First I tested all aircraft against P-51s 6 .50 cals.
Results: a short burst was enough for every aircraft to either be destroyed or damaged enough to force a crash landing. The toughest aircraft were the P-47 and FW-190 A8 (both were in most cases damaged and forced to land).

 

Then I decided to test out how additional 2 .50 cals of P-47 affect the performance. So I did 5 tests agains Fw-190 A8.
Results: a short burst was enough to destroy the aircraft every time.

 

Then I tested the Spitfire. Since it has 2 different weapon types I decided to test each one separately.
First I started with machineguns.
Results: As expected, they're weak. It's difficult to kill with those weapons. This had one benefit though - it made it easy to compare the toughness of each aircraft.
The P-47 was the toughest one (each time emptied full mags, didn't even manage to force a landing). 
Then the Fw-190A8 (1 damaged, 1 destroyed).
Then P-51 (mixed results of damaged and survived).
Then the Spit, Bf-109 and Fw-190D9 (mixed results of damaged and destroyed).
The I-16 was the easiest to kill (engine stopped after a short burst on each test).

 

At this point I was able to determine that the German fighters are not tougher than Allied ones. Still, I decided to continue the tests to see how different weapons compare to each other.

 

So I tested the Hispanos. 
Results: a very powerful weapon, possibly on the same level as 8x .50 cals (although more difficult to aim). Also an interesting discovery: the aiming point of the Hispanos is just below the center of the reticle. This could result in many misses when fired together with the machineguns.
I started with the P-51 (all destroyed) but then decided to try how they fare against the P-47 since it's the toughest aircraft. All 5 tests ended up with the Thunderbolt destroyed after just a few hits.

Then, just to be sure I tested it against all German fighters. The results were very consistent - all destroyed after just a few hits.

 

After that I tested the Bf-109's machineguns.
Results: I was surprised by how effective they are. Even the P-47 was destroyed every time after a quick burst. 2x MG-131s are almost as powerful as Mustang's 6 M2s. I'm guessing they'd be as effective as 4x .50 cals but there's no way to test this in DCS.

 

Then came the time for the 109's big 30mm.
Result: As expected - everything (tested against the P-51 and P-47) torn to shreds, mostly after a single hit. The Thunderbolt managed to survive the first hit a few times but it was still heavily damaged.

 

At last, just to be sure, I tested the Fw-109D9's machineguns and cannons (against the P-47).
Results: Machineguns worked just like in the 109, cannons worked just like the Spit's Hispanos.

I don't own the Fw-190A8 or the I-16 so couldn't test those.

 

Here is a google drive link to tracks and Tacview files:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/17kGX2JBw4O4V4IAU6EhT19yF6nKHiaw-?usp=sharing

 

Cheers!

Edited May 16, 2021 by PL_Harpoon

[Mogster]

The Mg131 has a faster fire rate than the Browning M2 and can fire HEI ammo.

[rkk01]

I find that the Anton’s guns deliver a very destructive punch - probably a combo of the weight of fire, nose mounted MGs and the Anton being a very stable gun platform...

 

I’m constantly amazed at the Anton’s ability to destroy small ground targets at a far higher range that you would open fire on an air target - and it sure isn’t my flying skills.

 

I suspect it is easy to overlook the German fighters’ ability to put a stream of hurt onto a target with those nose mounted MGs, and with the 109, the nose mounted cannon

[Bozon]

The allied planes suffer from convergence that is set too far out for air combat. For air combat the effective ranges are 200-300 yards, while the wing mounted guns seem to converge much father out, maybe 1000 yards. The latter is fine for ground strafing but makes 200-300 yards shot much less effective since your right-wing guns and left-wing guns hit wide apart, especially in the P47 due to the distance between its right and left guns.

 

The above does not explain the lethality of the MG131s. They are in the nose, but still only 2 of them and they lose ROF to the synchronization with the prop.

 

I wait for the Mosquito 4 hispanos + 4 303s  all nose mounted and no prop in the way to slow them down...

[PL_Harpoon]

34 minutes ago, Bozon said:

The allied planes suffer from convergence that is set too far out for air combat. For air combat the effective ranges are 200-300 yards, while the wing mounted guns seem to converge much father out, maybe 1000 yards. The latter is fine for ground strafing but makes 200-300 yards shot much less effective since your right-wing guns and left-wing guns hit wide apart, especially in the P47 due to the distance between its right and left guns.

 

The above does not explain the lethality of the MG131s. They are in the nose, but still only 2 of them and they lose ROF to the synchronization with the prop.

 

I wait for the Mosquito 4 hispanos + 4 303s  all nose mounted and no prop in the way to slow them down...

 

Not true.

 

The convergence for the allied fighters are:

1000ft/330yd for the P-51 and P-47:

900ft/300yd for the Spitfire

[Mogster]

58 minutes ago, Bozon said:

The allied planes suffer from convergence that is set too far out for air combat. For air combat the effective ranges are 200-300 yards, while the wing mounted guns seem to converge much father out, maybe 1000 yards. The latter is fine for ground strafing but makes 200-300 yards shot much less effective since your right-wing guns and left-wing guns hit wide apart, especially in the P47 due to the distance between its right and left guns.

 

The above does not explain the lethality of the MG131s. They are in the nose, but still only 2 of them and they lose ROF to the synchronization with the prop.

 

I wait for the Mosquito 4 hispanos + 4 303s  all nose mounted and no prop in the way to slow them down...

The German Mg131 had electrical ammo priming to keep a high rate of fire even when synchronised.

[PL_Harpoon]

I did some calculations regarding the MG131s.

 

First of all, gun synchronizations shouldn't be an issue. Even at idle the rpm is around 1400 (during flight at normal speed). With the engine's reduction ratio of 0.594:1 the prop rpm would be around 830 rpm. Considering it's a 3-bladed prop, for each resolution there are 3 safe prop positions to fire. That'd give us 2490 correct prop positions per minute, which is way more than MG131s 900 rounds per minute. There might be slight delays in rpm but it's negligible. 

 

However...

The M2 rate of fire isn't much lower at 800 rpm. 

 

So I made this simple calculation in Excel to see how powerful the MG131 round must be for the Bf-109 to have the same damage output as the P-51:

 

Aircraft / weapon	rps (rpm/60)	guns	hits per sec (all guns)	damage per bullet	dps (single gun)	dps (all guns)
BF-109 / MG131	15	2	30	2,7	40,5	81
P51 / M2 ,50	13,33	6	80	1	13,3	80

 

 

As you can see, the MG131 hit would have to be 2.7 times more effective than .50 cal to have the same effect.

 

Now, in my tests I found out that 2xMG131 are not as effective as 6x .50 but they're pretty close.

Also, there is a clear difference in type of damage:

MG131 ammo does damage where it hits.

.50 ammo has much greater chance of penetrating the airframe and damaging the engine or setting a fuel tank on fire.

 

Even so, to be only slightly less effective the single hit from the MG131 has to be at least twice as powerful as a hit from .50cal and I'm not sure that's correct.

 

[Bozon]

2 hours ago, Mogster said:

The German Mg131 had electrical ammo priming to keep a high rate of fire even when synchronised.

I don’t understand what is this electrical ammo priming?

AFAIK the synchronization prevents the guns from firing at certain prop positions, otherwise the gun is firing at its max rate. If it occasionally delays a discharge the gun can never fire at its maximum rate.

[Lynchsl62]

This article may help some of the discussion. My thoughts are the MG131 are over powered in DCS based on their ability to damage even medium size planes such as the A-20

 

http://users.skynet.be/Emmanuel.Gustin/fgun/fgun-pe.html

 

[Mogster]

16 minutes ago, Bozon said:

I don’t understand what is this electrical ammo priming?

AFAIK the synchronization prevents the guns from firing at certain prop positions, otherwise the gun is firing at its max rate. If it occasionally delays a discharge the gun can never fire at its maximum rate.

It seems the electrical system added heat to the primer which responding pretty much instantly by firing the propellant.  The Mg131 had no firing pin even, rounds avoided the prop very accurately maintaining the firing rate of 900+rpm.

[Mogster]

                                                  “WORLD WAR 2 FIGHTER ARMAMENT EFFECTIVENESS”

© Anthony G Williams & Emmanuel Gustin (with acknowledgements to Henning Ruch)

 

 

                                                       https://quarryhs.co.uk/WW2guneffect.htm

Edited May 17, 2021 by Mogster

[rkk01]

5 hours ago, Mogster said:

                                                  “WORLD WAR 2 FIGHTER ARMAMENT EFFECTIVENESS”

© Anthony G Williams & Emmanuel Gustin (with acknowledgements to Henning Ruch)

 

 

                                                       https://quarryhs.co.uk/WW2guneffect.htm

 

Fascinating paper...

 

... especially the way each Air Force up-gunned their craft as the war progressed. Spit V marked a clear step change, as did the Gustav for the Luftwaffe.

 

also interesting that the US position of sticking with 6-8 50 cals tied them in to a weaker position in terms of firepower - but of course, it was “No. of aircraft fielded” that made the difference

[amazingme]

 What about collision damage? I noticed that the Spitfire can put up some acrobatics when it smacks into the ground and nothing happens to it.. whereas the 109 explodes when it touches a tree leaf.. I think the collision damage is as important as the damage model and should be also tackled by ED.

[Mogster]

7 hours ago, rkk01 said:

Fascinating paper...

 

... especially the way each Air Force up-gunned their craft as the war progressed. Spit V marked a clear step change, as did the Gustav for the Luftwaffe.

 

also interesting that the US position of sticking with 6-8 50 cals tied them in to a weaker position in terms of firepower - but of course, it was “No. of aircraft fielded” that made the difference

They admit some of the calculations are a bit arbitrary but there’s a lot of  interesting stuff non the less.

 

The “power” of the Hispano is extraordinary. From their calculations 4 Hispanos provide similar hitting power to 12 .50 M2s and the 4 Hispanos are lighter...

 

Then there’s the Mk108...

Edited May 18, 2021 by Mogster

[Lynchsl62]

Interesting review as to why the USA 0.50 cal were the best solution for the USA versus the European solution of cannons. It was more than good enough for the task in hand and combined with superb training won the war over Germany and the Pacific. The USA did try them in the F4U but it was poor reliability due to lack of development that was the reason for their lack of success. Possibly the USA had ignored the canons for too long 

 

https://youtu.be/AQS6Ub5ekFE

 

[PL_Harpoon]

17 hours ago, Lynchsl62 said:

This article may help some of the discussion. My thoughts are the MG131 are over powered in DCS based on their ability to damage even medium size planes such as the A-20

 

http://users.skynet.be/Emmanuel.Gustin/fgun/fgun-pe.html

 

 

14 hours ago, Mogster said:

                                                  “WORLD WAR 2 FIGHTER ARMAMENT EFFECTIVENESS”

© Anthony G Williams & Emmanuel Gustin (with acknowledgements to Henning Ruch)

 

 

                                                       https://quarryhs.co.uk/WW2guneffect.htm

 

Interesting. Both of those articles seem to suggest that the 13mm bullet of MG131 was actually less effective than the M2's 50.cal.

 

Then there is this post: https://ww2aircraft.net/forum/threads/ww2-german-13mm-cartridge-mg131-vs-usa-50-cal-cartridge-browning-m2-damage.51419/#post-1484323

Quote

From British testing (1940):

Fuze sensitivity.--The fuze functions on 0.028 inch duraluminum, and the incendiary type ignited petrol in trade petrol tins placed 2 feet behind (one round only). When, however, a mild steel sheet of 0.045 inch was placed between the burster (duralumin) and the petrol, no ignition occurred (one round only).
During the taking of velocities three fuzes functioned on the card.
It would appear from the small number of rounds fired that the fuze is too sensitive to be effective.
If further supplies of this ammunition come to hand, care will be taken to watch for development of the fuze to render it less sensitive.

From later (1943) tests on 13mm & 15mm ammunition:

No new features of special interest appear in this report. The fuzes of both calibres are more sensitive than is considered desirable for attack of aircraft.

Although there are no sources to check so it'd difficult to confirm.