F-5E's AOA capability is too low.

[nairb121]

The F-5E in DCS, when clean, has an angle of attack at full aft stick of approximately 21° when gun ammunition is loaded, and approximately 25° when the guns are empty. Based on the public sources I've found, these are too low; capability should be approximately 30° (presumably with guns empty).

The paper here https://arc.aiaa.org/doi/10.2514/3.45660 concerns the departure characteristics of the F-5E and the means by which an impending departure could be detected and the pilot warned. This section (found at the top of the second page) states that pitch acceleration follows stick position up to about 30 degrees, at which point further pitch up is prevented by the aircraft's aerodynamic stability.

Fig. 7 also supports this - it shows time history of various flight parameters during an extended full-aft stick stall. The angle of attack can be seen as approximately 30 degrees for the majority of the time, further increasing to 40 degrees at the onset of post-stall gyration. (It should also be noted that the DCS F-5E shows little tendency toward PSG in this regime)

An additional source for the F-5E's AOA capabilities is this NASA report regarding the development of the "shark nose" used in the F-5E and F-5F. https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/19790001876/downloads/19790001876.pdf . This report mostly concerns the F-5F, but also includes some F-5E data. Figure 6 shows flight data for 1g power-off stalls for the F-5E - the charts are more difficult to read, but they do show similar AOA tendencies of 30 degrees at full aft stick, and up to 40 degrees upon departure.

I've attached a track in DCS attempting to replicate these tests by performing an extended wings-level 1g stall with guns unloaded. Upon full application of aft stick, the AOA remains between 25-26°, never approaching 30.

F-5 1g stall test.trk

Edit: I didn't realize the first document linked was incomplete; a full version is attached.

F-5E_Depature_Warning_System2.pdf

Edited April 2 by nairb121

[f-18hornet]

Reported.