Maybe I am just dumb or something, but sometimes I feel the P-51s, especially the P-51Ds are a bit off in the way they fly. I have flown Yaks, Spits and Zeros, and all I have studied footage of P-51s flying, and something feels off. When I fly the P-51, it seems extremely unstable and hard to control, unlike other planes. Please feel free to prove me wrong, or just say your ideas. :)
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Any particular block of P-51D?
I know that the early P-51D-5 is absolutely terrible in rudder and high-speed control for dogfights, but the later P-51D-20 and D-30 all have improved handling and flight performance onwards.
Can’t say much for the premium/Wetmore’s ace pack P-51D-10, since those are hidden and I do not own them.
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The D-20-NA has the lower WEP power like the D-5, but has the improved vertical stabilizer.
The D-10 (Wetmore) has higher WEP power and the improved vertical stabilizer.
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The P-51s got crappy rudders. The Ds in particular are garbage.
They don’t really compress well and are less maneuverable at high speeds. Still good in dive though due to the decent airframe, just don’t expect a good high speed dogfight. So just boom n zoom and only turn fight when u have to at low speed and u shouldn’t have an issue
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well that might be the problem, u are used to flying a turn fighter and this might be ur first time flying a heavy plane? Thats my guess. P51’s are rather heavy and u describe it as:
at low/stall speed they kinda wobble a lot and refuse to turn cuz, like i said, they are heavy. U just gotta learn how to energy fight and boom and zoom with them. A slow P51 is a dead P51
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I actually flew the P-51s more than the rest, and I actually main the P-51, I just don’t like how the P-51 flies compared to other planes. But I find myself struggling with energy fighting.
Everytime I dive on my target in BNZ, I always get the rudder lock up and my aim will lock too.
The predicament the P-51 (and its family, more or less) has in War Thunder ARB is that they were designed with the historical principle of what would be starting high in the air at match start (which pretty much never happens, air spawns not counting). So the times you can confidently engage anyone without waiting three minutes of climb aren’t particularly optimal for the airplane and it can feel like it’s being rubber-banded around the air horribly. But for what it is (similar to its radial‑engined, brick-like brother, the P-47), it can surely dive and build up speed quite fast but just make sure the dive doesn’t have you locking up your control surfaces, which only really happens around the 800 km/h mark for most P-51s (except one that does so at around 700) and while you’re doing that you can pull quite the nasty turns.
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Warthunder’s P-51s are a bit weird compared to Il2.
However, how much fuel are you taking?
Additionally, P-51s don’t like being slow. They’re wobbly at low speeds. Laminar flow wing doesn’t like low speed. This is true in both WT Full real controls and Il2:Great battles.
Fuel-wise, I’ve no idea where the breakpoint is in Warthunder. For Il2:GB, it’s at 68% fuel where the rear tank is fully empty and 75% fuel where you’re safe to do maneuvers.
Also the instructor/mouse aim imo can’t fly mustangs well. Flying the Mustang Mk Ia in ARB vs ASB is night and day imo.
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the P-51s have some wonky aspects to their flight model. However i dont find them hard to control or use at all, they feel almost as good as spitfires (sacrifice some turn for a lot more speed).
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