I’ve been comparing the stats to some late American piston props lately, and upon discovering the P-51H, I found that most discussions have given it glowing reviews. It is often described as “the best piston fighter in the game”. So I was wondering- why? On paper, the P-51H has average climbing stats, a relatively fragile airframe and engine, and the same 6c .50 cals. It even climbs slower than some P-51D variants, with its best aspect being it’s great level- flight speed. But it seems like naval aircraft like the F8F-1B and F4U-4B are generally easier to play with their 20mm cannons and superior climbing (the F8F-1B also seems to have better lower speeed handling.) so is there anything not on paper that makes it really shine? Thanks.
Don’t trust the statcard. The P-51H climbs with the Yak-3U and Hornet Mk3 and can even outclimb the Ta-152H even though it gets an air spawn. It also turns extremely well for a P-51 keeping up with Yaks and Spitfires at high alt along with an insane top speed, dive performance and ammo count. Imagine the strengths of the F2G and the Spitfire LF Mk9 combined in a single plane.
The F4U-4B doesn’t do anything better than the P-51H other than the guns and is kind of a brick at medium speed. The F8F loses all of its speed after a single turn and the engine starts melting after a few minutes even with MEC.
The Spitfire Mk24 is a little bit worse at almost everything (the guns are better) than the P-51H but sits at 6.7 and has an overheating problem too.
6 Likes
The Spitfire Mk24 is a little bit worse at almost everything (the guns are better) than the P-51H but sits at 6.7 and has an overheating problem too.
All the spitfire’s problems are fixed if you use MEC
MEC is still an inconvenience and can be a disadvantage if you forget to change SC gears during a fight.
Paper stats are very misleading for some reason; you have to test them in game with things like WTRTI. In almost all cases, planes outperform their paper stats, sometimes by a large margin.
Just comparing the P-51H and the F8F-1B since they’re at the same BR:
P-51H climbs better than the F8F-1B at all altitudes above 1000m. The P-51H reaches max climb rate of 30m/s at 1000m while the F8F-1B reaches max climb rate of 29m/s at sea level, and the difference only increases as altitude increases. They also have similar low speed handling, turn time around 16.5s at about 350km/h, and obviously the P-51H does better at high speed since the F8F-1B suffers from control lock up. The only downsides of the P-51H are the limited WEP (generally manageable) and armament (not amazing, but M20 is adequate).
It trades some high altitude performance for better guns and slightly better turn. The main problem I heard was that it gets uptiered with jets too often.
Still overheats on MEC, though slightly delays it allowing you to get to altitude and switch WEP off, if that’s what you mean by “fixed”. And the drag from fully opened radiators noticeably affects performance.
1 Like
Why would you ever fully open your rads. set your prop pitch to 90 and coast along with your rads at 20%
ive personally never run into that issue, but to each their own
Because in the initial climb, you’re not going to have enough speed to keep the radiators at optimal efficiency while you have to keep the engine running at maximum power. Cruising is obviously a different matter.
(i don’t understand any of this)
8 Likes
what i meant by crusing is that you dont really have to adjust it after that. and the easiest way to fix the climbing issue is to just climb at a faster speed, closer to 300kph
Very true. Always test various climb speeds in planes and don’t believe anything the statcard tells. Sometimes the top speed is wrong too (Meteor).
At sea level it’s much slower too and turning at high speed favors the P-51H too doesn’t it?
It’s especially bad when there’s more than 2 SC gears and it will always take away some of your attention leading to mistakes at times.
It’s especially bad when there’s more than 2 SC gears and it will always take away some of your attention leading to mistakes at times.
again, ive just never had this problem, even on planes like the corsair. its not super hard to remeber gear shift alts
I’m not saying it’s hard to do (it is very annoying) but you can’t expect all players to learn SC altitudes.
you dont even have to do that. many planes you can feel the difference fairly easily. take for example the corsairs. you can pretty much automatically shift it into second gear and then only shift it back into firse if your engine cuts out
That’s a lot of altitude you’re losing if you fail the gearswitch and you need every meter you get in the corsair.
most maps you gearswitch off the runway. because first geat is for the deck only
Doesn’t the second gear produce less power than the first below 1km? Why would you switch on the runway?
No it does not. the second gear produces equivalent power at low to medium speeds. the first gear is only really for if you are booking it on the deck, as it allows you to fully use ram air. You can check this in wtrti by looking at manifold pressure and horsepower. the HP is equivalent on the runway, if not slightly higher. In the F4U-4B, by the time you reach 1000 feet, second stage is better then the first. and thats taking off from sea level
paper stats are useless in game, since what actually matters isn’t shown
It’s something a lot of people forget. I did some test flight testing couple weeks ago and I found that while all radial Fw 190s could hit their statcard top speed, the 190 D9 didn’t even get close.