Pilot Rear aspect protection

[=FEW=N3cRoo]

• Rifle calibers are able to penetrate/perform on headrests of FW-190 series and the P-47
• He shells damage wingroots and engine when hitting the rear armor plates aswell as being able to somewhat injure pilots and kill within a couple of shots on the armor
• The whole aspect of pilot damage seems overly gamey and unfeasable for a sim... if you get a penetration of the headrest and shrapnel hits your melon or neck its game over. You can also perfeclty survive a rifleround to the chest or stomach from an unprotected angle and just carry on with your day. I'd heavily advise to have some sort of bleeding mechanic to not always have to kill the pilot outright, hence requiring emergency landing if the pilot gets hit badly. 
• P-47 
• He shells can "perform" on headrests, I hear an argument of spalling ricochet coming up but that is rather limited since substancial spalling would blast the canopy open and its pretty reliable at killing pilots aswell as warm and leather clothing offering protection from bouncing fragments. In case of AP focused 8mm that line of fragmentation is really not an option since those shells will fragment at the plate and therefore really not have any angles to go forward in the canopy

 

Why do i conclude following is the issue ingame

 

I did my testing, all tests where conducted with a full fuelload to get rid of the argument of penetrations being possible through the pilots backrest.

 

The fuellload  was also to prevent from fueltanks exploding like they still did in the P-47, you cannot combust a fueltank effectively when there is only liquid fuel, fuel that is igniting needs gassious fuel in an oxigen environment. A fueltank "explosion" needs a really force distributing in case of an explosive shell or high pressure system for fuelvapour to then ingite. 

 

one of my next test since we had a physics issue with the P-47 here have some AI being my dummy in SP 

 

 

 

What are the expectations of Armor: 

 

The Mg17 would be shooting as a part of the ammobelt SmK  with ~12mm of penertration with direct fire at 90° impace angle for the worst case, which does not include any aircraft skin or glass in the path of the bullet, desingers however where aware of angling armor plates when beneficial and when room allowed for it. Hence the realistic situation for an aircraft is passthrough of aircraft skin or glass/plexiglass required and then na impact (ger: indirekter beschuss) with much lower penetration of 4mm @100m according to my source.

https://www.lexpev.nl/downloads/handbuchderflugzeugbordwaffenmunition19361945.pdf page 45 cover the Smk with direct and indirect aswell as impact angles

 

Note: i acknowledge we have a bit of angle reduction due to the aircraft not being in flying attitude

 

with an angled armor plate of the Fw series of 12mm aswell as an angle even in the worst case scenerio the should be able to hold up even with pretty much the worst case senecario.

Its a german design, they defenitely made use of their assets, even in the unlikely even of direct fire the tested A-8 should hold up against the rifle rounds yet it doesnt.

As a note on the fueltank penetration given the attitude of the aircraft this seems to be feasable as long as there is no substancial covering the the top of the tank present

 

The P-47 has a 10mm angled plate and the US had their own 30-06 cartridge and had a copy of the mauser as the bolt action ... hence surely did their homework as NACA very often did. For this I',m going to reference greg and leave on the note that those 10mm on the unliekly event of direct fire look sketchy but rolled armor was manufactured with a positive tolerance on thickness.... by now you probably saw what the other problem with the P-47 was. 

 

The spitfires pilot armor seems to be the weakest of them all and I'll just include for the sake of completion. It should not be expected to hold up thicknesses and layout are page 41-42 aswell as multiple hints at those not holding up to 7.92 Ap bullets

https://forums.eagle.ru/attachment.php?attachmentid=189415&d=1531028358

 

Aside from the 8mm the 20mm canon seems to be able to kill pilots with He shells reliably in the 109s when striking the rear

 

I also happen to have footage where I'm 95% sure an He shell landed the killing blow in MP aswell as messed my wing up

 

I didnt aim to test this one thoroughly but i had experieced HE behaving unexpected in the past aswell done testing of He shells on pilots that proved very unsatisfactory with even 30mm and 37mm He shells in or around the cockpit not proving lethal. If you want a short clip take this one here and the link to the thread. (to those arguying MP is unreliable ... that footage is SP)

 

 

 

Another problem with the HE shell is it damages parts like engine and wingroots quite often when hitting the rear armor sections. which should be limited to impossible depending on proximity to the plate.

Odd the AP shell itself seems fine yet the bouncing on the engine not being taken out or bounced the few uninteded shots on cowling.

 

 

As a sidenode ... please also have a gander at the fueltank "explosion" mechanic, its looks rather erratic and often times the fire is not rendered. A nicely visible deflagration would be much more appreciated and matching with guncamera footage.

 

Greetings

[E69_geramos109]

How about 50cal penetrating the armor? Do you have tests and info?

 

I find now the 50 cal very deadly now on the game.  80% of my planes killed when I fly P40, P47, are pilot killed. The armor on the 190 should be not enought I guess to hold an impact of the 50cal but what about the 109 with the 60mm glass? On the rear the 109s had also a sandwich plate of 20+ mm, the fuel tank, and other 8mm plate on the seat. If there is mw50 as well there is other tank there as well that provides some protection. So I see that a 50 is unlikelly to penetrate everything from 6. 

[=FEW=N3cRoo]

I haven't done deliberate testing on .50 cals as designs did intend on making it "resistant" against under some conditions, with the guns accuracy being quite bad aswell as the headrest of those planes thin enough to be penetrated easily by a direct hit I didnt go into it. The water is muddled here when receiving in MP a bit  by not being sure excatly what hit where and what gun actually did the kill.

 

I've seen cases where i scratched my head, but i have no defenitive answer on that as its situational aswell as competing with other issues i could confirm.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksA7bh1Q6h0

Edited April 15, 2019 by =FEW=N3croo
typo

[E69_geramos109]

Notice as well that the MG light shells should not penetrate the first armor plate on the 109 that is on the rear of the fuel tank. That plate has 23mm 

[Dakpilot]

Is that the aluminium armour? I understood it was more protection against incendiary rounds

 

Cheers, Dakpilot 

[=FEW=N3cRoo]

This is the F-4 ... its dural "Behälterpanzerung"  would degrade unlike solid plate. The pilots protection of the 109s seemed fine against rifles but those fueltanks happenings look weird.

 

https://youtu.be/xJTyu2GLwPw?t=55

 

wanna have a single round of 8mm poke the fuel and kill the engine from the rear?

 

[=FEW=N3cRoo]

But on the last i suspect this may have happened, keep in mind at 300m the bullet would have started arching too and the F-4 we tested had no front armored glass, still weird that it said fueltank damage and that a hell of an angle if it passed through the cockpit and missed the armament. when the 20mm actually bounced on a few occasions on the cowlings

Edited April 15, 2019 by =FEW=N3croo
clarified

[E69_geramos109]

I think the F4 has not the 23mm duraluminium plate. Just 6mm behind the fuel tank and the 8mm on the seat. Anyway to hit the fuel tank and the engine with a rifle caliber on this angle.... is just not possible 

[PainGod85]

4 minutes ago, E69_geramos109 said:

I think the F4 has not the 23mm duraluminium plate. Just 6mm behind the fuel tank and the 8mm on the seat. Anyway to hit the fuel tank and the engine with a rifle caliber on this angle.... is just not possible 

 

It's not just that they're not in line with each other, a full fuel tank is the end of the line for any rifle caliber round and for a good portion of the larger calibers, too. It will not exit a full tank.

[Dakpilot]

2 hours ago, E69_geramos109 said:

Notice as well that the MG light shells should not penetrate the first armor plate on the 109 that is on the rear of the fuel tank. That plate has 23mm 

 

I am still confused. Do you feel rifle calibre bullets should not be able to penetrate  23mm duralumin? 

 

Cheers, Dakpilot 

[E69_geramos109]

I am trying to find this report. Vulnerability of 109F to attack from .303, 50 cal, 20mm ball and 20mm HEI" report from March 1943.

1 hour ago, Dakpilot said:

 

I am still confused. Do you feel rifle calibre bullets should not be able to penetrate  23mm duralumin? 

 

Cheers, Dakpilot 

What is the equivalent on mm of Durallumin VS steel?

[=FEW=N3cRoo]

all i can give you about the dural sheet metal performance is this, its more detailed on the mechanics not spefici to the 109s 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/mzkvkd8wc64c3w8/Vorg--nge-beim-Beschu---von-Panzerplatten-Bericht-166-Lilienthalgesellschaft-1943.pdf?dl=0

 

sth incomplete where i cannot tell you what the name of the original source is 

 

 

[E69_geramos109]

@Dakpilot There you have the answer. The rifle ammo and the Explossive ammo will not penetrate the dural. So no fuel tank leaks or fires.