Spitfire Mk IX Cut-off control?

[SvAF/F16_Dark_P]

Hi i finaly got Bodenplatte on Steam and i have realy enyoyed it in particualar the spit 9, but i have a question..

 

I tried to search the forum and the patch notes but cant find anything...

 

Why was the cut-off control, or mixture lever removed? I have seen it in the game in youtube videos, but when i loaded my Spit it was gone...  

 

If i understand it right early Bendix Stromberg carbs did not have it, but then the cut-out was operated by the slow running cut-out, but that one is not modeled in the cockpit either, it should be a ring just under the brake pressure guage.

 

This is not a biggie but it looks wierd for a otherwise detailed game, and i like to stop the engine with it for the immeraion ?

 

But if someone knows more about the spit please enlighten me!

 

Best regards.

Edited December 8, 2019 by Dark_P

[RNAS10_Oliver]

Quote

Why was the cut-off control, or mixture lever removed? I have seen it in the game in youtube videos, but when i loaded my Spit it was gone... 

 

Edited December 8, 2019 by Oliver88

[SvAF/F16_Dark_P]

OK thank you but it does not say why it was removed, if it is suposed to be the older carb type without the throttle lever, it sould have the "slow cut-off" ring instead....

Look at the pick below

Regards.

Edited December 8, 2019 by Dark_P

[Sokol1]

2 hours ago, Dark_P said:

This is not a biggie but it looks wierd for a otherwise detailed game, and i like to stop the engine with it for the immeraion 

 

You are missing this:

 

Player are no allowed to manipulate any controls during engine start-up and shutdown, to to just press "E" key or a joy button if you remap.

[SvAF/F16_Dark_P]

But you can kill engines with the mixture on several other airplanes, it works on the P-39 for example

[LukeFF]

The mixture lever for the Spitfire IX had been removed by the time the game's timeline starts in September 1944. There's a document out there detailing it that I'm sure someone will link to soon enough.

[Stoopy]

It isn't 1C's doing.  The virtual mechanics removed the mixture cutoff control because they got tired of having to calibrate it due to abuse by ham-handed pilots... and who can blame them, have you ever had to adjust an English carburetor?  Some of those Zenith-Stromberg setups will drive you nuts!!!!

[EAF19_Marsh]

My MG has a mixture control... 

[ZachariasX]

1 hour ago, Dark_P said:

OK thank you but it does not say why it was removed, if it is suposed to be the older carb type without the throttle lever, it sould have the "slow cut-off" ring instead....

Merlin 66, 70 and 266 engines with the late Bendix-Stromberg carburettor have the lever to turn off the engine, it is only on early Stromberg carburettor engines (Merlin 61, 63) that this is done by pulling back on that ring.

 

See Spitfire Pilot's Notes for Spitfire IX, XI & XVI

[LukeFF]

13 hours ago, LukeFF said:

The mixture lever for the Spitfire IX had been removed by the time the game's timeline starts in September 1944. There's a document out there detailing it that I'm sure someone will link to soon enough.

 

Ok, here we go. Paragraph 11:

 

[Art-J]

Thanks Luke, although that page doesn't explain how the engine with such a mod was started and stopped. Does anyone have another page from that leaflet which explains it?

[ZachariasX]

3 minutes ago, Art-J said:

Thanks Luke, although that page doesn't explain how the engine with such a mod was started and stopped. Does anyone have another page from that leaflet which explains it?

To start it, just have the lever in the "run" position (or don't touch the ring). Just prime, put on booster pump, mags, coils, and starter, maybe pump with the hand pump and the engine runs. You only need this lever/ring for stopping. If you sit where you want to stop, go fully idle then move the lever to "cut out" or pull the ring, and the engine will slowly cut out. That's all.

[Art-J]

Zach, with all due respect, you seem to be getting into confused/off-topic mode whenever You try to help in this thread ?. First You tried to explain the original poster things he actually acknowledged in his very first post and thus didn't need to be explained (while not answering the main question he asked); now you're writing me about the lever and the ring while we're clearly discussing the quadrant layout without lever and the ring :P.

 

To rephrase OP's and my the question - if Merlin 66/70 engines we have in BoX Spit did not use the ring, but used the lever, and at the same time this very lever was removed in late '44 according to the document Luke posted above, what device in cockpit was used by the pilot to inject/cut off the fuel mixture then?

[SvAF/F16_Dark_P]

After reading the pilots notes this is how  i understand it.

 

The document Luke posted just says that there is no mixture control and that is correct, but i am talking about the cut-off lever or slow runnig cut-out. That was not removed!

 

In the the game the lever acts like a mixture control but irl it is not.

 

They should not have removed the lever if the airplane uses the new Bendix Stromberg carbs.

If the plane uses the early carbs the ring was used. So they need to put back the lever or add the ring.

 

My pilots notes is from 1946

Edited December 9, 2019 by Dark_P

[ZachariasX]

4 hours ago, Art-J said:

Zach, with all due respect, you seem to be getting into confused/off-topic mode whenever You try to help in this thread ?.

Seems like it. Sorry for that.

 

54 minutes ago, Dark_P said:

In the the game the lever acts like a mixture control but irl it is not.

Indeed. So I think see you're problem now. Mistaking what is the mixture selector in the Mk.V for a misture selector in the Mk.IX, when in fact that is now effectively an engine shut off lever. AFAIR, those levers supposedly/allegedly have some gradual fuction. (Or at least I've read something about this somewhere in here.) Like a shut-off valve that you can open or clase gradually between "open" and "shut", meaning you can have the valve set that it is "half open".

 

I think, no I am sure, but I think that is wrong use uf such a lever (especially selecting intermediates between "auto-rich" and "auto lean"), although in the game it can function like that. This means you can use that little shut off lever present in our Spitfire (it should be there, it is a Merlin 66 or 70, the ring should not be there) in the game to lean the mixture, but you will never ever do that in a real aircraft.

 

It s fair to say that apart from power output (and maybe some more heat produced by leaning), the effect of leaning is simply absent in our sim, inviting all kind of stupidities.

 

In the real aircraft, both the ring and the lever are EXCLUSIVELY used to shut down the engine. In game, you can up your planes mileage when playing with that. It also kills the smoke trails at full power while giving a more powerful mixture ("rich-rich" gives you less power than "rich").

 

You can use this also in the Lightning. Go 48% mixture and it will not produce smoke at max. power, but it will give you all the performance you want, unpunished. This is gaming the game.

 

So this probably explains your confusion here:

4 hours ago, Art-J said:

if Merlin 66/70 engines we have in BoX Spit did not use the ring, but used the lever, and at the same time this very lever was removed in late '44 according to the document Luke posted above, what device in cockpit was used by the pilot to inject/cut off the fuel mixture then?

As Dark_P said above, our Spitfire IX has no mixture lever. What you take as mixture lever in the shut off lever that you ca use in the game as an override to reduce fuel flow, hence it acts as a mixture control.

 

There are in fact cases where there are other positions than "auto rich" and "auto lean" on a mixture quadrant even when mixture is indeed (as it says) automatic. You have this in airliners of the 40's and 50's. There, you have sector BEHIND "auto lean", where you can further lean out the engine below auto lean, to compensate for high altitude and just milk out the last mile from your engines by carefully cosidering engine torque 8we have no torque meters in our aircraft) and temps while further leaning out. This has no business whatsoever in the planes we have in game.

 

[AndytotheD]

The lever is there though? You can see it in the throttle quadrant. In addition, it works, it’s just on or off. You don’t get to control it in game. My understanding was that there was no fine control of mixture through this lever, the carb handled that, so when you started the engine you simply threw the lever into “run” and left it there until you turned the engine off.

Edited December 9, 2019 by AndytotheD

[SvAF/F16_Dark_P]

Nope they removed it... i made a picture so you can see

EDIT: Yes i have moved the throttle and it is not hiding behind, and it is not there with the gyro gunsight either.

Edited December 9, 2019 by Dark_P

[DD_fruitbat]

Since we don't have clickable cockpits, isn't this largely irrelevant, or am i missing something, granted i only skim read this thread.

[SvAF/F16_Dark_P]

Sure it have no function in the game, but there are alot of things in the cockpits that have no funktion in the game like radios and deicers and whatnot.

But it should be there in the cockpit!, it was there before so why remove it?

[ZachariasX]

Heavens, they indeed removed the lever with the last patch. It should be there.

26 minutes ago, Dark_P said:

But it should be there in the cockpit!, it was there before so why remove it?

Absolutely. It should be there.

 

There should be a visible action to that lever when shutting off the engine with "e". As the shutdown procedure is automatic, there should be no function to be mapped for the player (as things are now). Before (until very recently), the lever was present and it was indeed mapped on the mixture axis. No more getting rid of the smoke trail in the Spit.

 

Apologies, this is a game changer.

[HBPencil]

Good spotting @Dark_P. Until recently there was an issue with the operation of the MkIX's undercarriage lever which I believe stemmed from a misinterpretation of the pilot's notes, which may also be the case here.

[SvAF/F16_Dark_P]

Maybe a mod should move my thread to bug reports for a review?

[LukeFF]

4 minutes ago, Dark_P said:

Maybe a mod should move my thread to bug reports for a review?

 

I've made a report in the beta testing forum.

[Jade_Monkey]

It's only gone with the 150 Oct fuel, and still there without it ( or vice versa, can't remember)

[AndytotheD]

3 hours ago, Dark_P said:

Nope they removed it... i made a picture so you can see

EDIT: Yes i have moved the throttle and it is not hiding behind, and it is not there with the gyro gunsight either.

Oh darn, I hadn’t seen that it was actually gone. Good eye.

[SvAF/F16_Dark_P]

38 minutes ago, Jade_Monkey said:

It's only gone with the 150 Oct fuel, and still there without it ( or vice versa, can't remember)

No it is gone with both, i have tested that combo already

[DD_fruitbat]

Merlin 70 engine mod?

[SvAF/F16_Dark_P]

1 hour ago, DD_fruitbat said:

Merlin 70 engine mod?

Yes tried it, it does not matter

[Jade_Monkey]

2 hours ago, Dark_P said:

Yes tried it, it does not matter

 

Yeah, I just tried all three options and none of them have it. I remember someone telling me over MP chat that 150oct had it or was the only one that didnt have it. It doesnt seem to be true.

[Art-J]

I suppose the devs might have misinterpreted the doc Luke posted above then. The doc says there is not "mixture lever" in the quadrant, and that's true. However, the lever which was removed from the 3D cockpit in the BoBP release update was referred to as "idle cutoff control" in those old manuals and handbooks. It's a different thing and I'd hazard a guess it shouldn't be removed after all.

Edited December 10, 2019 by Art-J