Cannon equipped Hurricane in a Russian Campaign?

[Blitzen]

For some time now I have been flying a 303 equipped Hurricane in a Moscow Winter campaign. It "features" long flights over snow from Moscow to the front, often escorting bombers, only to meet superior numbers of superior 109's far from home.If this wasn't enough my 303's are about as effective against the Nazi gangsters , the 303 's are about as effective as throwing pebbles at them, whereas their cannon's a are pretty devastating, leading to death, forced landings at forward airfields or very long smoking flights back to Moscow. So....may I ask are their campaigns , perhaps on a different map in which I can fly my beloved Hurri with Hispano's? Your suggestions greatly appreciated & I'll bury this very frustrating career  under the frozen steppes...

[LukeFF]

Stalingrad

[Blitzen]

Ah.... sunny Stalingrad, here I come...

[Dragon1-1]

The 303s seem to be best used for deflection shooting, and they need good marksmanship skills to hit anything important. I've managed to kill a 109 using only MGs in the Spitfite, and it involved setting the convergence to 140m (150yd, the shortest the sight will go) and getting a lot of good hits over a period of time. I don't have the Hurricane, but I imagine fighting 109s armed only with those peashooters isn't the easiest thing to do.

[jollyjack]

For me a Hurricane in Cliffs seems 'better' than in IL2.  This tutorial is done with a spit:

 

Atached a QMB generated test, i got the bastard after 3 run around hits ..

 

QMB generated.zip

[Finkeren]

The. 303s are pretty good at one thing: puncturing coolant tanks. As soon as you see that thick white smoke, you can disengage, because you have put your oppoment on s timer, and they will shortly head home. Often they will make it home, and you won't get a kill, but you have still done your job. 

[jollyjack]

9 minutes ago, Finkeren said:

The. 303s are pretty good at one thing: puncturing coolant tanks. As soon as you see that thick white smoke, you can disengage, because you have put your oppoment on s timer, and they will shortly head home. Often they will make it home, and you won't get a kill, but you have still done your job. 

 

Ah, that's what happened in the above mission  at first, but that 109 blew up too after another round.

[Blitzen]

1 hour ago, jollyjack said:

For me a Hurricane in Cliffs seems 'better' than in IL2.  This tutorial is done with a spit:

I've found this to be true too, but accuracy of AI gunners is remarkable in both sims during 6O'clock stern attacks?

[Jaegermeister]

PKs are effective with the .303s. It doesn't help a lot from a stern attack, but aim for the cockpit, get around the armor plate, and they work fine.

[Diggun]

They start fires pretty nicely too, as noted above, deflection shooting is key with the. 303's. If you can get in a good, angled burst you can do critical damage. It won't put your target down instantly, but often, as the combat reports say, 'driven down trailing smoke'... 

[twilson37]

I love flying the Hurricane, it is such a simple, stable airplane to fly. The 303s are not the most powerful guns in an aircraft so shot placement is the key, sometimes the worst place to be against a 109 is on his six because you can pump hundreds of rounds into his fuselage and hit nothing vital but if you get him to turn you open up deflection shots to the engine or pilot, luckily the AI usually obliges. Stalingrad does allow you to fly the Hurricane with 2 .50s and 2-20mm(wish it had a gun selector switch) but it is a very short campaign, like 10 missions before the Hurricane is withdrawn.

[RyanR]

IIRC, Stalingrad gives you the 2x UB and 2x ShVAK, which is a crazy potent armament.

 

Sadly (for the AI), the AI often takes the bait and will try to make you overshoot.... which it can't! The only drawback with the Hurricane is to resist the temptation to pull big G's, as you'll soon exhaust your stamina. 

 

I really like the Hurricane as modeled here. So much more stable than the early Spitfire. Sadly, you've got to get in the Hurricane while you can.

 

-Ryan

[Blitzen]

On 4/9/2021 at 5:49 AM, Jaegermeister said:

PKs are effective with the .303s. It doesn't help a lot from a stern attack, but aim for the cockpit, get around the armor plate, and they work fine.

That pesky "Mess-o-Messerschmits" just won't stay still enough to get those kind of shots!!!