Hurray for the Mosquito!!

[Knarley-Bob]

Just flew my first mission in a Mosquito. I liked it.

Mostly where I live, we swat mosquitos, actually it is our un-official state bird. That plane handles just like a Spitfire, on the ground that is. Kind of like herding cats down the runway. Managed to take off, then 'bout had a heart attack. Who is that creepy looking guy sitting next to me? Wasn't really ready for him, and WHY does he have legs, and I don't? Quiet chap, hope he sings out if spotting a bandit.........

First flight was productive, got four AAA guns, four spotlights, and two trucks. A bit of a rodeo ride after we landed, did I mention it handles like a Spitfire on the ground? Any way,

Cheerio, and Merry Christmas

Knarley........

[Noisemaker]

1 hour ago, Knarley-Bob said:

did I mention it handles like a Spitfire on the ground? Any way,

Cheerio, and Merry Christmas

Knarley........

Lands like a Spitfire, as well, with 2 engines.  She'll happily float you 3 feet above the ground, the entire length of the runway.

[DD_Arthur]

2 hours ago, Knarley-Bob said:

 and WHY does he have legs, and I don’t?

Don’t complain.

At least this way he can’t put his hand on your knee and ask you if you like gladiator movies as your coming in to land….

[Raptorattacker]

3 minutes ago, DD_Arthur said:

Don’t complain.

At least this way he can’t put his hand on your knee and ask you if you like gladiator movies as your coming in to land….

Love it, made me chuckle did that!!

[AndyJWest]

What I don't like about right-seat geezer is the way he holds onto the the pilot's headrest. If you forget it's there, and then turn your head to the right, you jump out of your skin as you get a glimpse of a giant tarantula about to pounce on you... 

[Jaegermeister]

Don't get me started about what kind of music he likes...

[Irishratticus72]

11 hours ago, Knarley-Bob said:

 WHY does he have legs, and I don't?

Someone's been reading Bader's autobiography again.

[Lusekofte]

Mosquito is great. A real survivor of smart. I bomber ran away , came back strafed and ran away. Came back and took a head on attack on a FW 190 twice then went home and landed. What other two engined Gb plane can do that

[BlitzPig_EL]

Well, if you flew a P38 in the same manner you could do it.

[Lusekofte]

3 hours ago, BlitzPig_EL said:

Well, if you flew a P38 in the same manner you could do it.

I might be flyging it wrong. But fw 190 catch up with me in it

[BlitzPig_EL]

Interesting, the Mossie is faster down low than the P38?  

 

*buggers off to look at charts*

[=621=Samikatz]

With 150oct and the exhaust suppressors removed the Mosquito does nearly 370mph at sea level, it's not slow at all

[Lusekofte]

26 minutes ago, BlitzPig_EL said:

Interesting, the Mossie is faster down low than the P38?  

 

*buggers off to look at charts*

I do not know. There are two scenarios:

Either I met a couple of FW 190 with pilots not handeling well their planes while I flew Mosquito, or I can’t handle P 38 well while I met 190 with pilots that could. 
we are talking two or three occasion each. 
I am not the most active pilot 

results are indeed my confidence are better with Mosquito than P 38

Last time I flew P 38 one bullet teared that plane in half. 

Edited December 24, 2022 by Lusekofte

[Irishratticus72]

23 minutes ago, BlitzPig_EL said:

Interesting, the Mossie is faster down low than the P38?  

 

*buggers off to look at charts*

Allisons always got overshadowed by RRs. Criminal!

[JG27*PapaFly]

Not sure about the Mossie. It's roll rate, especially at high speeds,  is in the FW190 realm, which I find implausible for a bomber without hydraulically driven ailerons. I had no difficulty performing 6 g turns and loops,  given sufficient speeds. I know, all bombers display a level of agility which would completely wear out a real pilot in no time at all.  Lately,  I watched a movie showing Steve Hinton at the controls of a TBF Avenger. He repeatedly pointed out how taxing it is to do very moderate aerobatics in that plane due to the stick forces. IMO, having bombers fly like bats out of hell is a real immersion killer.

[Lusekofte]

2 hours ago, JG27_PapaFly said:

Not sure about the Mossie. It's roll rate, especially at high speeds,  is in the FW190 realm, which I find implausible for a bomber without hydraulically driven ailerons. I had no difficulty performing 6 g turns and loops,  given sufficient speeds. I know, all bombers display a level of agility which would completely wear out a real pilot in no time at all.  Lately,  I watched a movie showing Steve Hinton at the controls of a TBF Avenger. He repeatedly pointed out how taxing it is to do very moderate aerobatics in that plane due to the stick forces. IMO, having bombers fly like bats out of hell is a real immersion killer.

There is no game / sim with real boundaries 

[RedeyeStorm]

There are records of Mossies shooting down fighters so no lumbering behemoth. It is more in the realm of the 110 and 410 and an Avenger with three crew and two gun positions is another beast. Mayby even heavier then a Mossie?

[JG27*PapaFly]

5 hours ago, RedeyeStorm said:

There are records of Mossies shooting down fighters so no lumbering behemoth.

That fact only proves that the guns installed in the Mosquito were able to shoot down planes.  It doesn't tell us anything about its dogfighting abilities, and I se a lot of dogfighting Mossies these days.

 

5 hours ago, RedeyeStorm said:

an Avenger with three crew and two gun positions is another beast. Mayby even heavier then a Mossie?

Wikipedia lists following empty weights:

Avenger 4800 kg

Mossie 6500 kg

This disparity grows larger with a full load out (Avenger 8120 kg, Mossie 11340 kg)

Steve flew an empty Avenger, as is usual during air shows.

 

That roll rate at high speeds coming from a 2-engine plane with a span of 16 meters and without hydraulic actuators is very implausible IMO. The BF110 is more in line with what I'd expect from that configuration. High aspect wings with engine nacelles several meters away from the CG have a lot of roll inertia. This can we somewhat counteracted by increasing the aileron surface, but this requires more stick force.

Edited December 26, 2022 by JG27_PapaFly

[Gingerwelsh]

Tests back in the day, came to the conclusion, that the Mosquito VI was inferior as a fighter, to all contempory single engine fighters of the time, except the Spit V.

This is the reason why I never use it as a fighter, it's just too good.

The roll rate is too high.

 

Sure it shot down fighters, but in what circumstances.

 

In game, its RoR is the same as a 190. The Mossie is too high and the 190 is too low.

 

..

[Lusekofte]

3 minutes ago, Gingerwelsh said:

Tests back in the day, came to the conclusion, that the Mosquito VI was inferior as a fighter, to all contempory single engine fighters of the time, except the Spit V.

This is the reason why I never use it as a fighter, it's just too good.

The roll rate is too high.

 

Sure it shot down fighters, but in what circumstances.

 

In game, its RoR is the same as a 190. The Mossie is too high and the 190 is too low.

 

..

You can fight with it within historical boundaries. You just need to have speed and patience. Even in this game engage in dogfight is pretty stupid. You are for one a very big target in a environment easy to aim

[JG27*PapaFly]

11 minutes ago, Lusekofte said:

You can fight with it within historical boundaries.

Boundaries must be implemented by the developers.  If they give us a plane that can dogfight and outroll most of its opponents, people will use that to their advantage. This leads to an airquake-like environment. I like to see planes that

A) Look gorgeous (I absolutely love the level of graphical detail), and

B) Behave in a plausible way.

Planes that fulfill only A) are immersion killers IMO. This is in no way limited to the Mossie. The BF110s turn rate is a joke in it's own right.

Edited December 26, 2022 by JG27_PapaFly

[Lusekofte]

Well let them do what they like. I do fly it like it would have. Anything else is simply boring

[ATAG_Ezzie]

G'day everyone,

 

Ive been flying the Mossie online (Combat Box) since Oct and thought i would share some observations/thoughts that might be helpful for those interested in flying it online and surviving more often than not.  Ive been flying long range low level day ranger type of sorties against tgts located at the read of the battle area such as factories, rail yards etc so if this type of flying doesn't interest you there's no point reading any further.  And the following is just one way of doing it - there's plenty of other ways to fly the Mossie and have fun.

 

Speed = life. Coming to BOX from COD I'm not a fan of the timers.  But they are what they are so its useful to know how long you can fly with the engines at or near their max performance. If you see the bad guys early enough you can often get away using speed and low flying but you might end up in a long chase.  So knowing how long you can fly at 2850-3000 rpm / full boost is important to know and i use a timer to track this when flying at high rpm/boost.

 

Rear visibility sucks.  Most of the times i get shot down its due to a bad guy who has snuck up on me on my low 6 and his/her first burst kills me.  Turns out that this was a real issue for the Mossie in WW2 and was noted in at least one RAF combat evaluation report I have read.  Their solution was to fly very low and have the navigator sit athwartships (ie perpendicular to the direction of travel) so he could look to the rear.  Our Nav is not useful - except as a meat shield sometimes - so we cant do that.  So a solution is to map a key to the rearward view, use zoom and kick the rudder back back and forth to quickly clear six when flying low.  I do this often and its saved me once or twice from a baddie sneaking up on me.

 

Fly low.  No, lower than that.  When i first started i would fly just above the treeline thinking this was low enough. Turns out there are some baddies who fly low looking for tgts flying just above the treeline when silhouetted against the sky.  So I now fly below the treeline for the most part and when i pop up to clear some trees i clear my 6 doing the rear looking wiggle. Even when i think my 6 is clear i dont fly straight a level for more than a few seconds in case there's an unseen baddie carefully lining up their kill shot. This has saved me a few times.

 

Plan your mission.  I use the IL-2 planner to plan my route looking to minimise my closeness to enemy airfields and attacking the tgt from unexpected directions.  if you fly a direct track to the tgt on a busy server you will often be spotted by enemy patrolling between the target and the front line.  Low level navigation requires concentration but its possible to accurately do it and end up at the tgt after an indirect route flown at tree top height.

 

Have a plan when IVO the target.  As you near the tgt the baddies will get a server message saying 'enemy near XXX' when you are about 1 - 2 mins out from the tgt.  So any baddies in the tgt area may become extra vigilant when they see this.  Try not to fly straight and level as your near the tgt to mess with the AAA and continue to do so for up to 1 minute afterwards as by then the AAA has woken up and is angry at you. After you drop your bombs the baddies will get a message saying 'XXX is under attack' about 1 - 2 minutes after your bomb drop.  I think if you shoot your guns this message is sent more or less straight away but i could be mistaken.  So you have about 2 - 4 minutes to get in drop bombs and get away before the airborne defenders know pretty much where you are.

 

Of course plenty of players will do multiple passes and do lots of damage before being shot down so the above only applies to those of us who like one pass attacks and try and land every sortie.

 

The worst case scenario is enemy fighters more or less patrolling above the tgt at low-medium altitudes area who look down (rather than up) and spot you.  They will have speed advantage and low level flying wont help you until they are down at the same level as you.  There's not a whole lot you can do if they know what they are doing and spot you early.  Low level jinking may help prolong the inevitable and sometimes they will fly into the trees when fixated on you.  But it only takes a couple of hits from their cannons before your die or your Mossie falls apart.

 

And sometimes even when doing all the above you will die, either being shot down by a faster fighter who caught you, or fighter you didnt see sneak up on you or by a golden BB in the tgt area. But hopefully you will live more often than you will die if you follow some of the above and you can then get to enjoy flying the Mossie in its element - very low, fast and undetected (hopefully).

 

Ezzie

[ATAG_Ezzie]

<sigh> first sortie after writing the above a D9 got me as i was egressing the tgt. I saw him early and he almost flew into trees twice while chasing me at low level but he got me in the end.  Bombs on target but a stalag luft awaits me now...

[ATAG_Ezzie]

I'm still trying to work out the Mossie's on the deck max speed performance relative to various 109/190 types.

 

A couple of times recently on CB I've out run AI flown fighters on the deck in my Mossie and I'm wondering if the AI fly their aircraft to max performance or whether a human flying the same aircraft type would go faster?

 

Is the AI giving me a false sense of the relative speed performance?

 

[Knarley-Bob]

One has to figure that the AI/computer is going to be flying their bird to the T.  So if you are out running them, you are doing well. IMHO

[Freycinet]

For all of you who think you know what it is to fly the Mosquito after trying it in this sim.... Here's a great book for you:

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Terror-Starboard-Seat-Mosquito-Squadron/dp/0773730893 

[ATAG_Ezzie]

23 hours ago, Knarley-Bob said:

One has to figure that the AI/computer is going to be flying their bird to the T.  So if you are out running them, you are doing well. IMHO

Thanks Knarley-B

 

I just out ran a human (I think) G-14 on CB who blew his engine and had to bail after an extended chase so I'm getting a better feel for this now. D-9s are no escape from as best i can tell unless there's cloud nearby

[Knarley-Bob]

Too bad you don't get credit for a kill..............

[RossMarBow]

On 12/25/2022 at 9:52 AM, BlitzPig_EL said:

Interesting, the Mossie is faster down low than the P38?  

 

*buggers off to look at charts*

Yep
P38 can move more weight dough

[ATAG_Ezzie]

Low level intruder attack Deleen Airfield, Combat Box Alpha Day 17

[ATAG_Ezzie]

Bad day at the office - Apollo, Combat Box Strassfeld airfield attack

 

 

[ATAG_Ezzie]

Low level attack on Liege airfield Day 255 Combat Box.  Did some damage before the snappers (ACG - hey Jaydog long time no see!) got me.  Bailed and will spend the rest of the war in a Stalag Luft.

 

Low level single a/c intruder afield attacks are a lottery - if there are fighters airborne in the circuit then they are pretty much a one way mission if there is no cloud available to run and hide in.  Still its fun to do every so often and i think Liege became inoperable after my attack so i had an effect. The snappers were buzzing around like bees so I caught their attention it seems...

 

 

[ATAG_Ezzie]

Another airfield attack - this time I got very very lucky.

 

Came in over Dortmund airfield low and fast and got my bombs away OK.  Copped some flak in #1 engine which meant i couldnt keep going at 350mph IAS however. Cleared the tgt area OK without further damage but was dove upon by a high flying K4 who proceeded to chase me for ~ 8 mins thru the hills and valleys south of Dortmund.

 

I tried to shake the EA and cause it to CFIT to no avail and the EA closed to almost point blank range and damaged me a few times. However it seems the EA ran out of ammo or had a moment of chivalry and I was able to eventually make it home with #1 engine failing as I was taxying to my parking spot. I claim 4 buildings and an enemy aircraft on the ground as probably destroyed.

 

FLTLT Ezzie 464 Squadron RAAF

 

 

 

 

[Raptorattacker]

On 12/24/2022 at 2:42 AM, Jaegermeister said:

Don't get me started about what kind of music he likes...

'My Love Will Go On'?

[Knarley-Bob]

1 hour ago, Raptorattacker said:

'My Love Will Go On'?

I'm thinking old gladiator music......