Combat-Writing Thread

Assuming level flight. I'm trying to fix the rated stall speed for a fictional aircraft.

It's also designed for spaceflight, so with a combination of overpowerful maneuvering and orientation thrusters and pressing the stall speed, it can perform what I'm calling a kickflip and do an end-for-end rotation, stall in the process, and then slam the throttle and resume flight in the opposite direction while inverted.

edited 27th Feb '14 10:49:24 AM by Night

Technically it's incorrect to refer to stall speeds; you can stall at any airspeed if you exceed the critical angle of attack for your aircraft. This is, I imagine, part of the reason why "alpha" (angle of attack) is important to fighter pilots.

I made cursory searches for stall speeds for the Typhoon and F-15 (I would've searched for a third, but it's late over here), and I found conflicting information. Wikipedia wasn't any help either. Sorry.

An interesting idea - and supermaneuverability of the sort you're describing may be able to achieve it^note It reminds me of an extreme Pugachev's Cobra - but I'd point out that generally you don't want to get slow and stall whilst in a dogfight. You tend to lose far too much energy and altitude in the process and make it easy for an aircraft to set up a missile/gun shot. This is why thrust vectoring isn't necessarily an advantage - I remember reading in an aviation magazine that in mock dogfights F-22s ended up dumping a lot of their energy when using thrust vectoring that allowed Typhoons to nail them. Obviously lessons learnt and all that, but it's something to keep in mind.

The trick's more useful for forcing an overshoot than anything else (well, airshows), I grant. Ah well, you actually did help.

Hmmm. If we stretch the definition of "modern" a little, we might get better data—information on, say, an older F-4 would be easier to find than information on an F-15C. Then again though, as Flanker pointed out, it would vary according to a number of factors.

There are better ways to get the opponent to overshoot than bleeding off energy in a stall, though, since it leaves you horribly vulnerable and without the energy to maneuver should you need it.

That's the theory. However, part of the point is this manuever is mainly to be executed when you're low, slow, and don't have any energy anyways; combined with an excessive amount of reserve power as in a landing. It's unlikely they'd ever face off with a conventional aircraft unless caught while landing or taking off, rather like the way the 262 was historically out of reach.

Weellll, lessee. Chatter on the F-16.net forums seems to indicate that in clean configuration and 20 degrees AOA, an F-16 can get as low as 110 knots or so. Of course, the F-16 is fully FBW and is aerodynamically very advanced. Eastern Bloc Aircraft says that the stall speed for an L-39 Albatros—which I'm going to assume is in clean configuration—is 81 knots; of course, a straight-winged L-39 that tops out at subsonic speed isn't anywhere the same as a Falcon.

Also, reportedly, the MiG-21 can still maintain good control over pitch at 100 knots or so, even though that's well below what the manual recommends for it. But then again the Fishbed is probably the premier knife-fighter of the Jet Age.

Most fighter pilots open flaps and speed brakes...then again the oppsing fighter can do that...

..causing a "rolling scissors". While it sounds like a hardcore lesbian punk band that can be a bad thing.

"Advantage-disadvantage", as each aircraft slows and lets the other overshoot, they churn through fuel.

For pairs of aircraft, the problem is that another gal/guy can take a shot. Or you run out of fuel.. Or you look like a giant target to SAM's and someone on the ground takes a shot (a SAM crew puts "hold fire" on their aircraft and sends one up your tail pipe).

edited 1st Mar '14 3:38:26 PM by TairaMai

Urge to write another aviation effortpost... rising...

If I go ahead with such a thing, feel free to suggest what you'd like to see/what you have trouble with.

Well, the two aircraft could engage in a rolling scissors, trying not to bleed off too much speed. Or one of them could decide to scramble out on full afterburners either in a dive or a zoom-climb, leaving the other at a kinetic energy disadvantage as it tries to turn around and pursue. This is how an F-105 can survive if a MiG-21 gets into knife-fighting range; the Thud could not out-turn the Fishbed, but it sure as hell could run, and it typically carried more than enough fuel to force the Fishbed to break off.

(Or it could take the ballsy/insane maneuver and just drive for the Mig, afterburn roaring and guns blazing. There are a few accounts of North Vietnamese pilots losing their nerve and buggering out when faced with a clearly-insane American in that gigantic fighter-bomber heading straight for them.)

In my alternate history, instead of getting cancelled, Argentina goes through with Operación Soberanía and invades Chile over the Beagle Islands, starting the Beagle War. How might such a war go? This is mainly relatively unimportant background information, so I don't need it to be incredibly detailed (although that would be nice).

Not much really different from any other third world conflict. Argentina has A-4 Skyhawks and Super Entendards, Chile back then had A-37B's and a few other Cold War Era jets.

On the ground they were evenly matched with 50's era gear: M-48's, FN-FAL's and a few amphibous APC's. On the Naval side, WWII era ships. If Argentina gets their carrier into the game, it might give them an advantage for a bit.

You'd mainly see high-altitude mountain warfare; an overview of their SPMBT picklists reveals that both sides focused more on light tanks and heavy armored cars, many of which were French-built, to emphasize mobility in the rough terrain. The naval side of the equation, well, that's harder to say.

The political ramifications...hmm, a successful action would cause the Argentine junta's support to spike, briefly, but if the fighting goes on for any length of time, it'll plummet—witness the junta's expulsion after the Falklands War. Oh, and perhaps the fighting would cause Britain to view Argentine as a warmongering menace to peace and to reverse its habit of selling off military equipment (since an invasion of the Falklands would no longer be out of the question), but that might be wishful thinking on my part.

edited 5th Mar '14 5:24:52 AM by SabresEdge

Assuming that the melee exclusive combatants are heat-proof until they actually contact with lava, what is the best way to invade a castle in a middle of a volcanic lake filled with magma-proof stepping stones without resorting to dropping into it from the air? The castle gates, while heavily guarded, are always open for ventilation purposes.

edited 5th Mar '14 6:30:43 AM by murazrai

Cool off the magma with a sufficiently large amount of water, and zerg-rush the castle.

Archery backed by a smallish number of elite, heavily-armored troops to hold the gate. Archers are needed to suppress enemy fire from the walls as you advance across the lava, because if you have to do stepping stones and dodge arrows your casualties will be horrific.

Build a giant causeway out of stone. Drill a hole in the side of the volcano and divert the magma. Collapse one wall of the active cone so that the castle is overwhelmed. Pour a sufficient quantity of carbon dioxide into the cone and suffocate anyone in there.

Eh, just lay siege to volcano-castle and then wait'em out. They have to get food and supplies in. Take away the stepping stones and say ""Surrender or you starve!".

Call on the volcano gods and make it erupt.

Virgin sacrifices may be needed.

edited 5th Mar '14 5:52:12 PM by LeGarcon

Whoa, these ideas are really cool. I'll add some details to spice things up.

The magma rocks are quite far away from each other. Heavily armed soldiers would slow them down and risk them drowning in magma due to lack of jumping distance. Archers can grind the gate guards down, but reinforcements from outer areas are quick.

The volcanic lake is on ground, not on top of a volcanic mountain. Also, the reason why the volcanic lake exist is because a former leader in said castle actually blew up the neighbouring ground, leaving the magma-proof stones which were too tough to be exploded.

The supplies are from outside, but the supply carriers are as heavily armed as the soldiers in the castle itself, which essentially means a quick contact with the supply equals enemy reinforcement.

But the resulting eruption would kill everyone.

edited 6th Mar '14 5:28:34 AM by murazrai

Shh, details.

Perhaps they could construct a mighty bridge or something instead.

If the defenders are that tough, a siege is the only way to go. If a siege is impractical, go find easier prey.

&Guess what they did? They encircled the lake with two layers.

The outer layer are sword or spear wielding bandits who seek and destroy any nearby reinforcements.

The inner layer are a number of knife wielding bandits who jumped through the rocks to wall corners where they are invisible from the gate unless being peek out, something that is impossible without risking getting enemy soldiers burnt by the lave heat.

After some of them climbed up, most of the gate guards went to the center where it is the only possible entry route from top of the castle. As soon as they jumped down, the bandits outside of the castle rushed in and overwhelmed the thinned gate guards. The castle soon fall into the bandits' prey in half an hour at the sacrifice of the bandits who jumped down.

Does this sounds plausible?

edited 6th Mar '14 6:23:25 AM by murazrai

I'm still hazy on the setup, but it doesn't look entirely plausible if the defenders are alert. The setup sounds like it'd be extremely difficult to get infiltrators close to the castle—for much the same reason real-life castles have an apron of empty ground around them. You want to create a killing zone for your own ranged weapons, through which no enemy can move undetected. Having the only path in be magma stepping-stones sounds like that idea, but even more so.

Hey Sabre's Edge, didn't you say you were going to write up a post on something or another?

Battlefield psychology and combat motivation, yeah. It's sort of on hold for the moment.