New here. Would like to know if anyone is using the Sopwith Pup and if so which maneuver deck you are using for it. Any other special rules apply? Thanks
New here. Would like to know if anyone is using the Sopwith Pup and if so which maneuver deck you are using for it. Any other special rules apply? Thanks
From what I remember pup is 12 hp, D deck maneuver (Dr1) with B guns. I think it has a climb rate of 4 and a max of 12. (I'll check later and edit if wrong). A really fun little plane, fragile but nippy.
Hope this is correct and helps,
Andrew
BALM
Last edited by BeneathALeadMt; 09-30-2017 at 13:36.
Hi and welcome from Alberta.As for Sop' Pup D deck B gun 12 hp
Welcome to the Forum, Mike.
Mike
"Flying is learning to throw yourself at the ground and miss" Douglas Adams
"Wings of Glory won't skin your elbows and knees while practicing." OldGuy59
On behalf of the Squadrons based here in Dear old Blighty welcome to the Drome Mike.
Rob.
"Courage is the art of being the only one who knows you're scared to death."
Welcome to the aerodrome Mike. The Pup is a fun plane to fly. My wife and I have had many a great battles with it vs an Albatros DII.
Welcome to the Aerodrome, Mike, from here near Norwich in the United Kingdom. Ares have not released a Sopwith Pup model yet but we would like them to do so. However, there are models available from other sources.
Hi Mike, welcome from England. Another welcome present:
Run for your life - there are stupid people everywhere!
Welcome to you, from Bristol.
Although the Pup has not been released by Ares, I have a few from Shapeways and a metal kit from Red Eagle.
This is a great little aircraft and the D deck has a couple of surprizes for Albatross D2 and even D3
Thanks so much for all the replies and info. I am building a couple Valcom models to add to my collection and this greatly helps getting them in the game!
Thanks again,
mtw
Welcome to the 'Drome, Mike!
I too have 'Valom' Pups in my to-do queue, plus one or two 'Shapeways' prints of the little beastie.
I laugh in the face of danger - then I hide until it goes away!
Sorry Mike focused on answering rather than welcoming you so...... Welcome from South Wales to the most relaxed and gentlemanly (Chaps of either sex) forum around. Let us know how the pups turn out.
Andrew
BALM
I wonder if Ares release a Pup whether they'll change the deck ? There was a school of thought that the D deck didn't match the performance of the Pup and some added sharp left turns to augment the deck. (creating essentially a slower version of the O deck), others thought that was too much.
Some of the newer decks did not exist when the D deck was nominated of course - Of the current decks the W deck might fit well, it has the speed and a sharp turn each way but lacks the broad sideslips of the D. Will be interesting to see.
For reference:
Deck D (22) Average speed - 3.5cm - (arrow is 50% of the card)
3 straight
2 hard right turn (90°)
3 right turn
3 left turn
2 stall - steep
1 Immelmann !
2 right sideslip
2 left sideslip
1 broad right sideslip - steep
1 broad left sideslip - steep
1 climb
1 dive
Deck O (24) Fast speed - 4.7cm - (arrow is 80% of the card)
3 straight
2 hard right turn (90°)
2 hard left turn (90°)
3 right turn
3 left turn
2 stall - steep
1 Immelmann !
2 right sideslip
2 left sideslip
1 broad right sideslip - steep
1 broad left sideslip - steep
1 climb
1 dive
Deck W (20) Average speed - 3.5cm - (arrow is 50% of the card)
3 straight
3 right turn
3 left turn
1 hard right turn (90°) - steep
1 hard left turn (90°) - steep
2 stall - steep
1 Immelmann !
2 right sideslip
2 left sideslip
1 climb
1 dive
Sapiens qui vigilat... "He is wise who watches"
So is the Pup more like a Dr.I triplane or a Hannover Cl.IIIA?
Karl'
It is impossible for a man to begin to learn what he thinks he knows. -- Epictetus
It's more about whether it can turn slightly better than it's Albatros D.II/III opponents in both directions. W deck gives it that option.
What's probably needed is a slower version of the F deck (You could make one from D or I deck with the 90 turns from the W deck).
For reference:
Deck F (22) – Fast speed - 4.7cm - (arrow is 80% of the card)
3 straight
1 hard right turn (90°)
1 hard left turn (90°)
3 right turn
3 left turn
2 stall - steep
1 Immelmann !
2 right sideslip
2 left sideslip
1 broad right sideslip - steep
1 broad left sideslip - steep
1 climb
1 dive
There's room for a Z deck - I'm interested what that might be.
Sapiens qui vigilat... "He is wise who watches"
I always thought the Pup should have been given 13 Damage points as from all the pilot reports I have seen it was a sturdy & manoeuvrable Aircraft that did not suffer from the problems of the Albatross D.III & V or the Fokker Dr,I.
Thirteen sounds OK. What German aircraft would be ideal to pair Pup?
I haven't seen anything to classify the Pup as particularly "sturdy" - reliable, yes; easy (a delight!!!) to fly, and very manoeuvrable, but that was owing to a light airframe, a light weight rotary engine and a very large wing area, not structural strength.
As an aside, everything I have read about the Albatros series has placed emphasis on its particularly strong and robust fuselage (reputedly the plywood frame was so strong as to not require internal bracing) yet they still only have the same (or fewer) damage points of their contemporary opponents.
I laugh in the face of danger - then I hide until it goes away!
I'd have to do some reading for anecdotal evidence, but my thought is more for the W deck than the a shortened F. Easier to do, and I'm not sure about the wide SS. Maybe an inquiry to any repro Pup pilots, if a channel can be found?
Karl
It is impossible for a man to begin to learn what he thinks he knows. -- Epictetus
A slower version of the F deck would provide the extra agility seen in N.17/Dr.1 (decks I & D) that the W deck doesn't have; some will consider a slower version of the O deck with the extra 90 turns each way to fit the bill as the Pup could turn very quickly.
Something different from the D deck is needed I feel, it's interesting to speculate what that could be.
Last edited by flash; 10-08-2017 at 09:11.
Sapiens qui vigilat... "He is wise who watches"
The damage points seem to be about the right fit for the Pup & Alb's with 12 & 14pts respectively, particularly if compared to each other and their contemporaries when they were designed. The Alb's were clearly much stronger than most and the Pup was one of the strongest British machines produced at the time.
M.S N - 10pts; Nieuport 11-10pts; Nieuport 16- 10pts; N.17/23 - 12pts; DH.2 -14pts
Sapiens qui vigilat... "He is wise who watches"
I usually fly the Pup on the D deck, but I add a single hard left (90°) turn to account for the low wing loading/ large aileron.
The torque effect of the rotary aids the right turn, but hinders the left hence the imbalance in favour of right turns.
Adding two lefts, but making them steep and leaving the rights normal would also work.
I read somewhere that MvR rated the Dr1 as more manouverable than the Pup, it had a better rate of climb, but was the manouverability down to the machine or the pilots? We were fielding a lot of inexperienced chaps when the Pup was in use!
Lest we forget
Perhaps some games testing with different deck ideas/combos and posting the results might be a worthwhile endeavour?
See you on the Dark Side......
Except it doesn't work like that -- the effects would push the nose up, or down; not left, or right. That notion was debunked scientifically years ago; pity the fellow involved died in the crash of one of his WW1 acft. recently, or we'd have the book on the subject by now....
As I understand it, as you turn hard right, the torque effect tends to shove you down, keeping speed high but risking a spin. Turning left pushes the nose up bleeding off speed and risking a stall.
The cumulative effect is that right hand turns, not taken too far i.e. 90°-180° become classed as good fast turns, while the left hand turns get the reputation of being pilot killers.
Luck and the ability to understand what is happening to you lets some pilots become " acrobatic aces". The lack of these two qualities tends to make you dead.
I am not a pilot and the best available data tends to be the anecdotes of men now long dead, not trained in scientific analysis of what they did in the heat of battle, so realistically we will never know what a skilled pilot in wartime could wring out of a 'plane with a characteristically short service life
Lest we forget
That is my understanding as well. The torque effect causes the plane to be seriously out of trim and so makes doing a balanced (ball centred) turn much more difficult.
We sometimes forget the planes were flown by humans and it was humans who had to contend with the various planes quirks and weaknesses.
What was possible in theory (equal turns in both directions) may not have been so possible in practise.
So - in game terms - right turns are tighter than left turns.
[Added]
I also like your ideas for an adjusted D deck.
There was a torque effect for the pup but not as extreme as the Dr 1 - if for nothing else because of the much larger and more effective rudder size.
Not time for a game but can compare the turns quickly:
This shows three aircraft moving from the same start point two cards into a right turn move - an Albatros D.II (V deck) compared with Pups with a D deck and a W deck playing sharp;sharp & sharp;right turn respectively. (ignore the W card under the Alb that should have been removed)
This shows the same three aircraft - both Pups starting with a Sharp Right turn, D deck following with its second; all ending on Right Turns.
This shows the same three aircraft - both pups started with a Right Turn, both played a Sharp Right on the second card, D deck played a Sharp Right on the third
It can be clearly seen that the D deck Pup can out turn both the others to the right, the W deck Pup (with cdl fin) will out turn both the others to the left - John's extra Left Sharp will allow his Pups to out turn the Alb to the left and match the W deck Pup.
So what could it mean ? Well here's a couple of examples in one demo:
W deck Pup on the left, Alb D.II center; D deck Pup on the right
Both D & W deck Pups can sharp turn in this way round but won't get a shot as the Alb turns right, into the D decks attack.
The D deck can play its second sharp turn & can shoot at close range, The W deck plays a left turn and can shoot at long range
The D deck has to play a right turn and has no shot, the W deck can play a Sharp Right turn and get another long range shot (+1)
Conclusions - if you're flying Albs against Pups with any of the suggested decks - be careful - if you're flying Pups go with something that can sharp turn both ways.
You can see John's Pups in action here; https://www.wingsofwar.org/forums/sh...042#post459042
Last edited by flash; 10-13-2017 at 10:30.
Sapiens qui vigilat... "He is wise who watches"
Not quite -- I'm still waiting for Peter Garrison to publish the book on his researches with Javier Arango, but Arango's untimely demise seems to have delayed said project. That said, the article Garrison published in _Flying_ a few years back showed that even with the various effects, the turns rather didn't vary much between left and right; the only noticeable effect was at the *very* start of a turn, and even then it was only maybe 10 degrees or so. (_Flying_, Apr. 2014 was the issue.)
Arango was a sad loss, he had some interesting things to say about the different types he was able to fly.
One of my favorites is the Sopwith Camel. It’s marginally stable, but if you get to know it, it’s so much fun. It climbs at double the rate of any other airplane, it turns in nothing, it maneuvers—you just think and it goes there—and once you get used to its peculiarities of flying sideways and not doing what you expect all the time, it’s a very nice airplane to fly.”
Read more at http://www.airspacemag.com/history-o...2e5G5FHGduE.99Sadly he had the ultimate WW1 pilot experience flying his N.28. Cause is as yet unknown it seems.....pilots claimed that the Fokker Triplane climbed “like a monkey,” although its rate of climb was actually average. Like other thick-wing Fokkers, however, it could fly in a more nose-high attitude without stalling than the thin-wing Sopwiths and Nieuports, and the appearance of climbing steeply may have convinced other pilots that it was climbing rapidly.
Sapiens qui vigilat... "He is wise who watches"
There was discussion of the Camel's handling in the article -- short version: The Camel has *zero* inherent stability; any deflection in any direction is going to be massively exacerbated. Pretty-much-every acft. of the era was like that; one of the reasons the RE8 was such a failure was: It was *too* stable, so could not dodge attacks. (Garrison theorizes one of the reasons so few pilots actually scored kills in WW1 was: The airplanes were skittering around so much, trying to line one up was nearly impossible.)
I have a sneaking suspicion Arango's demise was a result of the godawful flight characteristics of the period-authentic acft. he was flying.
Anyone with any knowledge of the topic knows better than to put any stock in Witness Testimony:
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archiv...reliabili.html ....
So definitely wait for the NTSB report.
Sapiens qui vigilat... "He is wise who watches"
The Sopwith Pup had the lightest of all wing loadings, around 4.8 pounds per square foot which was well below the Fokker Triplane and virtually half that of the Albatros. It could also hold altitude at height, at altitudes where the Albatros had to trade height for speed in a tight turn.
The DH 2 is closest to the Pup at 5.7 pounds per square foot.
https://www.wingsofwar.org/forums/sh...178#post218178
Barry
Good gen Barry - something for the Wiki perhaps ?
Sapiens qui vigilat... "He is wise who watches"
A good point.
The great thing about this thread is we are all contributing to the issue from completely different angles - as always! - but there is clearly a convergence in all the posts.
The D Deck is not quite sufficiently good for the pup!
To keep things simple I like johnbiggles fix
But I'm OK with other options and I'm happy to mod my Sopwith Pup card and deck accordingly.I usually fly the Pup on the D deck, but I add a single hard left (90°) turn to account for the low wing loading/ large aileron.
As flash's helpful pictorial example shows the W deck can equally work and produce a historically reasonable result versus the Albatros.
So, what's the conclusion?
I laugh in the face of danger - then I hide until it goes away!
A recent reading of a Pup pilot's account agrees with this. The Albatros was more streamlined and heavier while the Pup's rotary cowling acted like an air scoop and retarded both speed and speed build-up in a dive. The pilot said that Pups liked to get altitude on an Albatros and then use it. At higher altitudes the Albatros was floundering in turns while the Pup was not. He also noted that clearing gun jams above 15,000 was virtually impossible due to shortage of oxygen. In the same vein another pilot complains of the near impossibility of putting a Lewis gun back into the upper position on a Foster mount while above 15,000 feet. [it should be noted that USAAF bomber crews went on oxygen around 12,000 to 13,000 feet]
Remember also that even a Camel could be outdived by an Albatros and this was the Albatros' only good escape manoeuvre. However given the Albo's wing weaknesses it was also a dangerous route to take and Albo pilots were told not to dive more than 1000 metres in one go (or was it 1000 feet?).
As a general rule of thumb, aircraft with heavy water-cooled engines dived better than those with the lighter air-cooled rotary engines.
Barry
Last edited by 'Warspite'; 10-17-2017 at 05:19. Reason: error
There was only a couple mph in it up to 10-11k and the Pup was the quicker, it was up in the 15k range it really began to struggle and the Albs seem to have had a 10-12mph advantage - all before wear taken into account ! Both were slower and would fall out of the average speed band at those levels but to take all these things into account would probably require three decks per plane !
I think the Pup needs a sharp turn both ways, whether it's one or two I'm undecided. One is OK but two may make it overpowering even though it looks right. The problem is that currently in this speed band only D & W decks have 90 turns; only the W has one in each direction but they are 'steep' which can be limiting, and W doesn't have the broad side slips (also steep) the other 'agile' decks have, so if Ares do produce a Pup & go this route they'll have to produce a new deck for it.
Slower versions of the F & O decks fit the bill as explained previously, to achieve something near JBs idea they could knock out a slower version of the M deck with two right & one left sharp turn; it has an extra broad side slip but what the hey !
Deck M (24) – Fast speed - 4.7cm - (arrow is 80% of the card)
3 straight
2 hard right turn (90°)
1 hard left turn (90°)
3 right turn
3 left turn
2 stall - steep
1 Immelmann !
2 right sideslip
2 left sideslip
2 broad right sideslip - steep
1 broad left sideslip - steep
1 climb
1 dive
Sapiens qui vigilat... "He is wise who watches"
To get the left turn, I scan the D deck right turn card, mirror flip it on my computer then print it.
What Ares do at whatever time they see fit to produce a Pup is up to them but for the time being, I'm happy and DR1s are nervous
The folowing link is to an OTT episode, turn 13 gives a description of the 90 left in use against a DIII
http://www.wingsofwar.org/forums/sho...-Jan-15th-1917
Last edited by johnbiggles; 10-17-2017 at 13:06.
Lest we forget
Actual top speeds -- another matter which needs to be Scienced.... :)
I think I'm rather in favor of a single left 90; the Snipe has a single left 90, and the only plane that has 2 left 90s (with 2 right 90s) is the Fokker D.VII, with "legendary" maneuverability.
There are a lot of factors that are difficult to be accounted for in the WoG game engine so sometimes (actually, a lot of the time), we have to use our guts.
Moreover, a pair of left 90s would, I think, give the Pup too much advantage over the D.IIIs.
Karl
It is impossible for a man to begin to learn what he thinks he knows. -- Epictetus
Bookmarks