CFS3 Historical Question

[Autothrottle]

This is a question surrounding the CFS3 Bf-109 (both G- variants) and earlier models versus the Spitfire Variants compared to their real life counterparts.

How is it, due to the proximity of France and England geographically that the 109's actually lacked fuel when on missions deep into Britain whilst the Spitfires could make hit and runs well over the English channel into France Proper?

I thought that these fighters seemed relatively equal in performance and range.

In the game however, If you were to play for the huns, the 109's could make it well into London on the games 'clean' setting. No special additions with player is invincible or unlimited fuel or ammo, everything is at 100 percent realism. The same seems to go for the spitfire vice versa. Maybe not all the way to Paris, but at least as far as Abbeville (I think)

Did the game designers get it right or is this just my PC loving me back for Christmas?

[hairyspin]

You're talking about combat radius and relative thirst of each aircraft, plus operational circumstances. Both Spit and Bf109 were relatively short-range aircraft, although the Bf109 was particularly thirsty. 109s could operate as far north as London but had only 10 min of combat time over the city before they had to cut and run if they didn't fancy swimming. They also burned a lot of fuel waiting for bombers to rendezvous over the Pas de Calais before even crossing the Channel: CFS3 can't model that afaik.
The RAF faced exactly the same problems from '41 onwards when they started escorted raids into northern France. For a good discussion of the problems, try Stephen Bungay's The Most Dangerous Enemy (which is also a dashed good read, btw).

[sandar]

The BF109g had typical range of 370 miles (600 km) or up to 620 miles (1000 km) if a long range drop tank was used.

The Spitfire Mk's I to III had a typical range of 500 miles (800 km) without external tanks, but a MkV could only manage about 470 Miles on internal fuel, but over 1000 miles 1600 km) with long range tanks.

But in the real world, headwinds, tailwinds, altitude, speed, plus a host of other factors can muddy the waters. In short, close bomber escort and fighting used more fuel than a fighter sweep, so the range for fighters undertaking a bomber escort role will typically be shorter than the range for what the RAF called rhubarb missions, fighter sweeps over Europe.

In the flightsim world though, it is a question of getting things as close as possible, One thing I noticed was an acidental stray bullet on blue on blue was enough to shoot down a friendly fighter, but it took half a magazine to down an enemy.