This evening, I've been playing around with engine failures with my C-46 Commando. When I set thrust to full power on 1 engine, it spirals uncontrollably out of control, and it's super unrealistic. I can't even keep it in the air with 1 engine, because if I put enough power into the engines to keep it up, it just spirals! It's terrible! And rudder doesn't have ANY effect! Also, a realistic amount of gyro is when you set the engine power to 1000hp. (The power of the other engine is 1700.) That's more than 1/2!
Please fix!
Uneven engine thrust creates too much gyro!
234k jamesPLANESii
8.0 years ago
I did this too but I managed to land
@jamesPLANESii agreed; however, I was flying around on full power on the "good" engine. The key to this is to maintain your airspeed, just as it is in real life. You generally would expect that Vmc would be slower than your approach speed, so that if you did have an engine failure, the aircraft wouldn't spiral out of control until you reduce power on the good engine. But, as I said below, it's really difficult to compare your build against an actual C-46, so I cannot say, for certain, the degree of control is similar to real life or not. I just know that, generally, in SP, the yaw encountered in a single-engine situation acts as it does in real life (pulls the aircraft away from the side of the good engine). Also, the yaw can be counteracted by full rudder and bank into the good engine and, also, getting slow in a single-engine situation is BAD. Real life multi-engine pilots practice single-engine situations all the time because they're difficult emergency scenarios. I don't really think there's a "bug" here, more of a degree of how much yaw is introduced. Or, it could be, how much effect the airflow has (or doesn't have) on the airplane and control surfaces. The physics model is an approximation, not exact and there are many things not quite right in the simulation (flaps, supersonic effects), but I (and you) find it close enough to be engaging. Otherwise, you wouldn't be practicing single-engine failures on final approach! ;)
Yea. It is difficult to maintain speed and altitude. Also, you can't put the throttle over 65%, or it will go into an uncontrollable spiral, and I was expecting to be able to keep flying on 1 engine, but you can't even get to the runway on the final approach locations, and I that's pretty stink. @ChiChiWerx
So, I did a little engine-out work on your C-46 myself. I put the left (critical) engine on AG1. I then took off and climbed to 5,500', where I shut down the left engine at 150 mph. Full right rudder and around 5 - 10 degrees of right bank maintained directional control without much difficulty. However, I could not maintain 150 mph and 5,500' on one engine. I then slowed at a controllable rate (1 - 5 mph per second) while losing airspeed and the aircraft began an uncontrollable left roll below 120 mph; I was able to regain control by letting the nose forward and accelerating or, alternatively, pulling power on the good engine (which led to more altitude loss). Lowering flaps only made the Vmc much higher, above 130 mph in fact and really exacerbated the thrust deficiency as even partial (as opposed to full) flaps here add a lot of drag, but not much lift (plus, pitch the nose UP, which is not what I would expect). Restarted the dead engine for approach and landing. Overall impression: Flies very nicely on two engines and very easy to land; in single-engine situations, this C-46 doesn't have a controllability problem, but does have a power deficiency at higher gross weights. As far as SP modeling is concerned, the single-engine physics seem realistic, though I cannot verify the DEGREE of accuracy (i.e., whether a 27,000 lb C-46 with 1700 hp each engine and 108 ft wingspan would react the same way). The flaps, however, are another story. I use flaps in some of my builds, but unfortunately, SP flaps do not do the same things flaps do in real life, which would be to change the camber of the wing, increase lift, pitch the nose DOWN (generally), add little/some drag initially and more drag at increased extension.
I find asymmetric thrust a bit exaggerated. However, I was able to fly my P-38 on one engine within the recommended airspeed listed in the USAAF pilot training manual. With hard rudder, slight flap deployment, slight bank, and proper elevator trim, I was able to get it to fly pretty straight and even too. Landing, however was another problem. But I did manage to do it after several tries. As @ChiChiWerx said, it's actually closer to realistic than you might think.
I can fly yours and tell you what I think, if you would like.
Controllability in single engine situations depends on several factors, but power setting (max power results in less controllability and necessity to fly faster) and speed (have to fly faster to stay in control). So, how fast are you flying when you go out of control? Any airplane, if flying below Vmc (Single-Engine Minimum Control Airspeed), will spiral out of control. SP physics replicates that; not sure how accurately, it's difficult to compare, but I don't think it's totally unrealistic.
You might be interested in this Pilot Report.
I've evaluated engine out characteristics on several builds, including my own B-24 build. I have to keep it above 200 mph if I fail an outboard, otherwise it goes out of control.