Noticed these were unassigned…
But what’s the point of the ones highlighted? What effect do they have?
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The radiator’s purpose is to keep the engine cool. Essentially, the radiator is a series of snaking tubes that take the hot engine coolant, pass cold air over it to cool it down, and pass it back into the engine cooling it down. The controllable aspect of a radiator is the cowl flaps , labelled as ‘radiator’ in the game’s controls. Setting the radiator to 0% means closing the flaps, whilst setting it at 100% means having them fully open. These, while open, allow an influx of air to enter the cooling system of the plane, reducing the engine temperature. However, opening the cowl flaps leads to increased drag in the surface of the aircraft, hurting performance in regards to dive rate, energy retention and straight-line speed. Whilst performing a sustained climb, the power-to-weight ratio is the most important aspect of the aircraft, thus the increased drag from open cowl flaps is rather harmless. When speed is the top priority, closing the cowl flaps to increase speed is a reasonable choice. When climbing at the start of a match, without the pressure of a dogfight, opening the cowl flaps to 100% to avoid overheating is recommended, but some planes will be able to climb needing only a partially opened radiator, reducing performance loss from drag.
Right, so that’s the radiator sorted.
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It is worth learning how to manage the fuel mixture since the automatic management of mixture in War Thunder by the AI isn’t perfect and does not always correspond to a pilot’s intentions. A mixture setting with a high fuel-air mixture is considered “rich” while a low fuel-air mixture is considered “lean”.
As the altitude changes, the optimal mixture changes too; the greater the altitude, the lower the presence of oxygen and density of the air (as such, the air intake decreases). This means that the pilot will need to increase the air in the mixture (making it “lean”). In War Thunder, fuel mixture is displayed as a percentage - to have a more fuel-rich mixture, useful for top performance at lower altitudes, the pilot sets the mixture to a number close to 100%, whilst to achieve a mixture with more air in it a much lower mixture is used (however, setting it at 0% little more than starve the engine and cut it). When at high altitudes, such as 8,500 m, a pilot may be using a mixture setting close to 40%. It is possible for some planes to achieve a mixture of up to 120%. This should only be used at altitudes of less than 1,000 m, as it was designed mostly for difficult takeoffs and landings, as well as a “WEP” in certain scenarios.
Most aircraft in the game can be left at the default 60% mixture and will fly without consequence. However, some such as the Ki-44-I and the P-47 require micromanagement of mixture to provide maximum thrust. Most German and Italian fighters use a completely automated mixture control which does not require or allow player input. Turbine engines in jets also have automatic mixture control, thus no manual control in game. Liquid rocket reaction engines are locked to a fixed ratio between fuel and oxidizer.
Mixture defaults at 60% when MEC is enabled. The last set manual setting is saved when toggling back to auto mode and will be set to that when toggling to manual mode.
and that clears up mixture
seems prop feathering gives you more glide if your engines cut out
and magneto is pretty much pointless
… and messing with prop pitch usually goes more harm than good.
Honestly, I never use them. Likely will be used if there was an air only mode, but at that point warthunder would be the game for you.
I believe all of those options are for boosting your planes efficiency depending on your altitude, , engine condition and speed.
Nevermind, learned something new: “magneto is also commonly used in aviation piston engines even though an electrical supply is normally available. This is because a magneto ignition system is more reliable than other options such as a battery-coil system.”–Magneto | SKYbrary Aviation Safety
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The radiator bit is definitely good to know.
If you figure out what Supercharger Gear is, ping me if you would!
All of those are probably there because the flight model system is copypasted from War Thunder.
Even there, those controls are meant for super fine engine / propeller management, very few people (if anyone) actually use them. I (used to) leave most of those controls in automatic mode myself, even when playing SIM.
TLDR:
Radiator affects the opening of the radiator lid. The wider the opening, the better the cooling, at the cost of increased drag.
Oil radiator = same thing, different radiator.
Prop pitch = basically the same as shifting gears in a car. Prop blades can twist in order to optimize efficiency at different speeds.
Prop feathering = only useful in emergency when an engine dies. Prop’s drive and pitch will be disengaged so that it spins freely and creates the less drag possible. That slightly increases your chances of making it back with the remaining engine(s), or to glide a little further to a safe landing zone.
Mixture = the fuel/air ratio that gets pumped in your engine. There’s less oxygen at higher altitudes, so you want a variable ratio to ensure optimal combustion.
Supercharger gear = some planes have got a compressor to pump more air into the engine at any time (see previous point). But said compressors are optimized for specific altitudes. Shifting compressor gear changes the current altitude setting of the compressor. @61839981
Magnetos - I’m not even sure what their purpose in game is supposed to be. Maybe for a more realistic start-up procedure?
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Never played using them, but I work with pilots, and they never adjust the magneto - there is no provision to do so.
modern piston engine a/c (those using petrol at least!) have 2 magnetos, which gives redundancy in case 1 fails, and more efficient burning of the mixture.
The only magneto control they have in the cockpit is left/right/both - and they only use left and right to check “magneto drop” as a pre flight check - engine RPM should drop by a couple of hundred if you use just one, so it is a check to see that both are working OK.
Other than that magneto is always set to “Both”
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