How many hits did it take to bring a machine down?

I don't know about you guys. But when im playing Red Baron 2 3D and it takes a full belt/Clip to bring a fighter down, it begs the question. How can canvas, wood and wire be that hard to shoot down? I know that it is just a game but im still curious how it was in real life. Thanks for the time and check your six as often as you can!

[Barrett]

To answer the question: It Only Takes One. (von Richthofen's tripe took one hit; thru the heart.)
No canvas on WW I birds (see related thread) but fabric is almost immune to gunfire. It'll take dozens or scores of hits without effecting the airframe. Wood is semiporous where bullets are concerned. You'd need a heavy concentration of hits to sever a spar in flight.

[StephenLawson]

Barrett: That shot was after he had already crashed though. :

Uh, oh, here we go again!

Seriously, though, didn't many flyers purposely try to get a bullet in the engine? Especially if you can get an oil leak!

A machine could absorb dozens of bullets for the reasons Barrett stated. And then, again, one could kill the pilot, kill the engine, or ignite the petrol tank.

P.S. I'm right there with you on Red Baron. It takes several rounds for me to take out an enemy bird and then one bullet from the ground will set me on fire! But the computer cheats in every game!

[Darryl]

If it were as easy in real life to fly and shoot down opposing aircraft as it is in computer games then every single pilot would be an ace in no time flat (except all those poor AI dopes who are cannon fodder anyway).

No matter how much you complain that it is too hard...forget it. It is way too easy. The problem is usually more to do with the superb accuracy that can be achieved, than with the damage model in my experience. Most games crank up the damage model to compensate.


BTW, I have been flying and fighting in computer planes since Commodore 64 days.

regards

Darryl

[Barrett]

Darryl old son: Egad! You're older'n dirt!
Stephen me lad: I fear that I missed a thread or two. If MvR was zapped on the ground, what brought him down in the first place? ???

[Alan]

Barrett, it was, uh, somewhat discussed in the Death of the Red Baron *thread which has about, oh, 18 pages.

You're really not missing too much....

[Darryl]

Darryl old son: Egad! *You're older'n dirt! *

Barrett,

Alas, you are close to the truth. I am so old I remember when we got our first sound card! Real engine noises!!

Very much like when you saw your first Talkie, I suspect

regards

Darryl

[Lufbery]

Barrett,

I was the guy on the grassy knoll, or Frank Luke. I can't remember anymore. One of them, though, that's for sure.

Back to the original question:

I've read a number of reports about various aces who were noted marksmen (the names escape me now) needing an estimated 20-30 shots per plane. I've also read accounts of control wires or rigging being shot off (imagine the odds of a bullet hitting a wire!).

Most of the accounts that I've read where pilots get shot down and then live to write about it involve either wounds to the pilot, a punctured fuel tank, or hits to the engine.

If you look closely at the Spad 13 at the National Air & Space Museum, you can see a number of patches where bullets went through the plane, but did not damage other than to put a hole in the fabric.

Regards,

[Volker_Nemsch]

Killing the pilot with a single shot could bring down a machine even if the aircraft wasn´t hit at all.

The most vulnerable points on the aircraft itself are:

1.)
The fuel tank (a hit in the fuel tank might not set the aircraft on fire but sparks from the ignition system or the heat of a running engine often caused the fire).

2.)
The lubrication system (an oil leak could destroy an engine within minutes).

3.)
The cooling system (a leak in the cooling system would have the same result within a short time). Rotary and most radial engines as well as air cooled inline engines had not this problem.


Struts and cables were not easy targets because they were not big enough. If those parts were damaged or destroyed it was mostly just a lucky hit.