How effective would WW1 biplanes be against modern fighters such as a F-22?

[Tribble]

Before posting crap like this, think first. Does this scenario really make any sense? Would it be feasible? It is one thing to post David versus Goliath type scenarios, it is another to have scenarios that have David being blind, deaf, mute and have no limbs and is severely mentally retarded up against a heavily armored Goliath wielding an assault rifle.

David can still win that scenario, all he has to do is get Goliath to trip over his body and with any luck Goliath will break his neck in the fall.

And, crush David like a wine press in the process, since he's unable to get out of the way, and too stupid to realize he needs to do so.

So would you call that a draw?

[InsaneTD]

Don't most world war one plane's fuselage only come parallel to the ground once close to take off speed? So their guns are normal pointed skyward at any speed slower right? Makes it hard to target anything sitting on the ground if they ain't airborne.

[Jub]

Don't most world war one plane's fuselage only come parallel to the ground once close to take off speed? So their guns are normal pointed skyward at any speed slower right? Makes it hard to target anything sitting on the ground if they ain't airborne.

Many of them had gunners who operated machine guns in flexible mounts. Assuming the gunner can depress the gun enough they might actually have the advantage in getting the F-22s in their sights.

[Zeropoint]

Regarding the issue of radar locking onto a wooden biplane, I would expect that the metal engine of the biplane would have a radar cross-section at least equal to any fourth-generation fighter, and certainly more than any stealth aircraft. Infrared missiles looking for jet exhaust might have a hard time finding them ... or might night, as exhaust manifolds get pretty hot.

[U.P. Cinnabar]

David can still win that scenario, all he has to do is get Goliath to trip over his body and with any luck Goliath will break his neck in the fall.

And, crush David like a wine press in the process, since he's unable to get out of the way, and too stupid to realize he needs to do so.

So would you call that a draw?

Pretty much.

[Raw Shark]

Er... ha. Ha ha... tee hee >snort< guffaw ha ha HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!

Thanks for this. I needed it.

[FaxModem1]

I'm suddenly reminded of my Independence Day DVD.

Okay, for perspective, back in 1996, Independence Day had an alternate ending made involving something a bit similar to this situation:

Link



Note what Dean Devlin, the man who worked with Roland Emmerich to have Godzilla hide in a city full of millions of people with access to telephones, news stations, and cameras, said about this scene. It lacked 'believability' , as the sight of a biplane keeping up with F-16s was patently silly on screen.

I wonder if it was your inspiration.

Please, when making these, think on whether or not it would look silly, and try to make it a bit better, or scrap the idea.

[Imperial528]

This question has been answered already:



This pits biplanes that are considerably more developed than WWI ones against the earliest jet fighters.

Now tack on five plus decades of aerodynamic, engine, weaponry, and electronics development.

If you don't want to watch the video, they have a scoreboard at the end. The visible biplane kills total to 5. The jet kills total to 145. Interestingly the jet deaths total to 22, meaning more jets were destroyed by mid-air collision or crashes than by enemy fire.

Normally a video game shouldn't be taken as proof, but given the question at hand, I think this should suffice for a decent visual at the least.

[LaCroix]

One more thing - concerning the "ground battle".

Most WW1 airplanes are taildraggers. Which means that all their guns point up into the sky while running slow. At angles of 20° and more. Anything they'd like to fire at while on ground would have to be gigantic, or very close and big.

The little wheel in their tail also has (for almost all of them) no controls - they cannot stear until they have enough speed that the rudder becomes effective. Steer, as in - make slight corrections to the straight run. Turning around was done by getting someone to push and pull.

A modern jet can steer, even at low speeds. They are actually pretty agile on ground.

There is no way a WW1 plane could target any modern fighter in a ground battle, at all. Their aim is fixed to an up angle, cna only run in straight lines, and they can't turn to aim. Unless the jet choses to make lazy passes almost right in front of them, coming very close. And even then, he'd most likely only endanger his vertical stabilizer and rudder to the guns.

[Broomstick]

This question has been answered already:

...[snip]...

This pits biplanes that are considerably more developed than WWI ones against the earliest jet fighters.

Now tack on five plus decades of aerodynamic, engine, weaponry, and electronics development.

If you don't want to watch the video, they have a scoreboard at the end. The visible biplane kills total to 5. The jet kills total to 145. Interestingly the jet deaths total to 22, meaning more jets were destroyed by mid-air collision or crashes than by enemy fire.

Normally a video game shouldn't be taken as proof, but given the question at hand, I think this should suffice for a decent visual at the least.

I'd also like to mention that the dude in the first person view here is NOT a particularly skillful pilot and has trouble controlling the jet at the relatively low speeds required to even reasonably engage the biplanes - someone with more piloting skills will do a hell of a lot better.

(This was a problem faced by the Me163 Komet, a rocket powered fighter from WWII - it was so massively faster than the other airplanes of the time that engaging the enemy was essentially done as a high-speed fly-by, followed by a turn and an additional gliding run (because they have only a very limited amount of fuel and always glided to a landing - it was a weird aircraft) giving the pilots only two chances to actually shoot at anyone. In the end the Komet killed more of its own pilots by blowing up than actual combat kills and killed-in-combat)

One more thing - concerning the "ground battle".

Most WW1 airplanes are taildraggers. Which means that all their guns point up into the sky while running slow. At angles of 20° and more. Anything they'd like to fire at while on ground would have to be gigantic, or very close and big.

The little wheel in their tail also has (for almost all of them) no controls - they cannot stear until they have enough speed that the rudder becomes effective. Steer, as in - make slight corrections to the straight run. Turning around was done by getting someone to push and pull.

All taildraggers want to swap ends and roll ass-first. Which might be why such gear configurations are a rarity when building aircraft these days. You can turn them around, but particularly for the very early ones you risk losing control. Which is not something you want to do in combat. The most well-behaved taildragger I've driven on the ground was much more of a pain in the ass to control than the most obnoxious tricycle gear airplane. And the taildraggers of WWI would not be what I would call "well-behaved".

[LadyTevar]

Everyone has proved why this scenario results in biplane debris all over the airspace. Archinist has yet to return to answer the questions. Thread Locked.