Weapons Performance
by Hammer
These pages contain results from various tests conducted on the weapons
in Ace High. I have tried to capture the performance of the weapons systems
used and present them in a way that is useful for determining what convergence
you'd like to use, how aim points might need to be adjusted at various ranges,
and how weapons that are paired together compare.
Aces High has a nice little tool you
can use to check the effects of various convergence settings. Using the command
".target xxx", where xxx is a range such as 400, puts a Bullseye type target
due north of your position, at your altitude, at the distance specified.
This distance and location remains constant as you maneuver your plane. When
you line up with and fire at the target, your strikes appear as black bullet
holes on the target, such as those in the picture on the left. The picture
on the right is a P-51D at maximum magnification at a range of 203 meters.
Superimposed over it is a target at the same magnification and a range of
200 meters. This gives you an idea of the size of a plane compared to the
rings of the target. If you decide to do some testing yourself, keep in mind
that to shoot at a target at exactly your altitude, you will generally enter
a shallow dive since most planes fly a bit nose up. Make sure you have enough
altitude that you don't crash while you are checking things out. To make
the target disappear, use the command ".target 0".
Direct Comparisons: The purpose of these pages is to allow a comparison of points of impact of bullets at various ranges when set to the same convergence. All weapons were set to a convergence range of 350 meters and fired at the "bullseye" at 200, 400, 600, 800, and 1000 meters. Results are shown by various groupings for easier comparison without having to print pages. A weapon was tested from only one platform (preferably a center-line mount) so varying barrel lengths are not accounted for.
Heavy (.50cal, 13mm, etc) Machine Guns
Rifle Caliber (.30cal, 7mm, etc) Machine Guns
Plane Specific Tests: These tests show the strike-points of bullets at various ranges and convergence settings for specific planes. For planes with multiple types of weapons, each weapon was tested separately.