Impressions...
It is a good manual for the P-51. Systems, Limitations, Normal and Emergency procedures all there. I diligently read the whole thing, copy-pasted the text of the procedures sections and printed them out so that I have a reference checklist. Then spent 45 minutes "sitting in the cockpit" doing some drill. It is not as alien a cockpit as I expected, but there were a couple of "moments".
First, a great many keys for the switches, and as I am a dreadful re-configurer the task of key assignment seemed daunting. However, I was glad to see that it is a clickable cockpit (first I have seen on DCS), and decided to make use of that feature instead.
Next, my information absorption from the manual failed me for a moment, and I found myself searching for the whiskey compass which would be necessary for correcting the gyro compass. I wondered if it might not be a flux-valve corrected gyro, and questioning if these were in use on the P-51 went searching for further information. I found that, yes, they were in use already on 1943 combat aircraft (
ref B-17 here), but nothing on the P-51.
This interactive panoramic also shows a lack of a whiskey compass. However, reference again to the manual "reminded" me that the instrument I was beginning to assume was an ADF up on the top left corner of the panel was indeed the remote magnetic compass, and the gyro is not flux-valve corrected.
Finally, when I tried to open the cockpit with the crank handle, there were a lot of "sliding" noises, but the canopy did not move. I assume the animation is not working on the 3D model. Not important. I culminated the session starting the engine (it caught on the second try), and shutting it down again, according to procedures. It is all I had time for today.
One thing I was not in complete agreement with on the manual was the take-off procedure recommendation to go to full take-off power as promptly as possible. I remember (yet again this reference!) in Yeager's autobiography, he mentioned the employment of great respect for the P-51's torque / P factor / prop disc precession / spiral flow adverse effects on take off, and a procedure of increasing power in three separate increments, as speed and rudder authority increased. That will be the one deviation I will apply myself here on the sim, when the time comes, and if I don't immediately trundle off onto the grass. From what I am reading, DCS tail-draggers are dicey.
OK... its approaching midnight and I still have not managed to get into the air. I can get to 170 km/h, stay on the runway... but once I slowly release the stick the plane does not take off and instead decides to yaw from the runway, roll until a wing breaks and then somersaults until it explodes.
No idea what makes it become so instable in that moment. Rudder and ailerons seems to have no effect to prevent it.
I was left wondering about Urwumpe's problems with the FW190-D9. You haven't, by any chance, reduced the saturation on the pitch axis in hopes of making the aircraft a bit more docile for first flights? It is just a thought, but from what I am reading and deducing here, the full elevator travel seems to be required to lock the tail wheel. But yes, I see you are maintaining control at lower speeds during the run, so it is probably not that.
