BF109 - Can't we just have the gunsight in the middle?

Actually thinking about it I don't think that Lixma's picture is realistic.

BUT:
It might be possible that in fact one did not have to lean right for aim. It depends on how the reflector glas actually worked.

As far as I understood reflector sights the trick is to project light on a surface that is reflected so that the pilot can see it. Now from school we know that inbound angle = outbound angle. That is the benefit of the reflector sight with respect to iron sights because this makes the aiming point almost independent of small head movements. The image will slightly move but it won't impact the aiming as much.

A little picture about the basic principle after which to my understanding a reflector sight works. For simplicity I moved the light source into the same horizontal plane as the eye but the principle won't change at all with a 90° moved light source:



The angle between the reflector glas and the light beam emanating from the light source is equal to the line of sight when the eye is on the image. That's the basical law of optical physics.

Now what happens if the reflector glas is slightly inclined sideways? Yes, the angle between the light beam and the reflector glas decreases and so the angle between reflector sight and the eye line of view. This itself increases the angle between the light beam and the eye line of view so that the image can be seen from further aside. But it will be on the reflector glas and not on the window.

Here a drawing with the setup as described. I exagerated on purpose the inclination of the reflector side to better make the effect visible. Please also keep in mind that with appropriate glas cristal design it should be possible to obtain the same optical result without really inclining the reflector glas.



My strong feeling is that taking into account the tight cockpit dimensions of the 109 and the not so far off-centre position of the reflector sight a very very very tiny inclination would have been enough to allow seeing the image without leaning sideways.

Anyhow I agree with drewpee. I mean we're not talking about making the 109 turn better than the spit. We talk about computer hardware limitations in simulations and as far as I see it there's absolutely no loss in realism if the sights can be recentred on a button push (I even suggested something that is inbetween the current status and old IL2 days).