Ephedrin

Question: what data do AMRAAM and Sparrow need to be loaded into? The Amraam is guided via datalink and the sparrow is a semi active radar homing missile that doesn‘t get or require any data at all. The connection between aircraft and Aim120 happens when you bump the weapon select switch up doesn‘t it?

Cheers everyone, I have the TM Warthog Hotas and I would like to assign the paddle switch to the Head Track Zoom function in several aircraft. I fly in VR (Reverb G2) and in most aircraft except the Hornet this switch isn‘t of any real use for the sim purpose. But I was only able to set it to zoom in the Cummunity Mod A4. In all other aircraft this function is greyed out for the HOTAS. I could use my autopilot panel which I have for other sims for example or an XBox controller but the Hotas devices are impossible to bind. Does anybody know the reason for that and is there a work around? I‘m using the DCS beta. thank you!

It‘s the same in the F18, any kill by an R27 or R77 missile will kill the pilot, as well as almost every kill by an R73. Only IGLAs and gun hits can be survived although every gun hit will empty the tank of the F16 within a minute

Good to know, thanks

Last point first: what stick do you use? I don‘t know many that have a double trigger except the expensive sticks and they all have a pickle button. regarding the missile(s): A2A missiles won‘t launch if you‘re in A/G master mode so if you want to drop bombs or launch the HARM (intentionally) you don‘t have to fear an Amraam or Sidewinder to go off. At the same time when you‘re in A/A the only weapon that can be started with the pickle button is the HARM in SP or override mode. I‘m not even sure atm if the HARM should start if it‘s only in SP but with the override button boxed while in A2A. I always turn the override off for that reason but I‘m usuall using PB or TOO with that weapon. With it off you can be in A2A mode and hit the pickle button to shoot the HARM at a ground station that attacks you. What you can definitely do is make sure that when you enter the stores page that the HARM at the top is not boxed so it‘s turned off. Nothing will (should) happen then regardless of the missile‘s mode and your master mode.

That‘s the whole point of the self protect mode. If you assign it that way you have to deal with pressing the pickle button. Solution 1: deactivate the HARM or put it into another mode Solution 2: assign your hardware properly. Edit: you could turn the trigger assignment around… trigger first stage, pickle second stage. Should work..

So it always moves back to the center when you trim?

Yeah totally understandable and I catch myself often enough to do the same. The FCS of the hornet invites you to do that. Just flip the switch and the velocity vector comes up towards the E-bracket. The problem is that you actually do a try and error here, you don‘t fly and give up the responsibility. And it takes time. Flip the trim switch, wait, flip the switch, wait again… it‘s inaccurate and if something unforseen happens like a strong thermal from s railstation below you (or a slightly too high approach speed for your current weight) you lose your nose, it will go somewhere you don‘t expect it to be. That‘s why it‘s important to always stay ahead and in command of your airplane. Keep your hands around the stick firmly, if the nose climbs push it down. Always fly the airplane with the stick and don‘t let it go. If you have to hold the stick forward to keep the velocity vector in the bracket you trim forward to relieve the force. Most of our home joysticks will be returned to the center but in reality the force would be removed and the stick would stay there. If you only flipped the trim switch this would move the stick itself, too, that’s what I meant it would be more obvious in the real hornet. If you‘re on speed in calm air you‘ll be able to perfectly manage your glide path with the engines and only use the ailerons for directional control. But always expect to make corrections with the elevator.

Exactly. Fly the velocity vector into the E Bracket and if you have to keep pressure on the stick trim that pressure away. In a real F18 it would be more obvious since the forces are much stronger there but it‘s a principle of flying any airplane: fly with the stick or yoke and trim forces away.

Everytime somebody tells you they tell you nonsense and that‘s why you‘re having issues with the nose. Trim is not a flight control. Not in a C172, not in a 737 and not in an F/A-18. Trim has exactly and only one purpose and that is to neutralize control forces. You fly the airplane with the stick and if you drop the flaps and this results in a nose up reaction then push it down. If you have to keep pushing THEN trim the forces away. If you let the airplane raise its nose because the electronics don’t compensate enough you give up the control and become a passenger of your plane. You’re supposed to be the pilot though. It‘s entire nonsense and bad flying to trim the velocity vector into the E bracket even if it‘s a recurring advice in hundreds of Youtube videos. Trim is not a flight control. Period.

No.. the target designation is something else. Boxing it is just the logical communication with the airplane. You don‘t designate a target with the DDI buttons except the WPDSG button which will use a selected waypoint. Would be quite a sad outcome if you sent a SLAM towards your Tacan Generally you designate a target via your sensors, so TGP, HUD/HMD, Radar, maybe SA page in the real plane. Navigation has nothing to do with the weapons and that‘s why it‘s on another page. HSI and SA page look similar but that is all, their purpose is entirely different.

I have the SA page on the lower screen. No map, no problems. ^^

Yep but that‘s still a huge difference to what we do with 1150 live rounds. ^^ good to know that A and C have the same weight though, thanks!

It‘s not the G force that brakes aircraft in a turn, it‘s the angle of attack that comes with pulling the airplane around. Most aircraft have their lowest drag at around 2 degrees AOA, give of take. If you become slower at a high GW you will fly at a higher AOA than if you were light at the same speed or faster at the same weight. This will cause higher drag and hence worse acceleration and performance. All in all the A10 with its mounted pylons, the half retracted wheels and the twin rudder tail is an extremely draggy airplane, it will not go fast. But if you fuel it as low as in the video with all munition removed (gun too!) it will be able to perform the same stunts. Being less than 5% within real specifications throughout the whole flight model is a great achievement already but providing data from another aircraft won‘t help much. The A10C is much heavier (see above) with no change to its shape and regardless if it has received a power update or if it carries its nose higher than the A model it will always suffer from more drag, simply due to aerodynamics. This does NOT mean that it‘s not underpowered, I simply can‘t evaluate that. I don‘t know the real aircraft. The F5 has btw been announced to receive a big update, I guess it‘s just not feasible to updtae it now before that.

I believe it saves when you press „align“ again but could be that you can simply switch the page as well.

You don‘t even have to be perfectly centered first, you can fine tune it right after with the TDC and then you just have to press the cage/uncage once to confirm for side and height and once for roll.

The DCS Hornet‘s AP engages reliably and even catches the altitude if you‘re in a climb or descent. It will oscillate around that altitude a while though. if it doesn‘t work, as said above, check your hardware for proper centering. Almost always a slight null zone is required.

I guess they just don‘t care about a slightly higher life-time of an M61 barrel. It‘s a gatling gun, not a sniper rifle and if a 20mm round costs a dollar or just a few cents less than another one with an objectively better pouder or load it‘s much more feasable. Doesn‘t change the fact though that fire like that is never a good sign for any gun lol

Sparks usually mean that the powder burns slower than the bullet takes to leave the barrel. It‘s wasted energy and a bad optimization of load and gun. It leaves a dirty barell and increases the wear and tear of the gun. On the other hand a slower burning powder makes a softer acceleration hence less recoil and less stress on the shoulder or in this case the mounting of the gun in the airframe. However I simply guess that there are different charges from the factory and some burn cleaner and some make more fireworks, it‘s the same problem with every mass product. But that‘s grey theory. In DCS however to make a final point we normally use tracers and it‘s no big news that any tracer munition makes a firework leaving the muzzle (and ruins every gun and leaves dirt and worn barrels) so I guess it‘s a give and take. Has anyone tried what happens with TP or ground attack load outs? It shouldn‘t spark THAT much at least.

It depends on how you slewed the targeting pod to the area of interest. If you use a waypoint with WPDSG on the HSI or SA page this is the point it will look at. This is also the point where your JDAM in TOO mode would go. It‘s the equivalent to a ground radar designation. WPDSG, ground radar, whatever you do with the castle switch, they all provide the system with a target. If you then move the tpod around with the TDC you need to tell the system that this new coordinates are your target and you do this with TDC depress. I believe that when you don‘t slave the TPod to a point and directly use it with the HMD or just by flying it to a target you only need to go into a track mode, area/point or scene/auto. This is from memory, I do all that with muscle memory so the explanation could be slightly wrong but I believe that this is how it works just keep in mind that the TPod works a bit differently with the Hornet‘s avionic than in the Warthog or Viper.

It starts here. but you‘re totally right though. I totally disliked the Hornet first, wouldn‘t get to grips with its FCS and avionics, coming from the A10. It tool a while and background knowledge of what a radar is, how and why it sees object, what TWS is and how an AIM120 or an Aim7 works (or an R77 and R27 to survive for a change). Know the ranges of your weapons at different altitudes and suddenly the Hornet wasn‘t so bad anymore, in fact it was pretty darn good and complete when I started flying it. Sure, currently there are a couple of things that are broken but usually they get fixed soon (and other things break *cough*). It‘s just what software development is I guess.

Saw that too but that‘s nonesense. 600ft downwind is case 1. When you‘re approachching a land based runway you‘re doing your pattern/circuit over populated area, imagine you buzz over houses at 250kts (480kph) in 600ft. Instead if you want to do an overhead break approach the airfield at 350kts and 1500ft AGL, hold that altitude while you fly your 3G (initially) turn. That‘s way above gear speed btw. Slow down and configure for landing (in this order) while you‘re in a straight and level downwind leg, it‘s really (really!) bad habit in aviation to touch the airfoil in a turn. Turns are aerodynamically unstable and unnatural situations, you don‘t touch your flaps (or spoilers in other aircraft) in a turn. Your FBW controls in this aircraft will stabilize you but a non-FBW aircraft won‘t like it. Start your descent in a wide final turn when the threshold is 45 deg behind you, again, this is not a Case 1. You‘ll have plenty of time to trim and get on speed. I usually drop the gear at 230 kts and the flaps below 200, the FCS will react and I have to push a bit to avoid a climb but it‘s no problem at all. If you use ATC you‘ll fly the Hornet on the glide path with the stick anyway and if you use manual thrust you don‘t need to touch the elevator once on speed (already on downwind).

I had this happen in a couple of my liberation campaigns as well but I haven‘t been able to reproduce it intentionally. I‘m fairly comfortable with the F16, there is not really much required to shoot an Amraam. But sometimes it simply refuses. I‘ll upload a track file if it happens again but as I said I wasn‘t able to reproduce it so the file may become a bit larger/longer. No such problems in the F18.

It‘s actually not a complicated topic but there is too much about it in flight simulation generally. QNH: theoretical baro pressure at the airport at sea level, altimeter readout is actual airport elevation. QFE: actual baro pressure at the airport, altimeter readout is zero simple ops for local flying only: set the altimeter to closest 1000 Altimeters‘ calibration mechanic is higly sensitive and can break easily if abused. In many alimeters there is no hardstop so use the knob sensibly. Use of QFE in DCS ATC is excessive and I assume it comes from the russian background of the sim. Russian aviation uses metric units and when you use meters (1 meter is roughly 3.3 feet) you deal with smaller and less rounded numbers, rounding altitude will lead to higher seperations and wasted space (and less precision at the same time, it‘s easier to display and read 1200ft with an analogue altimeter than the same altitude on a metric altimeter in meters. Hence the habit to use QFE: airport is at zero. Know your airport charts and use QNH, it‘s what you get in ATIS all around the world. If your aircraft has a radio altimeter you may use this one as well for landing, keep bank errors in mind.

A couple of years ago I was using a 3rd party anti virus software and I always had slightly laggy control in and outputs in Prepar3d. I did‘t use DCS at that time. I searched for help in various customer forums and one developer told me he had had the same problem bzt was able to track it down to his antivirus software. The AV was checking everything (!) that was handled in Win7 back then and so it also slowed down the signals coming from my yoke. Could this be something similar?