Rhrich

I’ve got the same question regarding squawking, can I fiddle with the transponder without going in the back?

Might be my lack of internet-skill, and in that case I apologise and ask for links, but I can’t find a good tutorial on front seat use? From what I can make out from old post the ADF in the front radio was not functional when the Turkey was released. Has this changed? The tutorials I find all recommend going to the back seat to set it up, but is there a good way to do it all from the front? Using that Jester wheel or some other magic? I'm quite new to DCS and only gradually getting to the point where I’m good enough to fly procedures and ADF would sure come in handy.

I’ll promise you Sir: If you make an electrode-to-balls add on you’re going to get a lot of new, but weird, customers. You’ll probably be surprised by their follow up requests though. Still not reading before you write? Honestly, Naquaii is doing a good job representing his/her company, but it would be easier without it’s groupie. I’ll spell it out for you one last time: Nothing, because the screens are crystal clear. If they try to make them burned out it’s going to be hard in VR, therefore, I hope they’ll make it optional if they do. But, all cockpit interactions in a sim on is trickier than in the real thing - unless you’ve got something like a professional sim with wrap around screens and a full cockpit. Long time ago, so my memory might be off but the 14s cockpit is roomy enough. And it would surprise me if USN pilots was strapped in tight the whole time… Probably better than my suggestion. Or, make them take compulsory training. Point is, there isn’t a “real” simulator anywhere. It’s always compromises. And that should include things like the readability of cockpit instruments and screens. That said, modifications is an excellent concept and if the makers allow this thing to to be used I think we should be happy and don’t bug them with anything more.

Correct. You could also get more realism if you add fear by having electrodes attached to your balls that gave you a shock if you crashed. But I’m not suggesting that either.

That’s fine, if you make it an option. Please remember that while a flight sim is far easier than flying the real thing in a lot of aspects.* Sims of modern fighters by necessity also end up being a simulation of operating a computer, without a proper interface and without looking directly at the screens. I.E.: It’s a lot harder to operate and view than the real thing. *The first thing anyone making a “real as possible” flight sim should do is to severely restrict head movement at high Gs. The second is to intrude genuine fear

Damn, you replied 12 minutes after my post. If you’re on the forum that often you can at least take your time to read my post, because you’ve clearly either misunderstood it or misread it on purpose. I’ll help you out: 1: Government property isn’t always well looked after. Some tomcats looked and smelled badly. We all agree on that. However, Tomcats weren’t much worse than other airframes with same amount of use. Therefore: 2: The approach to recreating this in a sim differ. In my view others have done this better than Heatblur. Take the F-5 or F-16. I’ve seen very worn down cockpits in both, much worse than the one in game. 3: I Read my point about visibility once more, perhaps you’ll get it this time. 4: The only thing I would state is unrealistic about the cockpit in the 14 is the screens. There’s no way screens that crisp went with a cockpit that worn. At least, that wasn’t the norm. From what I’ve heard most where burnt in to some degree and adjusting them wasn’t easy. Luckily they haven’t pursued this, it would make the game unplayable. 5. If the publisher really thinks is going to take that much time to make a better looking cockpit the answer seems obvious: Buy the rights to this mod, improve it, make some changes and call it a day. There can’t be any money in spending a lot of man hours recreating something the average player can get for free.

Haven’t anyone told you keyboard warriors that if you haven’t got something reasonable or valid to say you should stay silent? Try to be a bit more civilised in the future, and if you don’t have a few thousand hours in one, don’t tell me how a cockpit should look. If you can’t behave I’m sure there is a Barbie or Lego forum more suitable to your maturity level.

That’s very good news! Thank you!

Thank you for your reply. That sort of works out the same. The technicians would seldom have access to the screens while they where in operation. And as I said, all those who worked on the plane or flew it would have their memory clouded by now. I agree. As far as I’m concerned this mod solves my issues. Thank you for an excellent mod. The Tomcat is more modern than me, and while I disagree in some of your choices I will say that no other sim has given me the same smile and feeling of flying as your Tomcat. I’m very grateful!

You’re artists and you are entitled to portray your work in any way you want. But I do wonder why you are so intent on representing the tomcat as worn as possible, they didn’t all look like that and no one ever rattled. But I would appreciate it if you took my post into consideration, especially the bold text which in all modesty is a valid point. Btw: I’m going to guess your SMEs work in or have access to museum pieces. That’s the only way you would end up with so worn instruments and combine them with such crisp screens - with fingerprints. (Pilots vary, but I always wiped those.) As tomcats, like all planes, varied it would be appreciated if you also tried to make some look decent. The CAG planes almost never looked like this.

This will give you no valuable information. You should know that you can’t compare the time span from start to finish for someone working on and off in their free time and unrelated to the project and presumably unfamiliar with it, to a professional with intimate knowledge and experience and working full time.

Thanks for help, but unfortunately it wasn’t the solution. I sort of solved it using a solution I found in an old Reddit post: I booted up as normal, set all sound in DCS to 0 (all sound sliders) and quit DCS. Then I booted up DCS again and set the sliders up again. Then I’ve got sound as normal. However, a new problem has arisen: The sound works as long as I’m in DCS. If I then quit, it will not work again the next time I start DCS and I’ll have to repeat the process mentioned over. Any ideas how to solve this? Since the solution is found in DCS I’m going to assume that the issue also is within DCS. But what can cause this: So, to be clear, the issue is: If I don’t set all the volume sliders in DCS sound settings to 0 before exiting, DCS won’t give me sound next time I start. Edit: I’m as certain as I can be windows settings didn’t affect this and that it is something inside DCS that’s causing it.

This was most excellent, thank you. This made the Tomcat a thousand times more enjoyable for an old fart playing in Vr

Thanks again! Unfortunately it doesn’t seem to solve anything. What else can I try? What can cause this?

Hey Mud, thanks for your help. Yes, it’s selected and the volume is turned up. From reading through comments here I see the multithreaded game seems to have some issues. I believe I’m running with that. Can this be an explanation? Im not sure how I run without multi but with VR. (I’ve downloaded a DCS update tool that lets me run DCs without vr, and then the sound is fine, but I’m not sure if that is multi or not).

I’m having a problem and I don’t even know how to start troubleshooting. I'm suddenly, and without having changed anything, not hearing any sounds in VR. I’m getting sound from the VR headset for everything else (like if I open YouTube or Spotify) and the sound in game is set to the correct output. Any ideas? Where do I start to troubleshoot? Specs and what I’ve checked so far: Windows 10, DCS MT, G2 headset, openxr running through DCS. In windows sound mixer I can’t find DCS, but it’s one “unknown source” and it’s not muted. I’ve tried repairing DCS. It is updated to latest patch. PS: I’m an old fart using DCS to combat my withdrawal symptoms from not being able to fly planes in real life, so I might not be the most tech savvy.

I’ll add my two cents here. I believe you are confusing realism with difficulty. With a few stupid exceptions, the radar altimeter on the Hawkeye is glaring one, instruments isn’t and shouldn’t be hard to read - if the pilot is using energy or concentration on that something is very wrong. If any plane had instruments so worn they where hard to read one would never fly it except in an emergency. On the other hand, stuff like the trip on the stick might be very worn, much more than the DCS F-14. The most annoying part for me is the smudges that makes things unreadable in certain lighting conditions. A trick is to always carry a piece of cotton napkin, suppose it would be microfibre today, to remove any smudges.

Dear all. Late, but I wanted to thank you for your help. I found a whole bunch of shadow settings and I couldn’t figure out which one I was supposed to change. However I did install this, and it was a tremendous difference. I’m used to steam gauges and this made it all clear. They where not only readable, but it was also easy to see tendencies. Just like in real life. Also, am I imagining it or did the performance increase also? It doesn’t look as realistic as standard, but the wear does actually look more realistic. Combined with better readability this is a game changer for me. I’m grateful!

1: Thank you. 2: I have a Hewlett-Packard G2. From what I’ve read online it’s got slightly better graphics than the Rift S. My pc have a 3070 card.

Thank you, I’ll make sure to do that! Do you think it will have a major impact on performance?

1: There was differences I’m sure. I've heard but can’t confirm that CAGs plane usually looked better and from memory I believe the only one I’ve ever sat in was flown by the CAG. I get the impression that people have strong opinions about this, and I don’t see any use in discussing it further. It’s also hard to answer: The SMEs and developers only got access to museum pieces (often the most worn planes, and in all cases handled by workmen to make sure there isn’t any useful parts for Iran) and the airmen and maintainers memory will be clouded by time. The images that exist of cockpits when the plane was in service are not necessarily representative. The strongest objection I have is the following: If you make it look like a worn, but still realistic, cockpit on a 4k screen with a excellent graphics card, the average player with more average equipment and the constraints of VR glasses will have a much harder time viewing the instruments than a pilot flying the aircraft would. The attempt at realism therefore makes it unrealistic and further compromises playability. A simple solution to make the graphics more crisp when in VR or introduce an option seems obvious. 2: Sorry, I guess I’m slow. What do you mean by this? Should I enable shadows? What would your recommended settings be for improving this? Thank you very much, that’s kind of you! I will test and report back.

Thank you. The site was somewhat inaccessible and I only found a few mods, but one was named “less forge”. Is this what you had in mind? The wires add a certain “overtime deployment” feeling that might be expected if a major war was to break out. So even though they again are more of a artist work than realism I like them. It’s the gauges and the canopy I would have liked to change. How do I make the 14s canopy as transparent as the 16? And is there any way to change the cockpit gauges themselves? In real life they certainly could be, and VR makes it harder to see long distance as it is, so it would be most welcome.

Thank you for an excellent forum, game and airplane. Is anyone able to recommend settings or modifications to enhance cockpit visibility? Both instruments and view outside though the canopy. This plane is a joy to fly, but unfortunately VR in combination with an ageing (both me and the computer) makes the cockpit visibility, both viewing out of the canopy and the instruments, harder than it should be. I’ve got no problem with the steam gauges in other modules, but the artificial ageing and worse, the artificial scratching and dirt on the canopy makes, makes it challenging to view properly. It’s my understanding that the developer of this module have made a decision to age the aircraft as much as possible to create the ambiance they desire, and that is any artist right. But it does somewhat harm the playability. Is there any way to change this? Either with settings or some sort of modifications? Even though it might go against the artist’s intent I would not regard this as cheating. Having had the good fortune in my career to view and sit in multiple cockpits, including the F-14 and F-16, I can tell from first hand experience that among NATO countries there was 16s with much more wear and tear than what’s presented in the F-14 cockpit (never been in a block 50 US) and there was 14 cockpits in way better conditions than the current 16 cockpit. Of course, this was not always up to the pilot, sometimes he (or she) would luck out and sometimes not. And the random element introduced in the 14 adds a very nice touch.

So I didn’t screw something up? Thanks for the help, have a great day!

Hi,I’ve got a strange problem and hope some of you kind folks might be able to help me. Sometimes, at random and even when I just spawned into the jet in some of the “quick missions” the VDI wont display anything when I turn to “TV”. In “norm” everything looks normal, but in TV I only get the crosshair in the middle. I’m pretty sure the jet isn’t broken because it’s there when I spawn into it, for example sometimes in the basic BFM mission in Caucasus: the moment I spawn without doing anything: the VDI in TV mode will just display the crosshair and nothing else. This also happens, apparently at random, when using the lantirn. If I switch to Rio I can see everything just fine, but in the pilots seat I see all text and numbers from the lantirn, but the picture itself is just grey - like I’m looking at clouds. In the Rio seat everything is normal. I’m sure the fault is mine and that it’s not a bug, but I can’t figure out what it is. Tried messing with contrast, brightness and night filter. To no effect. And as stated, I see the digital symbols and text, just not the image feed. Please help! What might be the problem?