RyanR

There's a patch today? The F-16 starts so easy, I just do it myself. Two stitches and advance the throttle to idle. When I've auto-, hot-, or air-started, I feel like I have to "undo" more things than I have to do with the DIY-start. -Ryan

The ICP works the same with UHF/VHF radios. Once you get used to it, it makes a lot of sense.... but it's taken me a month to really even get comfortable with it. Finding ground targets is just not easy. I dunno how many times I've overflown the bad guys.... the bad guys that I put in a spot in a mission I made! -Ryan

Sadly, there's loads of mis-info. Just hit "steerpoint" (STPT).... #4 on the UFC/ICP? It's right under #1. Type in the steerpoint you want, and enter. I found the attached file for the "grids". Once you get it to work once, it works OK. It's just really hard to type in the 8-digit MGRS code before the radio messages disappear. I really need to map my keyboard's number pad to the ICP. Tonight, I found a simple mission someone made for an A-10, and I swapped it out for an F-16. Attached. I put some Mav's and some GBU's on it. It's a ground start, so the MAV's aren't boresighted. JTAC's seem to be pretty sketchy. The JTAC's for the quick mission builder seem to be especially sketchy. -Ryan MGRS.pdf JTAC_Training_Mission_UTM.miz

This tutorial is *amazing*! Thanks! -Ryan

I shall check these out. I've also got a VKB KG12 (clone of a 109/190 grip) from IL-2. That's sitting on the shelf since I caught the DCS bug a month ago! I got pretty good with toe brakes coming from the tail draggers. In DCS, toe brakes are a gawd-send with the F-86. The NWS is slow to react on takeoff.... so I'm guilty of the occasional nudge on the brakes to straighten her out. Definitely don't use rudders a heck of a lot in the F-16. -Ryan

Thanks guys! Indeed, I thought the answer here would be to just change the steerpoint.... and slewing the FCR is a fine workaround for the rare times this would need to happen. For the most point, one will be chasing a mark point for AG work. Cheers! -Ryan

It seems so obvious now, but it took me weeks to realize that since steerpoints have an altitude, the TGP points to that place in the sky. Not the ground. I chased my tail for a few weeks not understanding this. I felt so dumb. Is there an easy way to "snap" the TGP to the ground "under" a steerpoint without modifying the steerpoint? You can go through the FCR in AG mode and either set a SPI or just slew the cursor, and that will do the trick. Just wondering if there's a more direct way to accomplish this. I can't think of a practical reason to really do this, other than having botched setting up a practice mission. Thanks! -Ryan

While I don't know what half of the Mission Editor does, the learning curve isn't too bad to set up simple tasks (AKA stuff to blow up). I've found it to be a really good way to learn the various systems/etc. You can play with the weather and time, and push yourself where you see a need to improve. I got really frustrated with all the distractions with some of the built-in, or Quick Mission Builder. Mostly because other friendlies would blow up all the baddies before I could even find one. It was really helpful to make my own little practice tasks. -Ryan

I really want to like the idea of the VKB rudders. I just can't let go of having toe brakes. If I had another axis to control pressure, I'd probably do the VKB rudders in a heartbeat. I like their products a lot. -Ryan

Are you in CCRP mode? The TGP likes to be in point or area mode. If you change the steerpoint, the TGP will snap to that. I remember setting the steerpoints to auto for the first time. I sure thought that slick..... until I overflew a target, the steerpoint changed, and then all the senors slewed away. -Ryan

The "enable" tip is really neat. If I recall, you need the same button to align the HMCS on the ground, so it's handy to have mapped. Thanks! -Ryan

What are you using for rudders? My TM rudder pedals need replaced. My other sim hardware is VKB..... but their rudders don't have brakes.....

The F-16 is such a great example of good UI/UX. The avionics are super deep, but it's easier to focus on learning them, and you can keep your eyes out of the cockpit. I bought the A-10 recently. Soooo many switches. It works so well in DCS, too. Clickable cockpits make it easy to get into things. I started with the original Falcon on an Atari ST in 1988. I was enamored with the F-16 from then on. Tried Falcon 4 AF, like 15-20 years ago. Too many key bindings to remember... and the view system didn't work well without head tracking. I mostly was prop/warbird simming. I'm enjoying (and sometimes not enjoying.....) that everything is a learning experience. Even BFM and trimming the jet is a totally different animal from WWII and early jets. It's like starting over completely. -Ryan

Yeah.... I was kinda flustered when I clacked the keys typing this thread. Problem seems to be intermittent, and only happens if there is bad guy radar in the RWR. This is with the long ALQ-184. Position 3 only works in manual mode. Pos 2 and 1 work in the semi/auto modes. Positions 2-3 are ECM priority. Position 1 is radar priority. All of this is correct, and the radar is disabled when it's supposed to be. Every once and awhile, I can't get the FCR going again after being in Position 3, and then CMS switch right. That should put it the ECM in standby. When this happens I've tried adjusting every knob/switch on the CMDS panel. I've tried the flipping the FCR on/off ("rebooting". so to speak) on the right-side control panel. The only thing that works is turning the ECM pod off. The FCR starts sweeping again at than point. After a bit of frustration, the problem goes away by itself. It's just odd. -Ryan

Are there any "just for fun" squads? I haven't done online simming in 25-30 years. Things got too serious too quick. Though, I bet the devolving furball world of the WWII sims probably doesn't exist with DCS jet folks. I haven't seen good JTAC *tutorials*. Just people flying JTAC missions. Just doing a thing isn't isn't a tutorial. Wags has one, but the text is impossibly small.... and there's no breakdown of the lingo. The Reapers have one, but it's a real life guy doing the lazing. -Ryan

Try the training missions. Most of them work. Some are broke. I'm a month into DCS myself after decades of filght simming. The highs are high. The lows are low. Tip: Any tutorial older than about six months is obsolete and no longer applicable. Either the developers changed something, or the sim is simply broke/bugged. I'm hitting the point of finding a more "mature" aircraft model. I love the F-16, but I'm burned out from the bugs and lack of documentation. -Ryan

Is there a trick to getting the FCR to start up again if you have the ECM pod in manual/saturation mode? No matter what I do, I can't get the FCR to work after using the ECM in the full back position. If I turn the ECM pod completely off, the radar works again. If I turn in on, the radar stops sweeping. Nothing on the CMDS panel seems to have any effect. I just want to get it into radar priority mode. It seems that time is the only cure. Which would be fine if the red triangle from the AWACS wasn't screaming at you head on, and all you want is a radar track to send an AMRAAM down range. -Ryan

I pulled up the mission in the editor, sure enough, the F-18's last waypoint is #8. So they bug out. The "start at push? has the F-16's scattered. Might as well be herding cats. It takes 10-15 minutes to wrangle them into formation. Sheesh. This should be embarrassing to ED that another F-16 thing is broke. -Ryan

I've been stuck on the last mission. If you fly the mission from cold, the F-18 escort flies off to the east at push time. It never comes back. Since they're TDNL donors, you can watch them on the HSD after they fly east over your head. *Every* friendly flight gets shot down one by one. Your F-16 flight runs into both Groups of Flankers. If you survive to live to steerpoint #9, you're out of countermeasures and missiles. It's pretty bleak. In contrast, when you F10 and "skip to push time", you get a completely different mission. The F-18's spearhead the push, shoot down baddies. Friendly flights all pretty much live. It's almost too easy to scoot over the target and dump the GBU's, then laze the target as you break for beers. Something's gotta be off? -Ryan

Something that caught me off is that steerpoints have an altitude. The TGP will set to that altitude. You can't snap back down to earth unless you jiggle the cursor on the AG radar. Speaking of radar, I have noticed that the FCR will maintain its offset (with no SPI created) for a given steerpoint, even if you cycle to another steerpoint and back to the current one. I've found that I need to CZ the radar and the TGP. Is there a master "zero" function to wipe out all of the sensors? -Ryan

Make sure you push at the time in the planner. If you leave a few minutes early, it's hopeless. If you leave on time, there's more friendly assets in the air, and I think the F-18's start flinging Harms that way. -Ryan

Are you using the radio preset? I think it's 20? -Ryan

It almost seems to me that it takes the Maverick longer to lock on a target with the the TGP handoff than it does with the the WPN page as SOI. Thew other thing, is that no matter how well you boresight the missiles, you really need to have an eye on the WPN page to see when the MAV seeker can distinguish one target from another. -Ryan

The funny thing is that this is not a problem at all anymore. I just do it, and it works. What prompted this thread was a couple changes in a recent update that made some tutorials obsolete. The key is to learn what it looks like when the ground boresight "takes", and when it doesn't. When the boresight "highlights", and then un-highlights, you know you're good. You can cycle the two stations and see that they're boresighted. So many threads like this happen because you messed something up, and then it doesn't work when you're starting down a SAM site. I think screw-ups around SAM sites cause most posts around here. I'm appreciative that the community is top notch. -Ryan

Thanks all! The friendlies in the mission aren't in the "flight" (not blue on the HSD), so I'm guessing that's part of the issue. Not really enough time in a training mission to troubleshoot. -Ryan