AlphaOneSix

Flechette darts have much lower mass than rifle bullets, so they don't compare favorably. For example, green tip 5.56mm is 62 grains, while the darts from a flechette rocket are only about 20 grains.

Initially, back in the A-model days, installing the 230 gallon tanks meant that the gun had to be inhibited since its range of motion could mean that you shoot the tank. During Desert Storm, the fire control computer software was updated to basically "cut out" a portion of the gun's range of motion in order to prevent that situation. We used to train routinely in the A-model with the 230 gallon tanks. Keep in mind, as mentioned above, the tanks are not ballistic- or crash-resistant, so taking them into combat could be a bad idea. Risk vs. reward and all that.

Nope, you've hit the nail on the head, pardon the pun.

It's not completely accurate but it gets the job done.

But you don't have infinite coolant. I'm interested to see how this is handled in-game.

That launcher has two Iglas. The thing in the middle is the coolant, I believe.

I understand the Russian mentality behind having a flight engineer on the Mi-8, and I even generally agree with it. However, I've flown on Mi-8's for almost 15 years and I've never once flown with a flight engineer, and we don't see any issues with not having one. We do, however, fly with two crew chiefs in the back, American-style.

It fits because everything about the NATO 12.7mm x 99mm cartridge is smaller than the 12.7mm x 108mm cartridge, except for the diameter of the bullet, which is the ONLY thing that's the same about these two rounds. The neck is shorter, the shoulder is a smaller angle, the cartridge is a smaller diameter and shorter. I don't believe that a NATO .50 cal round will even go into battery in a weapon designed for 12.7mm x 108. So no, I don't believe it would even fire but if it did the results would be very bad. Then there is the belt, which causes a whole separate issue with feeding.

I don't doubt for a second that he believes it, but it just doesn't pass the sniff test as far as I'm concerned. Lots of stories like that get passed around in the military as fact when they are just not. Sort of like the whole "it's illegal to shoot people with the .50 cal" that everyone always says but is totally untrue.

I'm still trying to find a credible source that says that this is true. There are so many differences between the cartridges (and belt) that I just don't see how this is possible. Every time I search for it online I just see examples of people saying that it's a false claim.

Great! Let me start by saying that I always wanted to do YouTube videos on Mi-8 systems, but I just don't have it in me. And now I also don't really have the technical means. But if I were to do YouTube videos, I would aspire to make them just like your videos, they are really very good. All of my nitpicks are just that, little nitpicks. They don't affect the flying of the aircraft in-game. I have watched several of your piloting technique videos, and I honestly have no input for those, I think they are just about perfect as they are. But anyway, here we go... This list is all based on the Cold Start Tutorial video. 08:24 Location of service fuel tank. It is located above the cargo cabin, underneath the hydraulic deck, behind the main gearbox compartment. 08:41 References to "kerosene tank" for the heater. The heater is fed fuel from the service fuel tank just like the APU and engines. It does not have its own separate fuel tank. Jet fuel is just more highly refined kerosene, after all. 09:46 The APU is a self contained gas turbine engine. Compressed air from the APU is just bleed air from the APU combustion section. 10:11 There is no air tank for the APU. The air pressure gauge is measuring the line pressure in the piping that goes from the APU bleed valve to the engine air starters. 11:00 The reason for starting the downwind engine first is to keep exhaust gases out of the APU intake, which could cause it to overtemp. The engines don't care. 14:50 ECL Discussion. It may work in the game but raising the ECLs don't give you any extra power in real life. It's a longer discussion that I'll get into if interested but I'll save that for later. 19:04 Your standby inverters should be in AUTO during flight so that they can come back on automatically in the event of a dual AC generator failure. Putting them in AUTO early is fine but if they were turned on in MAN earlier they should be placed in AUTO now, not OFF. 24:00 The doppler system and the radar altimeter are two separate systems. 27:35 That box is the ICS controller for the flight engineer. There is no PA for the cabin on this version of the aircraft. 27:54 Again the radar altimeter system is separate from the doppler system. It has it's own antennas separate from the doppler antennas. Sometimes they are on the tail boom but they can also be on the bottom of the airframe. Not sure where they are in this version of the aircraft.

@vsTerminus Your tutorials videos are great. I have some tiny edits that probably don't rise to the level of redoing any of the videos, but might help with your knowledge of the aircraft. If you'd like I can either message my notes to you directly, or I can just put them here in a post for all to see. Thank you for all of your effort!

I don't agree that a pusher tail rotor is always less effective. It depends a lot on the design of the vertical stabilizer. AH-64 uses a pusher, for example.

The increase in tail rotor effectiveness does not come from pusher/puller but rather from benefitting from main rotor airflow over the tail rotor blades. That is, the tail rotor is a lot more effective when the lower half of the tail rotor spins forward into the main rotor downwash. On the older Mi-8 versions (prior to Mi-8M/Mi-8MT) the lower half of the tail rotor spun away from the main rotor downwash. To increase effectiveness, the tail rotor gearbox and the entire tail rotor assembly was simply "flipped" to the other side, changing the direction of rotation and greatly increasing effectiveness without any parts or major design changes. The Mi-8 always had a clockwise-spinning main rotor and therefore always used right pedal to counter torque as power was applied, regardless of which side the tail rotor was on.

Yep same in the Mi-8

Each collective has a spring-loaded INCR/DECR switch to adjust the rotor rpm. It’s set by increasing the collective pitch angle to 3 degrees on the blade pitch indicator and then using the switch to set the rotor rpm to 95%. At full INCR the rotor rpm should be between 96-98% and at full DECR it should be between 89-93%. It’s not meant to be used in flight, but rather just prior to taxi.

One issue with Western pilots that are used to aircraft is that they tend to wait until the bottom of the approach to start bringing in power. I'm no expert, but I think this has to do with the relative low inertia rotor systems that are easy to speed up, and more responsive engines that can spool up much faster, as Victor_UHPK has said. During transition training at my organization, one of the first things we teach new pilots (new to the Mi-8/17, not new to helicopters) is to get the power in early. I wonder if most VRS problems in DCS are caused by this failure to have enough power pulled in early enough during the final approach. The manuals I have differ a little bit but they generally call for a descent rate between 2 and 4 m/s at around 40 km/hr, decreasing to 1.5 to 2 m/s by the time the aircraft is in a hover. Max descent rate at 40 km/hr is 4m/s and max descent rate at a hover is 3 m/s. Touchdown should be between 0.1 and 0.2 m/s.

93% Nr is the rotor speed for takeoff power. 95% Nr is for everything else. The aircraft should not be flown with the ECLs pulled up. If one engine fails, the other will automatically allow allow you to pull more power. Moving the ECL's up from their center detent should only be done for ground testing purposes, since moving the ECL upwards will limit collective travel.

Well I made a longer video but it was in-flight and the wind noise drowns out the whistle noise from the drive link. I should have closed the doors.

I’m working today as you can see 64027765968__A994C8BD-2D3B-4D8E-879E-DB4B4AABC418.MOV

It’s the swashplate drive link 64027759015__3CC9B6BA-254F-4233-BA67-C8C3D623C4FB.MOV

Yeah that seems kind of crazy, since dumping the collective is a sure fire way to immediately over speed the rotor. The flight manual restricts collective movement to no more than 1 degree of blade pitch change per second. Even when practicing autorotations with the engines reduced to idle, you have to be careful how quickly you drop the collective as it will still overspeed the rotor. This aircraft has a very high inertia rotor system, the blades alone weigh 1500 pounds. You should definitely be able to trade airspeed for altitude weigh the collective lowered. I will double check some of these things as I’m flying with a DPE tomorrow. He is used to me asking him oddball questions like this, though.

The various Mi-8/17 flight manuals I have all say that in order to avoid VRS, do not exceed a descent rate of 4 m/s below 40 km/hr, and do not exceed a descent rate of 3 m/s in a vertical descent. vrs.png (994×155) (halo5.net) Oddly, I also have one blurb in an oddball emergency procedure that correlates engine rpm with VRS:

Yeah I hit that point long ago. I still post every now and then, but I gave up trying to make the sim better, I just talk about the real thing and let the virtual pilots figure out the rest on their own. Sometimes my knowledge is helpful to some, and for that, I'm happy enough. I just spent today, for example, making a refueling chart that shows, based on how much fuel you actually put into the aircraft, what the cockpit gauge will read on the ground when the aircraft is parked. (Result: The only time fuel added equals fuel on the gauge, on the ground, is when the tank is nearly full...the emptier it is, the more inaccurate the cockpit gauge is. I don't remember if that's modeled in the game or not.) At any rate, your insight is always welcome here, even if it is from a 47 guy. (I kid, I kid!)

Nosewheel takeoff is a gimmick for looks and to show off. The aircraft is perfectly capable of accelerating through ETL with all the wheels on the ground.