Kev2go

Not really? In that video That fcr page looks about the same from what I remember in dcs f16, except of course the dcs Viper has color displays. The general software layout has been maintained. My experience flying earlier block f16s virtually pretty much validates what I'm saying that it's a very similar experience. You could hop in a block 30 and only really need to account some older HUD symbology ( if its ODS era or older) and getting used to not having newer features you had on the blk 50, namely lack of , HMD , datalink , and targeting pod.

IS the APG 68 v1 that much different the v5? not in terms of hardware but as far as user interface goes from footage i saw FCR page looks very similar if not identical for A2A/A2G modes. similarly just like the APG 66 v2 on F16A MLU jets the FCR functions all looked like APG68V5 minus the Enhanced ground mode which V5 didn't have which makes me think ED used the MLU manuals floating on the internet as one of thier sources for F16C block 50 module but i digress.

did block 30's get retrofitted with the V5 eventually? or did they continue to retain the v1 well into the 90s or even 2000s?

To offer some feedback the blackhawk canopy glass causes reflections at night. It makes it more difficult on the eyes to fly with Night vision goggles compared to other modules. I don't know if that can be adjusted but i hope it can.

Just like you found a MH60K manual floating around online a UH60M manual is out there. think I saw one on coursehero. I will agree that the MH60k despite being a older bird has more advanced features such as a multi mode radar and FliR . Better firepower too. MH60's can mount M134 miniguns for the door gunners where as conventional army aviation only had M60 or M240 machineguns for their Blackhawks. The only advantage that comes to mind with Uh60M is the blueforce tracker integration for situational awareness and more power with GE-701D engines. But this isn't surprising the 160th soar had typically have more sophisticated variants of helicopters that regular army aviation uses. Ie compare features described in the aforementioned 1994 mh60k manual to Uh60L manuals in the a similar timeframe. Limas are almost entirely analog. Edit: As for the film blackhawk down I thought those were mh60L? I recall from the brief cockpit shots that were shown in the film it looked like Mh60L interior shown here:

Not to take away from your point about Northern plains being a more likely alternative then Fulda but the entire plan of 7 days to River Rhine is very fanciful. It seems very improbable to expect to reach the Rhine in a mere 7 days even with the use of nuclear strikes against Nato forces stationed in Germany ( with the added caveat it was in response to a 1st strike by Nato) , let alone to push past West German Border and reach Paris in another 7 days. Somehow i find it difficult to believe that a Soviet Spearhead through western Germany would outdo the pace of Hitlers blitzkrieg into France. IT comes off as a "bridge too far" type of scenario if played out. Plus it also depends what year a cold war gone hot scenario is entertained. The further you push into the 1980s the less favorable things look for the USSR having hope in besting Nato. The further into the decade USSR has to contend with US forces gradually becoming technologically superior along with quality of US army being brought back into a 1st rate fighting force (" army of excellence" program correcting the post Vietnam woes). The USSR has having more issues of its own with its declining economy and the questionability of warsaw pact ally readiness not to mention the politics shifting towards Detente in 1985 with Gorbachov at the helm thus further reducing the probability of any hot war scenario. But had the soviets treated central Germany as a sideshow and focused on cutting off sea ports wouldn't this mean that REFORGER units and supplies could still be airlifted to airbases like Ramstein? I read that Reforger units had thier vehicle in storage pre positioned in various places because it would take too long to ship entire Mechanized and Tank brigades from stateside. So the plan was to airlift the crews into Germany and then once in country they would be sent to POMCUS facilities to retrieve their vehicles then move out to reinforce the frontlines. OF course the simple answer is you cant maintain enough pressure Northern Germany and Fulda just Nuke the airfields so this doesn't happen, but then that would force escalatory response from Nato.

Not necessarily. this isnt the 1950s timeframe.

Its a bit misleading to only ever consider the US air force units pre positioned in Europe on a permanent basis Unless its under the expectation that either victory or ceasefire between 2 sides will end a conflict after a extremely short duration, you have to recall the # concept of reforger. Whilst there was only 3 F15C squadrons in West Germany as part of 36th Fighter wing in Bitburg AFB, There was a 4th F15 squadron , 32nd TFS stationed in Soesterberg AFB in Holland. 9th Air force had priority to send its assets to Europe IF things actually kicked off against Warpact. as part of 9th airforce Langley AFB had 1st tactical fighter Wing ( 27th, 71st, and 94 TFS) and at Eglin AFB 33rd Tactical Fighter wing ( 58th, 59th, 60tth TFS) that were equipped with F15'Cs. As part of 12th Air force the 49th fighter wing ( 7th , 8th, 9th TFS) at Holloman AFB was equipped with F15A's and those had instructions for Europe in event of war as well. So in total that's 9 additional F15 squadrons that were almost certainly going be seeing deployment to reinforce the aforementioned 4 squadrons stationed in Europe.

the flight model changed alot in 2.0 and feels much more responsive but also feels as if the helicopter has much more lift as well. Was the older Uh60L mod flight model simply underpowered for the GE 701C engines? or is this a Uh60L updated to reflect a Uh60L reffited with GE 701D engines ? IF so the choice of pilot model reflecting contemporary period uniforms would make sense as opposed to early GWOT period when olive green flight suits were still worn.

I think its fair to assume the F16CM and F/A18 L2 pods are based on litening 2 AT ( or at least the l2 ER. The L2 AT based on public sources is basically just an ER with improved datalinking functions) even if its not explicitly stated in the manual. just becuase functionality wise they all have 2 levels of FOV and 9 levels of digital zoom. Razbams av8b Litening2 pod isnt called the Litening 2 G4 but we can deduce its that particular model from the additional features it has compared to the old litening 2 pod which had the same limitations as L2 pod all those other modules.

For me PiP mode is a gimmick that adds unessesary complexity Lack of a wide fov in tv mode makes it less usefull for loitering overtop targets for CAS. This something rl pilots have said litening 2 is better at. Except of course without the degraded image there is no incentive to use sniper over litening except maybe or a2a or if you really want multi target track.

Snipers TV mode has better resolution then its FLIR yes but it only has 1 FOV if you don't count the additional XR processing. which is unfortunate.

even without using any of x1-4 level of zoom on the Sniper pod. the image quality on Narrow FOV still feels lackluster. In its current implementation The only quality image IMO is with XR processing mode but it requires an area or point track and multiple seconds for the image to process so it cannot be slewn around all the time without the image looking like a blurry mess.

the 4x4 MFD is supposed to be 524x524 not 256x256. https://www.astronautics.com/pdf/product_brochures/F-16_4-Inch_MFD.pdf even so like these videos others have posted of MFD recordings ( so not stretched from recording software) i wouldn't be able to tell they were 500 something pixel image. when you have small displays you dont need as high resolution. anyone who has actually tried to sport any noticable difference for thier nakeyed between 1080p and 1440p on thier 7-8 inch smartphone screens will know this is true.

the CCD/ TV image quality of litening 2 G4 didnt improve based on public sources. IT was already 1024x1024 on litening 2 AT. with L2 G4 the FLIR resolution was improved to 1024x1024 to match the CCD resolution. so i dont see how allowing additional zoom levels would not keep the images blurry to the point of uselessness unless there is some under the hood similar to xr type processing going on.