frostycab

I suspect this is the case. For a LOAL shot the missile needs to know roughly where there target is so that it knows which direction to go in. I don't know what sort of angle the seeker head can scan, but basically you need this point set as the ACQ source to ensure that when the missile comes down the laser will be within its field of view and within its remaining manoeuvring capability if it does detect it.

The altitude thing is news to me. I've flown routes that I've quickly dropped into the mission editor, thus having all my waypoints up around 6500ft, but flown past them in NoE flight and the waypoint has cycled just fine. If you have to pass them within 100m of altitude (which is less than 330ft!) it would be a real pain. EDIT: I've just tested this, and altitude does NOT appear to be a factor, at least not for me. I placed a waypoint at sea level and overflew it at 4000ft. At 0.1km lateral range it sequenced to the next route waypoint. I also tried placing one at 4500ft and flew under it at almost sea level, with the same result.

Can you not bind the button to action the command on press AND release in the Virpil software? My first bit of Virpil kit is finally arriving next week, so I haven't had a chance to play with the software yet.

I've just written a complete "How To" for this with pictures to help.

Worked for me when I tested just now. Steps were: WPN page : R1 through R3 read SAL, NORM and either LO or HI. TADS: LASE and STORE target point. TSD: used cursor to CAQ the stored point. TADS: Fired missile which lofted nicely and started lasing. Missile landed right on target. (Unusual for any Helffires so far, but I know it will improve )

Did you lose and store to create a point for the missile to loft towards?

I flew this mission this morning and initially ran into the same issue. the oddity with the target in this mission is that it's a control measure with type "EU" rather than an actual TG target point. This is a point type that seems to be turned off by default in both the NAV and ATK phases on the TSD. To enable it, press SHOW at T3, then COORD SHOW at T6. At L4 you will see "ENEMY UNITS" is unboxed. Press T4 to box it. You can press B1 to switch phases if you want to enable it for both. You can then press T3 to return to the main TSD display and the point should now be visible. Yes and no. The difference between the phases is that by default they have some point types that are enabled in one but not the other. In a cold start at least, "Planned target and threats" (i.e. TG points) don't show up in the NAV phase. Part of my startup routine is to go into the SHOW settings and enable them all for now, at least until I get used to what I want to see and when.

I'm seeing a lot of people struggling with control setups and understanding how they can use their HOTAS effectively in the front seat, so thought I'd share what I've done. Obviously to fly you will want to have the same cyclic and collective inputs that you have when in the back seat, so it's fine to just go ahead and bind those up as you normally would. The issue for some people is that they would sometimes like to be able to use the same axis again for another purpose, for example, the cyclic stick to control the Manual Tracker and slew the TADS around. DCS only lets you assign a physical control, whether that's a button or axes, to one sim control at a time, so in order to get this to work you need to use a modifier. This can be either normal button, hat press, keystroke or latched switch. My HOTAS Warthog has plenty of spare latched switches on the base, so that's what I've used. To set it all up, go into your controls settings, and along the bottom on the left side you will see a button labelled Modifiers. Click it to open the Modifiers Panel. In here you will see all of the existing modifiers such as the various shift, ctrl and alt keys. Click ADD on the left to open the next window. The reason there are 2 boxes here is because you can either use a latched modifier such as a physical switch or held-down keypress, OR a keystroke or button press that acts like an on/off toggle. If you want to use a button press then use the window on the right side. In the first dropdown box, select the device that has the switch you'll be using. In the next dropdown select the ID for the switch you want to use. You can give this modifier a name in the third box if you like. When finished, click OK, and then OK in the Modifiers Panel to return to the main control settings. The next step is to bind the controls with the modifier. For this example we'll bind the TEDAC Manual Tracker to the joystick. **I'm going to assume that you already got your cyclic pitch and roll axes bound the the JOY_X and JOY_Y on your stick.** Find the entry for "RHG MAN TRK Controller - X axis" then click on the corresponding box in the joystick column and press ADD. Move your joystick all the way left and right and you will see JOY_X appear in the box on the left. You will also see "Cyclic Roll" appear in the "Currently In Use" box at the bottom. If you were to press OK now then you would reassign the JOY_X axis to the Manual Tracker, unbinding it from the Cyclic Roll axis. Instead, use the dropdown box labelled "Add Modifier" on the right to select the modifier you set up earlier. This will appear in the "Added Modifiers field. The "Currently In Use" box should now be empty, so you can go ahead and click OK. In the box you should see your modifier followed by "+ JOY_X" if you've done everything right. Repeat this process for the "RHG MAN TRK Controller - Y axis" using the JOY_Y (pitch) axis on your stick. That's it, you're done! Now go and try it. Get the aircraft powered up and jump into the front seat. Press "C" to unstow the cyclic from its folded position, which also takes control away from George who is now in the back seat. He's had a long day and needs a nap. Move your stick around and you should see the cyclic match your movements. Once you're happy that it works press "C" again to wake George up and hand the flight controls back to him. Wiggle your stick again and you'll see that you no longer have control. Now look at the TEDAC. Make sure you have TADS selected as your sight so that you have slew control, and then move your stick around again. Nothing will happen, as the stick is still trying to control the cyclic. Switch on your modifier and try again. This time you should see the TADS slewing around to follow your stick movements. CONGRATULATIONS! You have successfully bound the same set of axes to 2 entirely different controls and are able to switch between them at will. This will work with as many axes and buttons as you like, with as many different modifiers as you wish to add. I'll add a note of caution though: Always be aware of whether your modifier is on or off. It's going to be a bad day if you take over the flight controls and forget that you have everything running in a different mode. (This is why I prefer to use a physical switch rather than a button press to turn it on or off!) If, for example, you were to press your trigger to fire a weapon while the modifier is on then nothing will happen since you're actually pressing your trigger with the modifier. To get around this you will need to rebind any other buttons or switches both with and without the modifier if you want them available to you at all times. This isn't a problem as you can have multiple buttons and switches bound to the same command in the controls settings. The only reason for this guide is because you can't do that the other way around, or with axes For example, the trigger on my stick needs to work in both modes. Therefore I've assigned both "JOY_BTN_1" and "Modifier + JOY_BTN_1" to the trigger command in the settings, meaning it will work regardless of whether the modifier is on or off. Other buttons have split uses. The big red pickle button on my stick works as chaff release without the modifier, but fires the laser if the modifier is on. I really hopes this helps some of you who are new to DCS, and perhaps some others who haven't tried this before and are struggling to find enough buttons on their controls. HAPPY FLYING!!!

If you look down in the CPG position you'll see that the cyclic is stowed in a folded and locked position and neither the cyclic nor collective respond to inputs. Pressing (default) "C" will unfold it and unlock both it and the collective. You can then fly the aircraft from the front seat. Pressing C again will fold the cyclic away again and return aircraft control to George in the back seat. What this means is that you can have your HOTAS set up to run the TEDAC while George is flying. You can then switch on the modifier, which will get your HOTAS to control the aircraft and then take control away from George to fly yourself. You then hand back control to George, switch the modifier again and your HOTAS is bound to the TEDAC.

Consent to Fire lets George engage one target, and you will have to give consent each time you want him to shoot. If you long press up on the George commands and turn his info green you are effectively giving him permanent consent to fire as and when he has a valid target selected. As such, if you assign a target for him to attack he will fire on his own as soon as he is within constraints. Another long press up will turn his commands yellow again and revoke the permanent consent.

You just have to keep your velocity vector lined up with the homeplate symbol, and then keep and eye on your range info. And another eye on the ground. And one on the engines. And one on the... Well, in short you just need more eyes. 6 should pretty much cover it all.

I think the issue here is that without using modifiers you can only assign an axis to one control at a time. So for example, if you want to fly from the front seat then obviously you'll want your cyclic and collective. However, if you give control back to the pilot you may want to use what *was* your cyclic to slew the TEDAC around. You can accomplish this using modifiers.

As long as your DIRect to point is part of the active route I believe it should auto-sequence to the next point in that route as long as you pass within 0.1km of it.

Well that's just a punch in the gut to the rest of us then. LOL Seriously though, I'm sure this module wouldn't have been possible without them, and I think it's safe to say we're all extremely grateful for their input and (ongoing) support.

Returning to the subject to the IHADDS symbology being too high for comfort, I'd be happy if we could just have some adjustment like we do for the HMS in the KA-50. It wouldn't require the monocle itself to move, just a bit of leeway for us to fine tune the symbology within the monocle field. I think the reason that different people are getting different experiences comes down to us all wearing our headsets in slightly different positions on our faces. For my Index I usually have to move it around slightly to find the "sweet spot" for the lenses and my eyes.

So you're asking for an axis modifier that would work the same way that button modifiers do? If so then it already exists. On my Warthog throttle I've bound my flap switch to act as a modifier when in the Up position. With the switch on my buttons all change to my TEDAC bindings, and my stick axes switch over to TEDAC slew controls. I'm still refining my setups, but you can see a picture of my bindings here. (Sorry, but I'm having trouble inserting images into my posts. I keep getting empty placeholders.) As you can see, the axis for my MAN TRK X and Y axes show the axis plus a button.

That's it indeed. If you look at the manual it's on page 85, item 24 (Range & Range Source.) The "N" means that it is displaying range to the navigation source. It can also display laser range, but I'm not sure if that's only while the laser is firing or not. Alternatively it might give range to the last point lased, but I haven't tested for that yet. How I tested: Aircraft sat on the ground. I created 3 TG points at various ranges in front of the aircraft, and then set the ACQ by pressing ACQ (R6) on the TSD, selecting "?00" at B4 and then selecting the target point from the COORDS page that opens. Selecting each TG point in turn showed a corresponding increase in the range in the IHADDS.

As for boresighting, and since you're talking about cold start situations where you need to wait for the INUs, you could just hop into the front seat and boresight before takeoff and then switch back. It'll probably stay aligned. (Not tested to confirm)

It might not be the solution you're looking for but: 1) Put TADS video feed on one of your MPDs and you will be able to see the lased range to target. (Caveat: I know this works with human CPGs, but George being George I don't know if he actually bothers lasing for range before actually firing.) 2) If you make, for example, T01 your ACQ point then you get range displayed in the IHADDS to the left of the field of regard display in X.Xkm format, so around 100m accuracy. (Just tested to confirm this works.)

I think you can get him to turn on the TADS if you get him to cycle weapons when you're in the back seat.

I think that's a great idea!

Yup, great bunch of lads (and possibly ladettes too!)

Oops, sorry. That's what happens when I try to read the forums on my phone without my glasses on. LOL

I think it's true of most helicopters. I've spent a lot of time in the Mi-8 over recent weeks and if you do fly in aerodynamic trim then it also has a noticeable crab,

Do not try to name the type of point using the KEU. On the TSD, select POINT, then ADD at R2. You then see the different point types below it. WP, TG, CM, and HZ at R3-R6. Select the type there, then IDENT at R1. It's important to select the right type before adding the IDENT abbreviation, as the some abbreviations are shared across types. Thus AE for a CM type might be something different for a TG type. Thanks to Raptor9 for pointing that out to me in another thread. In your example I think it needs to be a case of select TG on the TSD, then TG for the IDENT (if that's going to be a mission target) followed be the free text, MGRS and altitude.