Kazius

Ok, was going to test some CCIP drops of cluster bombs but picked the wrong F-18 I placed into the mission and took the one with the BDU-33's. I went and spam dropped the smoke bombs and was going to go land. I noticed one of the stores sorta hung. I eventually managed to get the last bomb to drop but it still showed 5 on the rack although it was empty now. Watching the mission will show the hung store and how I managed to make it drop the last BDU. I then kicked in afterburners and went to turn towards Nellis. However, when I disengaged the afterburners I noticed the speed wasn't really bleeding off. I then took the plane for a joy ride and got up to Mach 1.8 and then went into a 7G turn and the speed wasn't bleeding off very fast. I leveled off and was at around Mach 1.3 without afterburners on for quite awhile. Sorry to the people of Las Vegas for breaking all your windows, but I had a fun ride and that is all that counts :) Edit: Added track but had to split into two files. F-18C Crazy Speed and Bugged Stores.part1.rar F-18C Crazy Speed and Bugged Stores.part2.rar

Like I said, it was 8 bombs and only 1/2 hit inside the target area, so 4 bombs hit the vehicles, so 23 kills with 4 bombs is probably not to bad. Was making my target rings to make it quicker to see where the bomb is supposed to hit and on a run I decided to fly in slow. I used a single SPG inside the circle and at 350kias, auto release mode, waypoint set directly on top of the SPG , released at 2000 ft AGL I had a direct hit. So I went in for another run at 450 kias and 4500 ft AGL the bomb only slightly missed. So I think it is just that if your traveling to fast that auto mode can't calculate. I will link a video when I get it all finished. Plan to test with ~500 ft AGL, ~1000 ft AGL, ~2500 ft AGL and ~4500-5000 ft AGL. But I think they will all hit if I am going slow enough. So far though when the bombs hit the targets they kill... I will try to test on a SAM and AA, I'll just have to setup the SAM site near a mountain side so I can burn off its missiles before the attack run.

I didn't test on SAM sites but I could see them being used if the sites were used up. Not sure if AA sites run out of ammo, however, I know you can fly over them low and fast and they can't track you. Not sure how realistic that is either, but you could drop cluster bombs from 500 ft on them :). Was testing today with AUTO targeted runs. Seems AUTO targeting isn't working for these either, so they only fixed CCIP. Was going to make a video to show this, but when I do the higher altitude attacks its hard to show my target, so I'm making a mission with bullseyes made of smoke and fire :)

I know my test is unrealistic, it was just to see what gets destroyed and what doesn't. I don't know how correct wiki is, but from the description, you are probably correct. Sounds like this particular cluster bomb is made for destroying these types of vehicles with great effect. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CBU-100_Cluster_Bomb These two points the post makes seems to support your reasoning. " It weighs 490 pounds and carries 247 Mk 118 Mod 1 bomblets." "Each bomblet weighs 1.32 pounds (600 g) and has a 0.4-pound (180 g) shaped-charge warhead of high explosives, which produces up to 250,000 psi (1.7 GPa) at the point of impact, allowing penetration of approximately 7.5 inches (190 mm) of armor. Rockeye is most efficiently used against area targets requiring penetration to kill." So dropping 8x CBU-99 = 1,976 M118 bomblets. Seems likely many of those bomblets are going to be effective.

The low level high speed was to avoid as much ground to air fire as much as possible. I would never attempt that in an A-10, it would never survive. With auto mode of bombing not calculating for height changes, I had to do 500 or 700 feet above ground to make the test work for see if any vehicles of those types were able to withstand the damage from the bomblets. Point is, the the two bomb types do some damage against light armored vehicles. But I don't know how effective CBU-99's or Rockeyes are in real life, so for me, ~50% seems pretty good. There were 50 units, 10 of each type and there was 23 vehicles destroyed. With the patch today I am going to try some drops with HOF set higher. This should hopefully result in more units being destroyed. But this depends on if Auto was fixed with the accuracy fix. I also had the release interval to big, so ~1/2 munitions were outside the target area.

Thanks for finding information Shalashaka. Unfortunately Wigs video doesn't show if Auto/CCRP mode of use will work properly. I did some testing, seems the Mk-20RE, CBU-99 work just fine against BMP-3, BMP-2, BTR-80, BTR-RD's, BTR-Cobra's, etc. Made a video :)

Just finished some testing. Did a couple passes using the Harrier to carpet bomb a line of fuel trucks. Unfortunately found out the Harriers intervals are still not working so now I remember why I wasn't using the Rockeyes on the Harrier either. F-18 I tested both CBU-99's and Rockeyes many times, both bombs have exact same characteristics. I swear I saw somewhere on one of the models where you could set the function height but didn't see where I found that. I thought I saw at some point the default setting was about 300 feet. Test at the height before you are given the impact warning which is between 1800-2000 AGL I think I saw. Impact was way before target point. Test at 1000 feet release, impact started before the line of trucks, using 10 bombs, it would be about the 5th or 6th bomb that hit the first trucks. Test at 600 feet release (I think lower than 500 is getting to close to the invalid fusing point). First bomblets exploded near first truck and last bomb hit a few trucks before the end of a 20 truck line. Was using 225 foot intervals. I then tested CCIP drops. I could swear I was getting some really good pickles but looking back it seems I always came up short or before the pickle point. I don't know enough about manual drops, but used what I learned from the F-5E tutorials and used a 80 mil offset and the 5000 rollin, 3500 release, 20 degree dive angle method and I seem to hit every time. So I think CCIP might not be working either, however I don't know if F-18 manual bombing is same as describe for the F-5E, but seeing as how I was hitting my targets well it seems to work. I have previously done lots of CBU-97 carpet bombing runs in the A-10C as well as CBU-87's. From personal experience the CBU-97 seems to have a minimum 900 foot height of function. Any lower and the bomblets don't release well. But if I set my SPI in the middle of a line of vehicles then go line myself up for a run using CCRP, as long as I'm at 1000+ feet AGL height doesn't matter unless wind is on, CCRP figures out the release points. If say I use 5 CBU-97's, the 3rd bomb always looks to hit the spot my SPI at. If I use 7 CBU-97's then the 5th always hits the SPI target area. Same goes for the CBU-87's except I usually go lower function height since the bomblets are pretty week even against light armor, but the 3rd, 5th, 7th etc bombs dispersal is always hit in the SPI location. On that note, i don't know if the A-10C is correct either. I'm just a guy who loves simulators, so a real pilot would have to say if the A-10C is a correct comparison.

Been doing A-10C Red Flag campaign this week using open beta build. Found when the JTAC is on FM frequency he sometimes doesn't respond to check ins. Fortunately I didn't care and just took out primary's described in briefings and still completed the missions. So although some things seem to be fixed in OB, other things seem to be broken.

I think the bug has something to do with it not calculating for heights. I noticed from carpet bomb testing, if you use auto/CCRP and set a waypoint at the front of a column of vehicles and drop from ~1000 ft AGL, you can get a good carpet bombing. If you set the waypoint to the back of end of the column of vehicles you want to bomb at ~500 AGL. This changes if you change the bombs function height so the test is using default. However, if you bomb out side either of these heights you will miss massively which to me seems like the continuously calculated release point is not functioning or not setup for the Rockeyes or the CBU-99's. I haven't tested much with these using CCIP. I have dropped these using CCIP mode in both the Harrier and the Hornet, but I remember hitting my targets usually. I would have to test again to see if my memory is good though.

Was just making a spreadsheet of weapon weights and noticed that a single AIM-9 (model doesn't matter) appears to have the same weight as a dual rack AIM-9. I don't know if this is purely an A-10C related weight reading issue or if the actual weight isn't counted for the second AIM-9. As I know the new F-18C Lot 20 has a dual rack for AIM-9's I checked that plane and it looks to be roughly twice the weight of the rack on the A-10, so it might be A-10 only. I also checked the A-10A and it too seems to have the same weight for dual and single. Tried to share images, but couldn't, but if someone goes into mission editor or planning before a mission and remove all weapons and ammo to zero out weight, then add a single AIM-9 then change it to a dual AIM-9 it will show the same weight.

Solved the issue, it was a livery I had that no longer works with one of the recent updates. So not an issue with the planes development.

Today I was trying to create a practice mission for the Viggen on the Caucus map. I was going to take off from Batumi and use the old Kobuleti field for target range. However, every time I went to place the unit on the map the editor would get buggy. The plane would not appear where I clicked and nothing I clicked on did anything after. However, if I clicked on an icon it would look like I activated it but nothing happens. The factions I had selected were USAF Aggressors as red team and Sweden, USA, Canada, UK as blue team. I tried placing the Viggen as Sweden. It was the first and only unit to be placed right after map creation. I am not sure if something has gone corrupted for my files or if this is happening to other people. If someone can test to see if they are having the same issue, let me know. Just for note: I am able to place all the other planes I usually use without the same issue. Last patch as of this post: DCS World Newsletter - 15 June 2018

Thanks Emuyen, for this campaign that would work but some of the campaigns have 3 missions listed for each stage, for which makes it a bit more random. I also agree that it is a little disappointing in the lack of support for the campaigns, especially ones we pay for. However, I would rather see them continuing development of planes and terrains as a priority. I am good with the editor but for Stone Shield they did some odd things that are hidden to us. They have no triggers in there missions that I see, so I think the campaign might actually use hidden triggers. Now that I think of it, I might have messed up the missions by making my own copy and then changing the A-10C's from USA to Canada fictional and saving. I will maybe try playing through the original to see if the missions are messed up. I don't mind flying these over and over. Its good practice and still a lot of fun.

Didn't see any replies to this so far. Took the Mi-24s off late activation and tried it with them starting at same time mission starts. All they did according to the debrief was each fired an AT-6 then went and landed. Guess I will just edit my logbook to skip this mission.

So I flew this twice now and both times didn't see the Mi-24's in the debrief log. So I went into the mission editor to see what was going on and they are set for late activation, 00:00:00/0. Mission takes place at 01:40:00. I am willing to fix this for myself, just need to know the intended correct time these choppers are supposed to start. I would like to fly the mission as intended (one exception, I changed the A-10's to Canada and fictional livery :P).

+1

No flaps, going to watch it again because I think without using flaps you probably have the wrong AoA. After rewatching, you flared which isn't the normal way to land the F-18, it did give you I think about 12.0+ for AoA, you probably landed a bit fast. I know from my practice runs, with only sidewinders on the wingtips and about 2000lbs fuel, my on speed is around 128-134 area. Needless to say, good job to everyone. I enjoy the videos and as long as people are enjoying the sim it all good :) Also if it wasn't for people trying new things, there wouldn't even be a case I recovery, a SH carrier landing, a carrier or an airplane for that matter, so push those boundaries. At least in a sim you can't die seeing if something will work.

Just out of curiosity. What would happen in real life if a jet landed on a carrier at 236 kias and probably not 8.1 AoA? Would the plane event hook the cables? If it did hook, would there be damage or just a really bad jolt for the pilot?

Not to mention practicing hundreds of touch and go airport approach patterns and case I recoveries to find perfection :) Those alone will keep me busy for months.

Only landed on the carrier once so far and it wasn't pretty. I have aborted a lot of carrier landings but I might try doing it again now. i think I found a great way to practice. Take off from some airport with about 6000 lbs fuel and empty weapons. Then just practice flying the pattern around the airport at ~130 knots and 8.1, but instead of 3 degree slope, just try to keep it level the whole time. This helps you learn to anticipate throttle power increase and decrease before leveling off / turning. My last dozen or so landings on airfields have all been pattern landings and although not perfect, they are getting better every time. So I might now try carrier landings again. Hope my tip above helps.

Since I pretty much finished this year of university, I am so lucky to have free time to fly this module. It is truly the best plane released so far. And it will only get better and better as they fix the bugs and add the next features. So massive thanks to the teams working on the F-18. Keep up the amazing work.

I have been doing a lot of F-18 mission creation and haven't seen an option for it. Also, so far you have to have planes start on runway in order to be hooked up to the launch bar and the catapult shields raised. I think they mean to make it all very functional in the future. However, this is early access so we just need to be patient. Your idea is a great idea for them to add to the editor though :) I'd also like to have spots on deck with parking numbers where I could have parked uncontrollable navy planes sitting for show.

I noticed the same thing after last patch. Decided to do some testing and recording. So far noticed it isn't always from the same rack. In the video I had 2 mk-82 on first release, 3 mk-82 on second release, 3 on third release and the remaining two so not sure if it would have been more than 3 cause I only had 2 bombs left. https://youtu.be/pVM-PM0taII I also tested if the bombs actually release in multiples and they do. So it isn't a case of 1 releasing and 1 or 2 disappearing. Also it is always 2 or 3. I have run a test mission about 6 or so times and it has never been more or less than 2-3.

Headwarp, running SSAA has nothing to do with resolution increases. Anti-aliasing has nothing to do with DSR. Anti-aliasing blends graphic object edges to reduce jagged lines being seen. It does this through color blending and transparency. Dynamic Super Resolution or DSR renders images at higher resolutions. The images are then adjusted back to your monitors resolution. This can reduce jagged lines, but not in the same way anti-aliasing works. This is what Headwarp is describing and it is not a setting in DCS but a setting in your nvidia control panels 3D settings. There are better options than SSAA, however many of these options are not always compatible for all graphics cards. For example, Temporal anti-aliasing or TXAA is very efficient. It is slightly less quality than SSAA, but it still does a great job. Problem is this is proprietary to nvidia graphics cards.

Guess this is as good a place as any to say thank you to MadDog for helping me out and providing some form of fix for the Bear Trap campaign. It has been working well so far. Sorry I posted in a different area and that you end up replying to posts on this all over the place. Your help is greatly appreciated. People like you make this community great.