vanir

Tuskagee Airmen was a good movie but due to Hollywood plot treatment pretty much everything else made that has some decent budget to make any sort of flight scenes you have to delete everything except the ten minutes or so of flight sequences, ie. Pearl Harbour, Flyboys, Top Gun, etc. The classics like Cain's Battle of Britain and a Czech movie (which uses clips from the BoB movie) called Into the Blue I think, of course they're pretty good but a bit pedestrian as documentaries. I find ones like Memphis Bell too heavy on the star spangled banner but it has its moments. With fairly recent evolution and availability of CGI tools hopefully now previously unrealistic flight sequences will be available to small budget film makers, so you might see an increasing number of specific market straight to dvd releases with some surprising content. That's be pretty fantastic. Other than that, greater budget movies in Hollywood have two main production goals, extreme conservatism or extreme capitalism, telling a story or entertaining enthusiasts couldn't be further from their minds. Their beancounters surveyed market predictions to conclude that boobs are good for business and entertainment is for childrens classifications, the only story they even know is boys have schlongs and girls have gardens to put them in. Best you get is a few seconds worth of flight sequences in movies about American superiority and American values. The Ju-52 and 109 escort scenes in Valkyrie were awesome, the Kittyhawk strafing too. The flight sequences in Hart's War. The stukas and Heinkels in Enemy at the Gates. Things like that, just patches here and there.

Designation suggests analoguous to Su-27SM phase 2 proposal update (Irbis or ESA radar/fc and vectoring engines added), where the Su-30M is analoguous to Su-27SM phase 1 but with 12 pylons (N001V). Northern and Eastern commands kept requesting two seaters I know that much, crew fatigue on long patrols with single seats is a factor. Everything got organisationally messed up when they dumped/absorbed the PVO into VVS and army district commands, hell I think some missile regiments even got handed over to navy. I think they changed their minds about their Su-27SM updates supporting a small purchase of Su-35 (ESA/vectoring), and went for the two seaters to the same spec instead, like India did. Kinda makes sense, with the patrol range thing. Even though not a tandem (pilot/WSO layout), they found back in the 60s-70s especially on the long arctic patrols in those big Tupolev interceptors, it helped to have multicrew to talk to each other or they started going a little crazy over the ice out there. Anyways that's best I can gather from places like Milavia. Mikoyan and Sukhoi, etc., the manufacturers themselves are pretty forthcoming, they really don't go in for the whole "industrial secrets are national security" thing americans love so they'll probably give a press release soon listing specific fitments and show photos of the weapons systems.

Personally I wouldn't have a real clue, but just shootin the breeze here I figure the crash photo looks like an engine failure, our radio news said eyewitnesses reported a fire under the wing, and it appears as Yurgon I think pointed out that no attempt was made to steer the craft away from population, and the whole thing happened about a minute after take off. Another eyewitness report says plane went upwards then dive/crashed in what sounds like a classic low airspeed stall or sabre dance, instructor on board so he had to have grabbed controls by this point, I'm going with engine failure at take off and low speed, there appears to be a fuel tank right in front of the engines on either side so one of those punctured and this was the fuel dump, I mean if we're talking about FOD for all this then I don't think it was a bird but something big and metal like a radio control plane or something from the residential area. Unless of course it was a legitimate fuel dump but why. Has anything like that happened before, a residential area that close to a fighter base caused danger? From things like footballs and radio control toys and stuff like that. You'd think it would, I mean me and my mates did all sorts of screwed up things as kids, I wrecked a big earth mover tractor when I was 10. Had to climb a monster fence to get to it, but we were playing star wars and I decided it was the millenium falcon, captured by imperials...

There's only really an emergency field near where I am, within WW2 fighter range anyway but I think it is used as a fuel stop during air show season depending where folks are coming from. So my unusual sight was a beautifully restored Yak-3 flying low enough to count the rivets right over my workplace. I was pretty excited but nobody else had any idea what I was going on about. Been right dead underneath some Hornet low alt aerobatics before, that was awesome. I got better view than the tv coverage. Anyway I figured MiGs because afaik you've only got a couple of Flankers over there but you've got literally squadrons of MiGs under lock and key, kept for test purposes and flown.

Sorry to bump a thread that got a little testy, but some relevant information for the OP I was just reading about 21 MiG-29C purchased back in 1997 from Moldava (via Romania) and 500 R73 missiles, "ostensibly to keep them out of the hands of rogue states but kept by the Air Force for testing." They were taken by C17 to Wright-Patterson "then distributed to various sources". (winchester)

Reported on our local news station (ABC radio, our version of BBC), eyewitnesses said the flames were coming from the inner wing, not the engine. "Eyewitnesses said flames were coming from underneath the wing..." is what they said yesterday. *shrug*

You're a beautiful man beczl :) always making us terrific models next thing you will give me Gorog Zita's phone number.

ah thanks tflash, when I just do general googles on things like that I wind up with all the adware and spam sites since I don't look up things like that very regularly to know which sites to go straight to. your instincts are on track of course cali, but the way I understand it is the most closely guarded secret on the USAF fleet is their datalink system. They'll be giving an older, but NATO compatable one for sure. The USAF datalink update on your Eagles though puts them more in the Flanker/SuperMiG class for inflight avionics data exchange even between squadron mates. It's a major 3.5 gen feature, probably more important than flash in the pan "stealth" (wish people would call it high survivability) features. The block 2, 3 harpoon datalink they're talking about, probably ties in with this. Probably need the newer update on the bird to support block 3 on the harpoon, as in this retargeting feature was probably built around the avionics datalink (the one used with AWACS etc) update. Kind of getting outside my own scope here but, my technical knowledge is pretty limited.

IvanK, I'm not sure if it's relevant but the USAF guy over at F-16.net who did the write up on the Fulcrum versus Vipers (he's tons of flying hours in the MiG-29G and Block 30 and 50 Vipers and instructed at the advanced training centre), he described the MiG-29 dampener as a rod which extends from under the pilot seat, between your legs and literally pushes against the stick when you pull too hard. Sounds pretty old school to me, not like the dampener in a Viper, in fact that was his complain although he liked the way you could just switch it off and exceed alpha limits which that airframe can do and a Viper can't.

like the paki vipers, guessed that much but is it the old radar set or are they giving the new phased array dish? they're getting F100-229 and new build airframes aren't they?

They strike me as a fairly old school kind of airframe design, with fuel tanks in the wing box and intake tunnel. I mean a Hornet say, might start to eventually crack around the fins, or the skins peel, but a Phantom style construction layout starts catching fire when they get long in the tooth...

Plus the SE are new build aren't they? The rest of the Eagle fleet are nearing end of airframe life. This batch will go for another 30yrs, hence the updates, they're calling them 3.5 gen like the superflanker. Anyone know if they're giving the Saudi's phased array? I still find the whole thing politically questionable but this isn't the place for that kind of discussion.

That much fuel wouldn't have to move very far to be rather dramatic in effect, as in I would guess it causes a tremendous control lag. Bit like the difference between tapping your finger on a knee and tapping a sledgehammer on it. Just imagination, I wouldn't know but it is what I thought of. They use fuel cells, soaked foam don't they? The fuel wouldn't exactly slide around very much anyway unless you sustained G's. But it would feel like a herd of blue whales is pressing against the side of the fuselage and slowly rolling it over too much, during banks. I assume the FltCS would increasingly compensate but still...control input lag recovering. just guessing, dunno. This stuff is just interesting.

Superb work Tom, tremendous attention to detail, I'm stunned by the quality when at the same time you are always making sure your models are playable with minimum FPS hit. This one looks almost photo-realistic in the DCS engine. It always impresses me how many man-hours these models take to finalise and that you are still willing, and happy to do them. I am also very thankful that a version will go into FC2 as I only have a slow single core computer and don't have DCS for that reason. FC2 plays very well though, and will look fantastic with this model. Thankyou for the hard work Tom. It is very kind of you.

hello andy, thanks for reply. I was looking for the Crimea airbase mod for english FC2, is the mod complete? which links are there for the complete mod?

Is there any chance of using a host like http://files.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/ which has download manager support. At Filefront I can only get 30kb/s download speed. It would take me about 400 years to download that file and cost me about 500gig worth of download allowance, because every time the connection gets interrupted it has to start all over again from scratch, at 30kb/s... we have some poor ISP in my country. with d/l manager support like at http://files.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/ I can download at more like 250kb/s and get resume support if the connection drops out, no wasted allowance. otherwise big files cost me more than the game itself, that part I'm not exaggerating. is there a complete/bug sorted version at the 1st post link? any chance of uploading it to http://files.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/?

Please excuse my cluttering the thread with a largely useless post but I simply wished to congratulate and thank you guys for this effort to address FC2, for which I'm happy to purchase as a repackaged FC3 (I'm guessing part of the priority is the map change of DCSBS2 for return to online compatability between DCS/FC) I stick with FC always myself, because I don't want to fly choppers and mud movers, I want to fly fighter jets. The only bugs that's really bugging me is the HSI freeze in AC mode and the bouncy ball suicidal low alt sead mission AI, you know both already mentioned in this thread that's cool. I don't expect any more to be done than is reasonable or possible, I won't die if these didn't get fixed. I assume many of the updated DCS models (AI planes) will be adopted, that alone is worth $30 or whatever to me. It's hard work, I see the hard work when the modders are doing it. I spend more than that on some drinking. I spent more than that on smokes in the last four days and I'm a small earner not a home owner or anything. It's no trouble. Thanks so much for considering FC again for us. It is really good of ED, irrespective of what is or isn't delivered. I only have a single core 2g man, I won't be doing DCS until I build a new computer and that won't be for a while. Not a priority, I'm mostly into older games anyway, the only, only newer game I've got is FC2. Not much further interest in gaming so much anymore, flight simming yeah, my old modded il2 and FC2 that's it. Makes DCS even if you brought out a Flanker-D version, still a 2 grand proposition, I'm really not that much interested when it's just a luxury and I don't even have a car. so again, thanks so much ED just for reconsidering FC series like this. Really appreciate it. :) Oh, with N019M from what I've been reading around the place it basically is just achieved target discrimination and lookdown/shootdown update on the older set, different antenna is a little better, R77 fire control set, stuff like that (might give better lock range on close multiple targets and discriminate better, and allow track in lead, old set only allows track in trail IRL). Not total transformation like multiple locks a-la Hornet. Old set was virtually useless in those areas and BVR in general, which was basically an adapted Flogger ML unit really, almost like it was done in a shed with some gaffa tape and a hammer from my impressions. First prototypes even just used Flogger ML set. I don't know anything about the technical side of it like you guys, this was just the impressions I've been forming over quite a bit of reading. Just parroting and assuming, I wouldn't really know.

The Su33 was always my plane since I first bought lomac years ago, I switched to the Su27 b/c of the 3GO model and couldn't go back but I missed my bird very much. For the last couple of months I haven't been able to play at all waiting with such extreme anticipation of this model release. Thank you combatace, very much for giving my favourite plane back to me :) This is a superb gift! You sir, are a champion.

There was indeed an extremely valid reason catapults were cancelled for the Kuznetsov class, incorrectly reported as development cost savings. They're not that complicated, difficult or expensive comparatively speaking and are a far better system in every way. Except for one thing: the Black Sea Treaty (1991 iirc). No aircraft carrier fitted with catapults is allowed into the Black Sea (helicopter carriers, ASW cruisers and "cruisers with air complement" are excepted). The idea was to keep American supercarriers out, at the time it was the one and only issue all three of Russia, Ukraine and Turkey firmly agreed on. There's a big international game of monopoly going on in the region, Romania, Tblisi/Abkhazia/Chechnya, Bulgaria, Turkey, etc., the big three over there don't want the US involved in it. The CIS threatened to attack NATO if it entered Georgia in 96 you know, when the Navy opened up on the coast. That was why with the ramp, the Kuz is the most powerful naval unit allowed into the Black Sea, sort of makes the Russian Federation the final word on Black Sea regional security bar none. I think with the split between the Turkish military and its civilian government however it's going to or already has expired and the purpose is hollow with massive NATO military presence all over the shop around Asia Minor, the Middle East and Central Asia anyway. The advance of US bases through the Balkans into the Black Sea region ran out of puff when Bush was swapped for Obama and the strategic focus for the southern districts firmly overland or across the Caspian now. Kind of funny really. The reason a piece of technology is being used by a military was 100% political. I wonder how many times that's happened in the past.

What's that up there, travel agency spam in Russian?

whenever GG and Ethereal get into a thread discussion I always feel a little bit like I'm on mt olympus, invariably fascinating discussion but scary at the same time like one of them could just send a lightning bolt and blast the thread to pieces at any moment lol ahem, from what I've been reading around the place they're right, much as it is disappointing because I'd really like to see the R-77 on Flankers as a standard option in FC2. and perhaps there is still argument on the flipside of the survey simulator characterisation, a balance thing for the eagle's better radar, ARH for Flankers. but for IRL speculation what appears most likely from reasonable sources would be that the 27S has no base R77 capability out of the box but is merely a software upgrade held in reserve for cost-benefit ratio by RuAF. Standard only as part of an SM upgrade for example. If the RuAF went to war tomorrow software upgrades and R77 production would feed current servicable 27S units by the squadron in very short order I suspect, but in the event this doesn't happen you've just got a limited number equipped for them in the meantime, mostly 27SM outfits. And it'll probably stay that way for the moment because a lot of the current fleet might be nearing airframe death and looking at retirement. Some tail numbers have been out there a few years now. It's not like the Russians are newcomers to superfluous munitions stockpiles, they're still holding millions of artillery shells for the M3 guns of WW2, which therefore despite being completely obsolete they're compelled to keep mothballed because the whole damn thing just represents so much money. They dusted them off in Chechnya about 98 after going through the entire production of D3 ammo from 1960-80 worth. War just costs so much, even regional skirmish if sustained it was a big savings to do it that way and whip out the 70yr old artillery to use ancient stockpiles (that probably have a 50% failure rate by now but who cares). I can't imagine the Russians want to go producing any present tech stockpiles of significant size whilst current war materiels technologies are developing at a rather ambiguous pace. Nobody would be surprised if conventional thought on ARH AAMs was suddenly revolutionised any day now. Or never. The US can still manage to make/replace perpetual munitions stockpiles but I think the Russians are way more conservative and this is the thinking behind front line upgrades. It's like the Su-33, so many latent capabilities lacking only the software modules to incorporate, antiship weapons for one. They do indeed advertise the capability, but the upgrades aren't fitted standard to the service examples. And then this makes fiscal sense for the Russians because the whole Su-33/Kuznetsov is a pilot program anyway, it's not truly an operational force projection, it's a very expensive technology demonstrator. I think when we view the current RuAF fleets in this context things are a little clearer. It's really a work in progress for the 21st century with an emergency capability for now, sort of I think. Does that sound right? Thereabouts? Maybe?

maybe download one of the community mods that add formations templates to FC2 mission editor. That's what I did, one click and you've got a whole SAM battery/brigade. For realism and FPS be conservative with static emplacements. IRL there appears to be one S300 AD regiment based at Novorossyysk, a Buk brigade at Krasnodar and one over near Krymsk (north of it) and there's an Osa regiment between them, another Osa regiment based at Batumi (which is virtually a Russian sovereign territory because of all the hoopla between Tblisi and the Kremlin over RuArmy bases in Georgia), and one more Osa regiment based in North Ossetia, just over the Russian border where those bases are on the map. When I'm going to do a mission I just look at the local AD type for the region and put a battery near value targets like airfields. There's 3 batteries in a regiment at full strength afaik and up to 12 missiles per battery (2 launchers plus a reload carrier for the Osa). It starts to get hairy only when the mission is interdiction rather than strike, since armour brings its own significant SAM/AAA in addition to local static emplacements (I like Tunguska for them). Also helicopter regiments and troop movements will have their own AD (I like Strela for these). If I'm putting a major offensive on the board I use layered AD near concentrated units (Tor, Shilka and Igla). Don't go putting a Buk battery with every tank squad basically, it doesn't really work like that IRL. For an airfield strike, if currently being used as a major base, say with a guards fighter regiment they're going to have their own AD. Most airbases have obligatory Zu23 AAA (2 emplacements might be typical), but a guards regiment might've brought Tor, Tunguska, just about anything air portable. Hence it's usually better to perform runway denial when Army Intelligence discovers major elements are going to be transferred to a given airbase, somewhat before they get there or at least before they get properly setup, kind of defeats the purpose otherwise. Since you're flying RuAF craft, a western support contingent in Georgia will most plausibly start at the early stages with a small NATO or Israeli force with some chaparrels at a small airbase lent by Tblisi, Georgia would provide main AD coverage (similar setup to the Russkies but like a poverty version), local airfield coverage would be independent (eg. if an Israeli detachment of say, six F-16 and a couple of Hercs, they might have a couple of chapparels and vulcans plus regional Georgian AD like an Osa battery somewhere). If full blown hostilities in the midst of a campaign and you're facing any serious involvement by a NATO coalition then the bases up near the battlelines are going to be forward tactical ones with just about everything western and air portable present. NATO isn't very good at subtle. They'll also be supported by long range assets outside the battlezone (coming from Turkey or southern Georgia, off the map and including AWACS, tankers, Eagles, B-1B's and all the usual goodies). You get the idea. Just some thoughts leastways.

Anybody know military journalist/writer Piotr Butowski? According to him the R-27EA was abandoned early on (replaced by R-77 interest) but the Artem factory in Kiev made a short, limited production run (ostensibly for service trials) of R-27P in 1991 with seekers supplied by CKBA in Omsk. This wasn't known until more than ten years later but the author investigated an export listing for the missile at Kiev, apparently from what I can gather he followed the breadcrumbs to discover the limited production run and the information was published in Janes 2004. According to the author whilst Kiev could no longer produce R-27P, at Vympel in Moscow he claims small orders for either R-27P or EP can be filled and he infers having confirmed this with the company. For whatever that's all worth. Any thoughts?

Really looking forward to this model's release combatace. You have me in suspense.

Agree, I don't believe the ADF envisions any problems with Indonesia, it was just the handy hypothetical to provide an example of threatened territorial interests, which they do need to consider. More about strategic development than identifying potential aggressors I'm sure. But what it is doing its purchases based on is RAAF doctrine, carried over from the Mirage/Pig/Hornet outlay. The superbugs are being handed to the strike sqns and the JSF will go to the fighter sqns. And whether we use Indonesia or some other figure, a hypothetical "rogue state" the strategic doctrine for national security and territorial interests remains the same.