ESzczesniak

In all fairness, I haven't seen what he's asking for and would like to see it myself. There's no step by step guide to adding a small 7-8" monitor for an MFCD. Most/all of the threads are either only part of the story or base assumptions on knowning the process from DCS:BS. Add another one who'd love a simple guide (even if it pertains to BS since this isn't officially supported by the beta).

Yes. It's either activated automatically if the CMS mode switched is placed in auto, or by the CMS Hat Z-axis if in semi or manual modes.

Serial #: 01520 Location: Chicago, IL USA

I would imagine you would rather be making smaller smooth throttle changes. However, if you ever get a chance to see some cockpit videos of the Blue Angles or Thunderbirds, you'll see that they often make quick and drastic throttle changes as well while flying in tight formation. Sometimes it's just what you have to do to get the job done.

Mine's coming from the Pennsylvania warehouse. Not sure about others.

In short, yes! I have a number of Saitek pieces of hardware for flight simulation and am slowling phasing some out. They all experience this "twitchin"--it seems that Saitek uses some pretty cheap pots and there is a lot of noise. They're pedals and X-52 also have a lot of center slop. I have their yoke and throttle quadrants and they experience the same issues, but it doesn't present an issue flying heavy airliners that are more stable and don't respond to these sub-second spikes. My X-52 is heading for a junk heap very quickly though. Unfortunately I don't know how to fix it other than just replacing the pots.

In fact, it only got it half right. The lights still only reference the boom position (in real life, not true in F4). They are correct after contact/latch. However, priot to that point the lights have no meaning. Even though the pilot can not see the boom, he/she must fly the picture outside the window to get in to approximately the right position. The lights do not help the pilot get there. That is what calls from the boom operator are for. The only realistic option guiding a pilot to the boom with the technology available at the time of the KC-10/KC-135R's would be Frensal lenses. Unfortunately, these would require reprogramming for each new aircraft type and are not realistic for feasibility. For modern electronics, it may be feasible, but anything that is in mainstream military use is 5-10 years behind current ability (for good reason, it has proven reliability at this pont).

The show is called "Mail Call". It airs on either History Channel or Discovery Channel. I don't recall which at the moment, but is definitely an awesome show where lot's of %$#^ blows up.

Patience is a virtue. It's one I don't have. However, realistically wait 1-2 business days for an order to ship and get an update. Companies do need time to process, package and ship orders.

I had been thinking of the name you use when flying (or name of your pilot if you fly off line only), but I suppose either works.

This is a completely off topic post, but could be fun. How did you come about your callsign? I ended up with the callsign "boner". I've been working towards practicing orthopaedic surgery for some time which naturally led to the initial callsign "bones". Inevitidebly, this didn't last long and was changed to "boner". I only graduated medical school 6 months ago and am only 4 months into residency in orthopaedic surgery, but the callsign stuck a long time ago. Anyone else have stories?

I'm far from an expert...really far. However, I do recall when you have these severl GB files from FRAPS (if that's what it's from), you could put it through Microsoft Movie Maker and save it to an MPEG-4 usually decreasing size by 10-30 fold.

Out of curiousity, when did you place your order? Trying to get an idea of where I might be in line.

I wish I could give you an answer. Truth is that it's too easy to fly the boom and too hard to see the PDL/PDI lights around the boom that I haven't given them any real thought. You can see where the amber band is and the when teh boom is lowered you get a good sense of your height through this picture. The boom is held at a constant angle until very near contact and at this point I "fly the paint" and keep the same picture outside the aircraft. So far I've managed to get 2,500 lbs on boards before disconnect because I got out of position (on the best try...there are some less worthy examples). Also haven't done any night flying yet (although I really do need to give that a try).

Not sure what's going on. I somehow doubt that almost 100 people have cancelled their pre-orders, but I'm not sure they're shipping either. At the time I placed my order (October 25ish), there were something like 55-60 pre-orders inline. If they really are preparing to ship a batch, I should be in line (from they're 117 preorders at one point to 46 now gives 71...well over 55-60th place I should be in line). However, all my ETA did was change from "none" to "15 business days".

There are two things to keep in mind about those lights. 1. As mentioned before in this thread, they are aliased to boom position. This means that they are of little value until you're latched. Before this point, they're not useful, as they're just telling you where the tip of the probe should go. There's a long of discussion on various places that treat these lights as a frensel system where it would depend on your aircraft position. However, aircraft position varies by type of aircraft and there's no easy way to change such a system. 2. You can see the probe in an A-10 when latched...fly that. The A-10 is the only aicraft I can think of this moment where you have this gift (F-15 is close being over your left shoulder. The aircraft that really need these lights are the heavies (and that's who they're designed for) who have the boom latching several feet behind they're heads. This isn't fully appropriate, but I'm actually finding myself flying the approahc to the boom a little like a Navy drogue and probe style. Since I can see where the boom is at all times, it's very easy to put the probe right in the recepticle (Obviously aided by the boom operating flying the boom to keep it inline.

No, it measures absolute acceleration. However, your brain will be very aware of quick changes in acceleration. The inner ear is a less than perfect mechanism and prolonged periods of constant accleration (several minutes) can sometimes register as a slowly decreasing absolute acceleration. However, the ear is definitely not designed to measure the rate of change of acceleration. Also of note, the inner ear will give the body position sense in 3 axes of rotation (they actually don't match up with a standard X, Y, Z system, but similarly are all in orthogonal planes), but again is a less than perfect system. The conception that the inner ear gives only rate of change in acceleration tends to come from the confusion situations like a pilot can have in IFR weather. A pilot in say a shallow 15 degree bank turn will feel as if he's level and not turning. The problem here is that in a stable turn, there is no acceleration whatsoever. If the pilot increases bank fro 15 to 30 degrees, he will again feel like he's turning during that increase in bank, as there is now rotational and angular acceleration. This error in this misconception stems more from inaccuracy of the latter system (position sense) than in inaccuracy of acceleration detection.

My default answer is that you're probably not holding steady enough behind the tanker once connected. However, you may have something here. I stayed connected for about 30 seconds and I don't think I recieved any fuel. If I recall correctly, the flow is something on the order of 2,000 gallons/min. I should have gotten close to 1,000 gallons and at best got 100.

I've been looking for an answer on whether I would pay the $405 that I pre-ordered at or the $515 that it's listed at. No one will tell me which it is.

So you're an Air Force fighter pilot? The F22 is a single seat only aircraft.

I do agree with that, although I am switching my order to a place I'll likely get it a little earlier from. It costs a bit more than the original BLT price, but I can't ever get answers from ShopBLT's customer service. I can at the new shop. What worries me about BLT and that there may be issues is 1) some vendors have mentioned that BLT's original price was less than wholesale and 2) when other shops are struggling to get 10-20, they supposedly have over 200 on the way. It may all be very legitimate, but I am a little curious on these two points. Seeing as I can't get any answers from their customer service, speculation just grows.

How do we know when you have them instock actually. The webpage seems like it would allow me to order them as if they were in stock right now. Given that I think I would likely pay $515 from BLT, I'd be happy to order from you at any point I know they are in stock.

Perhaps they have...but I really don't know that we have the whole picture to be able to make such accusations. Additionally, at the moment they are the cheapest available in the states (even the new price of $515 is about the lowest I could it to the USA for). A few more delays, increases in price, etc and I may start to change my mind. However, I was looking for a cheap TM Warthog and that may involve a few delays to save some money.

I'm a bit surprised about Dell selling the TM Warthog for $630. I don't normally expect a bit name retailer to mark up a product above MSRP. I do understand that this is a high demand product and some retailers will do this, but such a big name doing it surprises me. As for now, I'm annoyed by the situation, but BLT hasn't actually done any wrong at this point. I will be disappointed if they don't honor the earlier pre-order price, but until I see some indication of that or that they're hoarding some supply of these things I think I'll keep my pre-order with them.

Well, truthfully I'm willing to do that. Anyone have suggestions on good places? From what I'm seeing, this is going to cost $500ish now that BLT upped their cost. It appears that many places in Europe will be $500ish since we don't have to pay the VAT tax. If the place has them instock, I'm likely to get it about the same time anyway. So, any suggestions?