Spiceman

Lower them as soon as you put the wings out. Nothing special.

Half flaps in the Tomcat is just not a thing. For takeoff you either use full flaps or you use maneuver flaps. You should already have maneuver flaps mapped, since it’s the same control as DLC and you really can’t get by landing on the boat without DLC.

Use the cues from the LANTIRN and drop in Manual. No reason that shouldn’t work.

Yes, the flap handle is a continuous movement, it’s only the slots that it sits in that make it a 2-position up or down. Very few crew would ever attempt to really manipulate the flaps in a dogfight, though. The flight regime where they wouldn’t break was extremely small. More than 220 knots or 2g and they’re going to break (the torque tubes would snap) and then you’re screwed. So if HB were to modify the module and make them an axis, they should also model just how easy it is to lock them out, in order to be realistic. The Grim Reapers did one of their videos with a guy showing how you could dogfight using the flaps and it was total BS. Gave a lot of guys the impression that using the flaps in a dogfight was the way to go. I guarantee you that if the flap damage was modeled realistically, guys just wouldn’t mess with it.

I do think that the dim push buttons are an ED issue. I’ve flown several modules today, the MIG-29, SU-33... they all suffer from this issue. They are mentioned in the Beta Tester log as being fixed for the next patch.

It’s a bug. It’ll be fixed soon hopefully. In the meantime, flick the nose gear to Extend before you salute and you’re good to go.

The lighting is an ED issue and hopefully gets fixed in the next patch.

Everyone knows about the issue. It’s affecting all modules. ED is fiddling with the lighting. It doesn’t make sense for HB to chase the issue and they’re probably waiting for the dust to settle so that they only have to fix it one time. Chill.

The launch bar is tied to kneeling and extending the strut. It is connected to the scissors by a pair of bungees and will be raised and lowered as the scissors extend and retract. There is a latch that the ground crew can either pull on as the strut is kneeling, or if they miss it, they can lift the launch bar slightly to take the tension off the latch, pull it, then drop the launch bar. The latch will also un-latch if the nosegear is swung left or right more than 10 degrees, which is also a common way for the yellow shirt to get the launch bar down if the green shirt is not in position to do it and the jet is not up to the catapult raceway yet... just signal the pilot to swing the nose gear.

Our RL crews that we talk to say that the cut lights were used to signal to the guys at the bottom of the stack that the deck was rigged for recovery.

Still not modeled.

No, they didn’t. The lighting updates in DCS have created some work to do for everyone. The lighting in DCS used to have barely any luminescence at all. So modules were built around that. Now all of a sudden everything is too intense. I’m sure HB will adjust it, but hopefully it’s a lower priority than getting the A done which we’re all itching for. So for now, just turn the lights down.

Ah yes, that part is a Tomcat bug. The strut kneel valve should go to extend with weight off wheels and right now it doesn’t. So we’re in a weird place with a hand signal that shouldn’t be there, which just so happens to relate to a bug that also shouldn’t be there. Lol. So for now, at least what I do, is ignore the hand signal that shouldn’t be there, and flick the kneel switch to Extend before I salute, and then you won’t land in kneel.

It's incorrect. ED hasn't tailored the hand signals for the F-14. It's unclear whether they intend to. Just ignore that hand signal.

Well I will certainly admit when I am wrong and if you say you were there, I’ll certainly take your word for it. I watched the Hornets on the boat from the 88’ work-ups to the end of our 89’ deployment and didn’t see them giving that signal. We can’t post the NATOPS here so I’ll paraphrase from memory... when the “Final Turnup” signal is received from the catapult officer, advance throttles to MIL or MAX. On aircraft 161353 THRU 161715, the launch bar switch automatically returns to RETRACT. On aircraft 161716 AND UP, place the launch bar to RETRACT. So the earlier Hornets had the launch bar retract automatically at mil and on the later ones, the pilot had to do it. So it’s weird that you gave the signal on the earlier Hornets and didn’t on the later Hornets. Seems backwards. Oh well... I’ll drop it (not to mention this is the Tomcat forum and I’d much rather talk about Tomcats!).

The modeling isn’t exactly right on the wing sweep handle. The wings should be set in Auto before moving the wings out of oversweep which will drive the captains bars, and the spider detent, to 20 degrees. To come out of oversweep into wings forward, the handle is lifted, moved to 20, and then dropped into the spider detent and then a Master Reset. From this point on, the handle will move with the wings. The way it’s modeled now, if you follow that procedure, the handle doesn’t engage the spider detent. So the way to do it in DCS is to lift the handle, move it to 68, drop it down, hit Master Reset and then put the wings in Auto. It’s a small discrepancy and probably not worth the effort to fix right now. I’m sure the A is high on the priority list.

No... first they pointed to a CNATRA doc, but unfortunately it was for the T-45 Goshawk. Then they pointed out a reference that said the director can give the hand signal “as applicable” which would mean in a situation where the launch is suspended prior to the run up, in which case it would indeed be necessary for the director to signal to the pilot to raise the launch bar. There was no era in which the director ever gave the retract launch bar hand signal during a normal launch. There was a time in the Hornet where the launch bar retraction occurred automatically once at mil power. But that’s a different issue. I’m not trying to criticize ED, they’ve made a conscious decision not to undo something they’ve put development effort into, put out in videos and manuals and all that. It’s all good, I can understand that, really.

They did not give a flap signal IRL, it was assumed. The extend launch bar signal for the Hornet is also wrong, BTW. They did not give that signal IRL. Raising the launch bar is part of the pilots run up procedure after being in tension and going to mil power. It’s not a signal the plane director gives. It was brought up in testing and ED ultimately took the position of, yeah, it’s probably wrong but we’re not changing it at this point.

Server/multiplayer tracks are not nearly as bad. Host a multiplayer server for yourself and use that track. I think you’ll have better luck.

Sweet, glad to help!

The arrow on the outside of the compass rose is pointing to the tacan station. Your job is to get the course line on the inside of the circle to align with the pointer on the outside of the circle, and when you do this, the course deviation index will center and all three elements will now be in alignment, the tacan station bearing pointer, the course marker, and the course deviation index. To align them, place the bearing pointer between the course marker and your heading. So if you want to get to a course of North, 360, and the bearing pointer says the ship is currently at a bearing of 030, then make your heading something greater than 030, let’s say 060. The bearing pointer will then move to the left and line up with the course marker at 360 and you’ll be on course. In the picture attached, if I was this guy, I would turn left to 270. The bearing pointer would then move right to line up with the course of 354. Of course, he’s at a DME of 0.5 so it doesn’t really matter, he just needs to look down! A good gouge is to make two equal distances, I.e. make your heading such that the distance between your heading and the bearing pointer equals the distance between the bearing pointer and the course marker. Sandwich the bearing pointer between your heading and the course marker.

+1 ... combat aircraft, including many of the ones in DCS were made to operate from forward bases and third party mods show just how easy, and awesome, better FARP capabilities make the sim. At least fix the bug with the A-10 that makes its gear collapse when placed on Suntsags FARP mats. Every other DCS airplane works except the A-10... the one DCS airplane most likely to be used from a FARP.

I watched your videos.... the one commenter said he was able to fix it by “removing the bottom face of the collision object”. Can you explain how to do this?

Yep... and we simply used parachute cord from the PR shop for the yaw string.

So the A-10 seems to be the only plane that won't work on the mats. It doesn't see them as solid ground. Even if they're laid on top of a road, and the A-10 sees the road as solid ground, it will then see the road as not solid. Anybody discover a workaround for this? Even the chicken-legged F-16 can park on the mats, but not the A-10. It drops the A-10 from about six feet on spawn and breaks the landing gear.