Navigation Tips

[Wayc00lio]

Hi All,

 

I've just flown all the tutorials on the MiG21 mod and love it. This sim is so awesome. I thought I'd pretty much cracked the Nav element until I tried the first mission of the MiG21 campaign.

 

Now, I did all the navigation by having the airfield as my RSBN location (channel 13) and knew the rough bearing for stpt 1 and 2 but from then on in I was navigating by the map and finding the landmarks on the ground around each steer point. I did an alright job considering, but I felt completely blind. I only found out about the rCntl down marker thing on the knee pad afterwards.

 

This map reading way of navigating isn't entirely optimal and certainly not accurate, especially if the sh*t hit the fan. I don't like the idea of the rCntl and down key as it seems a bit like cheating to me. Is there any real world advice that someone could give on how to nav properly using the systems in place? I suppose taking measurements in the briefing screen for each nav point from the originating AB would be one way, especially in a circuit type of flight that this particular mission was.

 

BTW, I only got 50% success after the flight as I still need to work on my landings! :-)

 

Thanks all in advance

[Justin Case]

I use the F10 map extensively, without showing any icons on it. Terrain (press the "alt" button in top right corner), water, towns, roads, power lines are all there and very useful for reference.

The key to success is to constantly keep track of where you are and always have back up reference, a distinct terrain feature for your current location.

 

If you end up in a dogfight and have to escape it is not really the perfect moment to press F10 in order to determine your current exact location, that's when it's nice to have a general bearing in your head and also something like a hill or a lake to aim for.

 

Once you're out of danger you can climb up and check your bearings from an RSBN, say the needle point towards the station with a bearing of 090 and the DME says 120.

Now pull up your F10 map and use the ruler, draw a line FROM the station towards 270 degrees and a distance of 120 km...that's where you are!

 

Planning with waypoints using courses and bearing can also be helpful, even more so if you do a rough time calculation for each leg.

[NeilWillis]

The map marking points is to give you an alternative to dead reckoning or visual references, which are used a lot by MiG-21 pilots. Visual references are only useful to a degree because the landscape doesn't have that many clearly recognisable landmarks. You can follow rivers or roads etc of course. Placing the marker on the kneeboard map just gives you the information without you having to calculate time and distance, or search for ground cues for each leg of your route.

 

Triangulation using a couple of RSBN beacons is a useful way to pin down your location, or as Justin said, use one, and work with a back bearing and distance.

[xxJohnxx]

Triangulation using a couple of RSBN beacons is a useful way to pin down your location, or as Justin said, use one, and work with a back bearing and distance.

 

While triangulation might be useful for the ARK, you probably don't need to perform it for the RSBN, as it gives you a bearing and a distance. With a ruler you can easily plot your position onto a map with just one RSBN station used as reference.

[NeilWillis]

While triangulation might be useful for the ARK, you probably don't need to perform it for the RSBN, as it gives you a bearing and a distance. With a ruler you can easily plot your position onto a map with just one RSBN station used as reference.

 

As stated at the end of the sentence you quoted. :thumbup:

[xxJohnxx]

As stated at the end of the sentence you quoted. :thumbup:

 

Hmm, I should start reading a sentence to end before starting to type an answer... Sorry for that ;)

[NeilWillis]

Good point about ARC beacons though, I haven't used them much at all yet.

[Nefron]

What we really need is a car GPS hackish avionics upgrade.

 

[Wayc00lio]

Cheers guys, I'm getting the hang of it now. Proper pre-briefing rather than in falcon BMS - jump in and off you go!

[kanami314]

a trick to help with waypoints, in the mission planner, pick the closesd rsbn station that you know of to the waypoint, then find the distance to it from the rsbn station, then determen the heading towards the waypoint, wright this down and use it to compare your position so you know when you have arived, then wright down the heading you need to fly. next do the same for each waypoint until you have finished with them all. once done, you should be able to get close enough to each waypoint with out any problems. flight plan notes are very helpful.

 

on combat missions, I would also recomend writting down other key information such as where the aaa and sam support is located, as well as where friendlys are expected to be and such. with good notes you wont get lost or outnumbered as often.

[Wayc00lio]

Cheers K :-)

[airwar]

Hi Mig-21 pilots! I created a mission (MP/SP) for helicopters with the Custom radio beacons (NDB in accordance with the Jeppesen). Could somebody check how custom NDB work with the MiG-21 radio compass (ARC). Thanks in advance !!!

 

Mission with Custom NDB with Morse code (CTTS v 1.04) - http://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/431053/

 

Custom NDB:

BT - 353 kHz (Ali)

LU - 430 kHz (Batumi)

DF - 520 kHz (Mukharani)

VP - 342 kHz (Tbilisi)

TIG - 477 kHz (Kutaisi)

UY - 842 kHz (Kutaisi)

TI -156 kHz (Senaki-Kolkhi)

I - 229 kHz (Senaki-Kolkhi)

KT - 870 kHz (Kobuletti)

T- 490 kHz (Kobuletti)

 

Edited November 1, 2014 by airwar

[ff4life4]

Dont forget about the ~~6 degree offset between magnetic and true north for this region.