How to get A/C weight in flight?

[moggel]

I just started the Maple flags BFT campaign and in the second mission I need to land the bird on one engine. My instructions are to attain a speed of 150kts + 1kt per 1000 lbs over 30000lbs. My question is: How do I know my current weight? Do I need to calculate that manually, from charts, or can I get the info from the onboard systems?

[Zyll]

Checklist screen on the MFD has this exact info

[Zyll]

I just started the Maple flags BFT campaign and in the second mission I need to land the bird on one engine. My instructions are to attain a speed of 150kts + 1kt per 1000 lbs over 30000lbs. My question is: How do I know my current weight? Do I need to calculate that manually, from charts, or can I get the info from the onboard systems?

 

 

 

Checklist screen on the MFD has this exact info

 

Oops sorry, wrong aircraft :)

[Frederf]

Manually

[kylekatarn720]

Empty weight of the aircraft + fuel load which you can see from the fuel gauge

 

Should get you pretty close everytime, unless you like carring lots of weapons.

 

Edit: although now come to think of it, i cant remember how much the full load of 30mm rounds weigh. Gotta check that too just to be on the safe side.

 

Sent from my SM-G965F using Tapatalk

Edited September 3, 2018 by kylekatarn720

[moggel]

Ok, so manual. Are there any charts anywhere that looks like the ones r/w pilot (I assume) must be using for this? Or is there some other procedure IRL, such as getting support via radio/AWACS?

[bbrz]

Why would you need charts? You should know the DOW (dry operating weight) and the fuel weight. You don't need anything else to figure out the actual gross weight.

It's the same IRL.

And if you don't know it, how should anyone else, who's not even sitting in your A-10, know the actual weight?

[eaglecash867]

Just write down all the weights from the loadout screen for the aircraft, and then do the math based on the ordnance/external stores and fuel remaining as you're flying. That should get you close enough. I'm not familiar with the mission, so I don't know why you end up landing on one engine, but that sounds like maybe an emergency situation (battle damage?) where it might be a good idea to punch off your external stores.

[tom_19d]

As Eagle said, if you enter the mission planner before the mission you can see the weights. Specifically for this case, BFT02 (the EFATO mission you are playing), has nothing mounted on the hardpoints and full load of CM gun ammunition and countermeasures. It gives you these amounts.

 

Empty Weight 24967

Fuel 7489

Weapons 1775

Total 34231

 

I don't think you will be expending any ordnance on that mission so as has been mentioned you only have to worry about how much fuel you burn off. Depending on how quick you get going 153-154 KIAS should be a safe number. And if you can fly +/- 1 knot single engine you probably don't need advice from anyone here...

 

Also, just in case you weren't aware, each DLC campaign has its own dedicated topic in the forums. Here is the one for BFT.

[Ramsay]

How do I know my current weight? Do I need to calculate that manually, from charts, or can I get the info from the onboard systems?

As others have said, it's done manually - so you'd calculate your weight for rotation speed, ground roll, etc.

 

In the case of BFTQ missions 2, the easiest way to estimate your weight is to contact the Ground Crew and open the Rearm/refuel dialog, it shows a GTW 35,084 lb of which ~7,500 lb (fuel gauge, mission brief or flight planner) is fuel i.e. you'd add a max of +5kts to your speed.

 

 

I'm not familiar with the mission, so I don't know why you end up landing on one engine, but that sounds like maybe an emergency situation (battle damage?) where it might be a good idea to punch off your external stores.

Basic Flight Training Qualification - Mission 2: is a simulated Engine Failure After Takeoff, as it's a training exercise, the aircraft isn't carrying any stores. Your advice is otherwise sound.

[moggel]

Thanks guys! I was asking about weight calculation in general, not for a specific mission. I just assume there are several situations, such as prior to landing and before taking onboard fuel from a KC-130. That's why I assumed there would be some CDU/MFD page that would help out with this calculation. But if I understand you correctly this is something the pilot would have to calculate in.air by him-/herself. If so, are there some sort of charts the pilot use for this?

[Ramsay]

... if I understand you correctly this is something the pilot would have to calculate in.air by him-/herself. If so, are there some sort of charts the pilot use for this?

Yes, the Performance Data/Charts include loadout weight and drag for planning.

 

A sample flight plan might look like this:

 

 

I'm not sure what is available for the DCS A-10C (or allowed under rule 1.16) but this:

 

 

from the User Files: Blech's A-10C Payload, should be sufficient to replicate RL planning if you don't want to data mine "db_weapons_data.lua", etc.

Edited September 10, 2018 by Ramsay