Tips for making a level turn and trimming with the Tomcat

[alexkon3]

Hi guys,

 

I tried to practice the Case I landing Pattern with the Tomcat (I managed to do on speed AOA which I normaly really struggle) but for the love of all that is holy I just can't manage to turn with it without increasing alt in a huge way (from 800 to 1300 ft) I tried giving Rudder imput to maybe counteract this but even the smallest movement of the pedals rolls the plane to the left instead. What is the trick to make a level turn with the Turkey?

 

The other major problem I have is Trimming the plane. I don't understand how you can fine tune anything with it. In videos everyone flies level all the time while I bounce up and down all the time either gaining or losing alt. deploying the gear or the flaps almost seems trivial while when i try this the plane goes full nose up immediatley and I trim all the way down until I have to use stick to level the plane again. Does anyone have tips how to do this properly? any fine tunings in the options I have to consider?

 

I use a T.1600m Stick fts HOTAS and TFRP flight pedals with

 

Pitch / Roll: Deadzone = 5 Curve = +15

 

Rudder: Deadzone = 6 Curve = +18

 

Any help would be appreciated!

 

Cheers

[BuzZoo]

Sorry, I can't be of assistance. But I have the very same issues and have the same controllers with similar curves.

I have the same problem with gaining altitude at the break even with brake out and throttle idle as recommended. There is a great vid from 104th maverick but it would be great to see his control grid in that clip.

Regarding trim. I find it trickier than other planes. The obvious difference is you have an extra variable with the wings changing sweep angle. I think it's doable though if you're patient and use small trim adjustments without also moving the throttle. I must admit, I'm at the more casual end of players and I often just let the autopilot do the hard work for me.

[TLTeo]

Going into the break what I do is just control vertical velocity by changing the angle of bank.

 

 

Coming out of the break there is definitely a tendency to picth up a lot, and before the AoA builds up the jet ends up wanting to climb. The way I deal with it is simply to brutally push the stick forward until I'm slow enough. It's not pretty and it probably shouldn't be done that way, but it seems to work.

 

 

Regarding trim, what I've been doing is turning on altitude hold, letting it trim the aircraft, and then turning it off and going from there. Also probably wrong but still works for me.

[alexkon3]

I took this vid as tutorial I still don't get how he is able to turn without loosing alt it looks so smooth.

[Bearfoot]

I posted a similar question here a while back:

 

https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=248356

 

The responses were very helpful.

 

Basically, as @TLTeo said: use AoB to control the climb --- more AoB, less climb and vice versa.

 

So (making sure wings are swept back fully) bank steeply and pull watching VSI --- if above 0 bank some more, if less than 0 relax bank angle. As you settle into turn your speed should drop and you will lose lift, but just around that time you will bring wings to auto and you will get back lift. Drop the gear once the speed is slow enough. But I've found dropping my flaps during the turn can make the turn rougher for me. Once I drop flaps the turn becomes really slow but I find it hard to control the ballooning. So I try and delay the flaps till I'm just returning to level on the downwind. During the turn itself if I find myself climbing or dropping I am not shy about using the stick to reposition my nose on the horizon to get a 0 rate of climb. Looks ugly as I am wobbling and there is typically minor PIO over/below the horizon. But it keeps me the ballpark. Obviously, still got a lot of work to do.

[alexkon3]

Thank you very much Bearfoot! I will try this tonight

[evolgenius81]

I know this is old but for posterity purposes, after I removed my curves from the Tomcat and added a little saturation so I only have 90% max input, my tomcat problems went away. This sounds counter-intuitive as I'm sure you wanted to deaden someof the input, but curves give the F-14 the opposite effect somewhere towards the middle of stick travel.  The Tomcat and some warbirds are the only aircraft I highly recommend NOT using curves with strongly suggest to learn to fly it without.  The issue with the curves is that it becomes wayyyyyy to easy to buck the plane now because it's too easy to hit that input speed ramp.  Small inputs are easier, but the sweet-spot is now smaller, and it actually becomes too easy to over-control the plane now and make her shake n quake and come apart.

I couldn't do an on-speed case-one trap for the life of me until I took the curves off.  Practiced for 12 hours straight on one Sunday, failed all but 1 lucky attempt that I did (the gamer way), and then the following day took the curves off and had no problem.

My other tip is to only adjust your trim on downwind leg only and not touch it after that.  From then on out use the DLC wheel/stick as that will practically turn the E bracket into a cursor that you can slide up or down to control your altitude/flight path.  If you need more time to trim out, make your initial break later so you have a longer downwind leg.  I find that with all my wings, boarrds, flaps, dlc, gear extended that she flies level and onspeed with throttles at or about the MIL line.

Edited September 21, 2023 by evolgenius81

[JCTherik]

On 10/3/2019 at 9:06 AM, TLTeo said:

The way I deal with it is simply to brutally push the stick forward until I'm slow enough

Are you iddle and boards out on entry to the break?

You shouldn't be coming out of the break too fast, in fact, you'd normally need some power at the end of the break in order not to get too slow.

This is how I do it:

Enter on perfect trim, wings back, 350kn, 800ft.  On entry, iddle + boards out + left bank ~50 degrees. Pull for 0 vertical velocity (left indicator in the hud and FPM across the horizon), pull needs steadily increasing as the speed drops. 300kn: wings auto, 250 drop gear, around this time the gear pushes your nose up and the wings get open enough that you need to suddenly decrease the pull quite a bit, but then immediatelly start increasing again. 210-200 flaps down. Below 200kn pull now needs increasing quite a bit faster (assuming 0 pitch curves) due to low speed.

About 20-30 degrees of turn to go, the pull is becoming too much, I hold nose up trim for 4 seconds - say 1 potato 2 potato 3 potato 4 potato, then let go of trim. You'll have to reduce the pull a lot at the same time to stay level ofcourse. 160kn at around 15 degrees to go, start putting power back in. When facing downwind tap right rudder a little to initiate smooth rollout, put wings level and let go of the last bit of the pull. When wings level, dlc open to initiate the descend to 600, arrest the descend with additional power.

50 ish degrees of bank should put you on track to get to 1.2 - 1.4 miles abeam, and with 4 potatoes of trim, you'll be pretty much on speed when you roll out of the break, you may just need few clicks to fine tune.

Some people like constant pull and adjusting bank for altitude, i do constant 50 degree bank (horizon touching just above the bottom right corner of the hud) and adjust pull for altitude, so if you want to do constant pull instead, you'll have to do some experiments to find how much AOA to pull, and you'd be ofcourse moving bank instead of pull to keep level.

Don't trim it continuously during the break though, fly the stick, then trim it when the pull is too much. You can trim for 2 seconds in the middle of the break and 2 seconds towards the end if you don't want to hold so much pull, or 4 seconds all towards the end, or fully wait until you get out of the break and then trim it, it doesn't matter, but don't trim it for hands-off flight while in the break, that would be way too much nose up trim once you roll out.

About 4 seconds of nose up trim is the difference between wings-back 350kn and landing config on speed, so count 4 potatoes of trim, then you can fine tune once on downwind.

(note, it's 4 seconds trim since the change in the tomcat trim in beta. It used to be 3 seconds, i'm not sure if that change is in DCS stable already.)

 

For practice, you can set a tacan over an airport, put a course line to whichever way you're flying, overfly the tacan beacon as if it was initial and do a case 1 break almost immediatelly, then check your distance when the beacon is on your 9 oclock. Then adjust how much you pull/bank to aim for about 1.3 miles. Keep in mind that the tomcat compass goes out of sync with the planet every time you even think of turning, so zero the compass after every break. I always zero it on initial, otherwise my downwind is at an angle and my abeam distance is off.

Edited October 13, 2023 by JCTherik

[eatthis]

18 hours ago, JCTherik said:

Are you iddle and boards out on entry to the break?

You shouldn't be coming out of the break too fast, in fact, you'd normally need some power at the end of the break in order not to get too slow.

This is how I do it:

Enter on perfect trim, wings back, 350kn, 800ft.  On entry, iddle + boards out + left bank ~50 degrees. Pull for 0 vertical velocity (left indicator in the hud and FPM across the horizon), pull needs steadily increasing as the speed drops. 300kn: wings auto, 250 drop gear, around this time the gear pushes your nose up and the wings get open enough that you need to suddenly decrease the pull quite a bit, but then immediatelly start increasing again. 210-200 flaps down. Below 200kn pull now needs increasing quite a bit faster (assuming 0 pitch curves) due to low speed.

About 20-30 degrees of turn to go, the pull is becoming too much, I hold nose up trim for 4 seconds - say 1 potato 2 potato 3 potato 4 potato, then let go of trim. You'll have to reduce the pull a lot at the same time to stay level ofcourse. 160kn at around 15 degrees to go, start putting power back in. When facing downwind tap right rudder a little to initiate smooth rollout, put wings level and let go of the last bit of the pull. When wings level, dlc open to initiate the descend to 600, arrest the descend with additional power.

50 ish degrees of bank should put you on track to get to 1.2 - 1.4 miles abeam, and with 4 potatoes of trim, you'll be pretty much on speed when you roll out of the break, you may just need few clicks to fine tune.

Some people like constant pull and adjusting bank for altitude, i do constant 50 degree bank (horizon touching just above the bottom right corner of the hud) and adjust pull for altitude, so if you want to do constant pull instead, you'll have to do some experiments to find how much AOA to pull, and you'd be ofcourse moving bank instead of pull to keep level.

Don't trim it continuously during the break though, fly the stick, then trim it when the pull is too much. You can trim for 2 seconds in the middle of the break and 2 seconds towards the end if you don't want to hold so much pull, or 4 seconds all towards the end, or fully wait until you get out of the break and then trim it, it doesn't matter, but don't trim it for hands-off flight while in the break, that would be way too much nose up trim once you roll out.

About 4 seconds of nose up trim is the difference between wings-back 350kn and landing config on speed, so count 4 potatoes of trim, then you can fine tune once on downwind.

(note, it's 4 seconds trim since the change in the tomcat trim in beta. It used to be 3 seconds, i'm not sure if that change is in DCS stable already.)

 

For practice, you can set a tacan over an airport, put a course line to whichever way you're flying, overfly the tacan beacon as if it was initial and do a case 1 break almost immediatelly, then check your distance when the beacon is on your 9 oclock. Then adjust how much you pull/bank to aim for about 1.3 miles. Keep in mind that the tomcat compass goes out of sync with the planet every time you even think of turning, so zero the compass after every break. I always zero it on initial, otherwise my downwind is at an angle and my abeam distance is off.

 

how do i zero the compass?

 

[IronMike]

Here, hope this helps:
 

 

[JCTherik]

6 hours ago, eatthis said:

how do i zero the compass?

 

It's zeroing itself slowly in straight level flights, but you can speed it up by pressing the button on the right, in front of the icls frequency knob, left of the compass slave knob. It's quite small, white, round and it can be scrolled or pressed. Bind the press on it.

You have to be in a level flight with constant speed for it to start working, and if your wings aren't perfectly level, it will put your compass onto a wrong value. Especially the constant speed is tricky, it has some quite tight margins and there doesn't seem to be an indicator whether you're accelerating or deccelerating. Luckily, you don't need to stay on constant speed, you just have to cross through it slowly.

I usually hold the button and rock the wings slightly and either push little more power until i see my speed climb and then slowly reduce it until the compass starts responding to the rocking wings, or the other way around - decrease power and once speed is visibly dropping on the dial, increase slowly. Right at the moment the speed is constant, the compass will respond wildly to your bank inputs, that's why i rock the wings, to find the moment of constant speed. When the compass is responding to bank inputs, put wings level and let go of the button. I have no idea if this is the right way to do it, but it does put the compass reasonably straight, +- few degrees.

That's usually a huge improvement, since after few slow orbits around a boat or an airfield, the compass is easily 30 degrees off, which makes it worse than useless.

Compass can also read wrong near big metal ships, heatblur wouldn't surprise me if they simulated that too, but i haven't tested it.

 

 

[Rhrich]

You know that little thing in the hud that sort of looks like an Cessna (if you squint) if you set the tomcat to landing mode?

It’s called the flight path marker and shows you where your plane is going. When you’re flying straight and level and keeping altitude adjust the horizon in the hud to it. (Altitude hold might help you).

On a clear day the horizon should line up approx with the horizon over the sea. 

Then just drag the fpm across the horizon and you’ll keep 800ft. You can use the horizon as well, but then you’re relying on unlimited visibility and only ocean to look at. So don’t get into that habit. 

Ignore any bozo who wants to be smart and say you’re to dependent on the hud. If you flew the real thing you wouldn’t need anything else than your pants and your instruments would be much easier to scan.

But, when you get more proficient you might want to scan the instruments above your left knee. 
The tomcat has a decent proper steam gauge altimeter. From habit I ignore the VSI and only pay attention to the former. That’s not the proper way of doing it, you’re supposed to include both in your scan, but I say that’s not needed. 

Edited October 15, 2023 by Rhrich

[Victory205]

Turn off the HUD.

[JCTherik]

10 minutes ago, Victory205 said:

Turn off the HUD.

The thing is, the vsi in the hud has much faster response than the steam gauge one.

[AH_Solid_Snake]

I think the accuracy of the HUD is unrealistically good.

I do wonder if theres an expectation and reality problem. In a lot of electric jets you can put the airplane into a particular state and it will hold itself there incredibly precisely.

With the F-14 and anything earlier its all on you, so look out the window and watch for the horizon moving, you can use visual markers like canopy bow or the instrument panel for where you expect the ground to line up with.

After that if you are just starting then accept some degree of deviation… +\- 100 ft working to 50 to 10. Expect continual inputs even when you are in trim if you are expecting to maintain right on the dot.

 

[BMO]

Am 3.10.2019 um 07:21 schrieb alexkon3:

Pitch / Roll: Deadzone = 5 Curve = +15

Rudder: Deadzone = 6 Curve = +18

remove the curves, sounds odd but it helps.

[BMO]

Am 13.10.2023 um 20:22 schrieb JCTherik:

I hold nose up trim for 4 seconds - say 1 potato 2 potato 3 potato 4 potato

I did the rest the same but this changed a lot for me, always had trouble finding the right trim after the break. 

THIS ALONE increased my bankler score by 10-15points on average

[grant977]

On 10/15/2023 at 5:46 AM, JCTherik said:

The thing is, the vsi in the hud has much faster response than the steam gauge one.

Oh No not at all and it’s not accurate. Turn that nonsense off. It’s a distraction.

[JCTherik]

On 10/22/2023 at 1:19 PM, AH_Solid_Snake said:

I think the accuracy of the HUD is unrealistically good.

I do wonder if theres an expectation and reality problem. In a lot of electric jets you can put the airplane into a particular state and it will hold itself there incredibly precisely.

With the F-14 and anything earlier its all on you, so look out the window and watch for the horizon moving, you can use visual markers like canopy bow or the instrument panel for where you expect the ground to line up with.

After that if you are just starting then accept some degree of deviation… +\- 100 ft working to 50 to 10. Expect continual inputs even when you are in trim if you are expecting to maintain right on the dot.

 

I tried some breaks and landings and you're right, watching the horizon in peripheral vision makes the climbs and descends when on-speed pretty noticable, i guess i just never really paid any attention to them.

That definitely makes it doable without a hud. I tried it a long time ago and i couldn't even hold a level flight, but i was mainly following the VSI.

Level break still seems pretty tricky without the hud. I'm mainly focused on baro alt and steam vsi since it's hard to judge climb/descent visually while in a bank and dirtying the airplane. The steamgauge VSI has a noticable delay of several seconds, especially in rapid changes. It's as if the needle had inertia. The VSI seems reliable only if the needle isn't moving. And yet, the baro alt seems to have a quick response, which is another thing that i never noticed.

So i guess i should mainly use baro alt and then vsi only to finetune when the baroalt seems stable?

For some reason the VSI on the left of the hud has pretty much an instant response compared to the steam gauge VSI. I don't know if that's realistic, but the truth is the HUD VSI in DCS is objectively a lot more accurate.

I get that landing with HUD creates a risk that people will be planting the FPM in the wires and then end up drifting left and low as a result. But if the HUD VSI is realistic, we should probably use it. And if it isn't then maybe it should be a bug report?

[Nealius]

I just use the VSI repeater in the HUD's TO/landing mode. Without the inner-ear feedback you would get in a real aircraft we're extremely limited in how precisely we can fly from a static gaming chair without using HUD or instruments. With this in mind there's really no point in arguing HUD-off traps or purely-visual flying (except for bragging rights). 

On 11/5/2023 at 12:10 AM, JCTherik said:

I get that landing with HUD creates a risk that people will be planting the FPM in the wires and then end up drifting left and low as a result.

Easily solved by lineup-AoA-ball scan. The HUD has nothing to do with it.

Edited November 6, 2023 by Nealius

[Victory205]

When I say “turn off the HUD” in the landing pattern, it’s because that is the only way that you are going to learn the skills you need to be a skilled (sim) aviator. It’s the same whether you’re flying a desktop sim, a full motion sim, or an actual aircraft.

The Navy teaches “Attitude Instrument Flying” from day one. Tiny adjustments result in performance changes in jets due to both higher energy states and simple vector state geometry. One degree of pitch has a higher value at the end of a velocity vector has a larger vertical resultant. 

Reference the VDI, it’s got better fidelity. Eventually, you can turn that off too, and fly referencing the horizon for tactical flying.

Each one G airspeed (or on speed AOA in the landing config) has a corresponding pitch attitude and power setting. For example, at max trap weight, level flight at 15 units AOA in landing config, takes about 10º nose high and 3300 pph fuel flow per engine (this is from memory, it changes slightly as we tweak the FM with each release). This also changes with weight and stores, but it’s relatively minor, a degree or two in pitch and a few hundred pph in fuel flow. It will get you in the ballpark. Same for turning flight, which requires a slight increase in pitch attitude and additional thrust. Practice turns, find out what pitch and power is required for those too.

The goal is to be able to take your hand off of the stick without the aircraft pitch attitude changing. Trim will take constant attention, and should become natural and second nature. 

In the break, is similar, but dynamic since speeds and configuration is changing. Attitude is still the key, and angle of bank is used to control that attitude. As speed decreases, you’ll need more pitch and less bank.

The HUD in the F14A/B was not designed to be used as a primary flight instrument. The horizon line, FPM and VSI jittered and lagged, depending upon the quality of alignment. Quality of alignment was usually worse at sea.  It was common to have “runaway winds” with a SINS alignment at sea, caused by observables during the alignment. This resulted in the FPM being pegged and out of view. HUDs also overheated and failed, regularly.

If you take the training wheels off, then you’ll learn to ride your bike. Note the pitch and power required for a desired speed and configuration. Write them down, be able to reproduce them. You’re life will get very, very easy.

Edited November 8, 2023 by Victory205

[Nealius]

Maybe I'm an anomaly because I never found a need to turn the HUD off and still have good passes (by simulation standards), and I know some who get perfect scores on Bankler's recovery trainer who have also never turned off the HUD, but I wouldn't be so absolutist as to say it's the only way to learn the skills. It may have been that way in real life at the time, and it certainly has validity in DCS as a method, but in DCS context I wouldn't dismiss individual factors by saying it's the only way. 

Edited November 9, 2023 by Nealius

[Lt_Jaeger]

From what I get, the HUD is way better in the game as in real life. I think it is way easier in the game to get results with the HUD on but one is bound to become dependent on it.

I read the same stuff Victory205 stated above in other posts by him as well, and decided one day to turn that thing off, and low and behold, almost got killed in the virtual world. Since then, it is still on, but at least till I hit the 90 I try to fly only by the instruments. The last part I'm still a HUD cripple for relying too much on the FPM to get the lineup right.

So currently I'm working on that last part of the flight to make it without that thing, and ruining my otherwise average score in the process. Since I'm obviously not the fastest learner and far away from the ability’s to be a real fighter guy, I need to take my time.

Eventually everything will click in place - I hope.

So yes, even for someone just pretending to be a fighter jock it makes sense to turn it off (I just lower the brightness - sometimes) to get better and experience some more immersion.

My 2c

[draconus]

14 hours ago, Victory205 said:

The horizon line, FPM and VSI jittered and lagged, depending upon the quality of alignment. Quality of alignment was usually worse at sea.  It was common to have “runaway winds” with a SINS alignment at sea, caused by observables during the alignment. This resulted in the FPM being pegged and out of view. HUDs also overheated and failed, regularly.

I never experienced any of this in my hundreds of HB F-14 flight hours. @IronMike do you plan to worsen our HUD modeling? I mean a fix to make it more realistic.

[BMO]

I only know messed up HUD´s from excessive G.