F-16 seat & G-tolerance improvement

[Hummingbird]

This might be of interest:

 

Documents listing the increase in G tolerance afforded by the F-16's reclined seating position:

 

https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/bbm%3A978-1-4614-3030-8%2F1.pdf

 

Excerpt:

1) "Tolerance. Average aircrew relaxed G tolerance in the F-16 seat is about 5.2 G (about .5 to .75 G less in aircraft without a reclined seat); the G suit can add another 1 G, and a good AOSM can add another 3.5 G or more of tolerance. When these are totaled, one can see that 9 G is a big challenge for most aircrew; there is little or no safety margin"

 

 

 

https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/e104/13a5e16e72db61ea9087c995f96e83c862ba.pdf

 

Excerpt:

"When the F-16-configured seat is used, the training profiles are set 1 G higher than they are when the conventional fighter aircraft seat (13* seatback angle, normal rudder pedal position) is used. The higher-G profiles are used with the F-16 seat because pilots report a 1- to 2-G subjective improvement in G tolerance in the F-16 as compared to other fighter aircraft, and because data obtained during centrifuge training when both types of seat were used revealed at least 0.8 G greater tolerances in the F- 16-configured seat than in the conventional seat"

[GGTharos]

IIRC Later papers showed that that this was indeed subjective and significant g protection requires the angle to be 55 degrees or more.

[Hummingbird]

Well how much is"significant"? If it provided no improvement it wouldn't be mentioned in the later document. Regardless the non subjective & documented improvement was 0.5-0.8 G, which is still going to be quite noticable.

 

Edit: I think I found the document you're talking about, and it shows that 12 G's could be tolerated at 55 deg, but that this is a very impractical seating angle.

Edited November 17, 2019 by Hummingbird

[Tenkom]

If you want to know effective the angle of the seat is you need only multiply with the cosine of the angle.

For example a seat reclined 30 degrees from the vertical would reduce 9 g to 7,79 g(9*cos(30))

They should make seats that recline when you pull gs

[Kirk66]

Those numbers pretty much match my experience in the centrifuge way back when it was first beginning to be used (mid-80s) due to F-16 GLOCs. My resting (in this context "resting" means twisting around checking 6 and talking on the radio or working the radar without any real anti-G straining) G was around 6; add a G suit and it was around 7, and I could function at 9 with a good AGSM - but it wasn't fun and you had to work at it!

 

Of course, that was in an old-school F-4 Martin Baker "sit up and beg" seat; and I was a smokin' and drinkin' Field-Grade WSO, so pulling Gs wasn't a problem! It was fun watching the skinny marathon-running overachieving captains GLOC everytime - soon after the AF banned marathon-type exercising, instead stressing weight-lifting, etc...

 

Yanking and banking is fun (especially in DCS), but IRL it's way better to let the skinny wingman do all the work, and save your strength for bat-hanging in the o-club after the flight!

 

Vulture

[Cytarabine]

Well how much is"significant"? If it provided no improvement it wouldn't be mentioned in the later document. Regardless the non subjective & documented improvement was 0.5-0.8 G, which is still going to be quite noticable.

 

Edit: I think I found the document you're talking about, and it shows that 12 G's could be tolerated at 55 deg, but that this is a very impractical seating angle.

 

There were experiments with prone pilot positions for this reason (and allowing a reduced frontal aspect so reducing drag).

[briosky2]

Will the F-16C be able to sustain 9Gs?

[Deano87]

You might want to be a bit more specific with what you're asking...

Do you mean... "When will we get a pilot that can sustain 9G for a reasonable period of time without blacking out?" or are you talking about FM related things?

[Spurts]

The FM already can sustain 9G at the right weights, altitudes, and speeds, but the pilot blacks out way to fast.

[BIGNEWY]

It can sustain 9gs but if you are pulling into it without warming up you may find the black out happen quicker. 

[Aquorys]

12 hours ago, briosky2 said:

Will the F-16C be able to sustain 9Gs?

As far as I've tried it, it already does. Your pilot doesn't for very long, so if you want to test it, you could create a test mission and turn off G effects. The F-16 can only sustain 9Gs at high speeds. The heavier the aircraft (fuel, weapons, etc.), the higher the speed you need to get sustained 9G turns. You can quite easily reach a weight where the aircraft cannot sustain 9G turns (or at least not at speeds where it would still be useful), and there are also a lot of configurations (specifically A-G) where you can't do 9G turns at all (or at least not without over-Ging the aircraft, which would potentially cause damage to the airframe and/or any G-limited equipment or ordnance mounted on it).

[Frederf]

Very often 9g is not sustainable due to weight, drag, height and speed. A look at the Ps charts will identify conditions where Ps is 0 or better. Try half fuel clean at SL starting at 450-500 knots, colder temps help. I can't think of better conditions than that.

EDIT: Looks like the best Ps0 line is 7.5 or so and that's with about zero fuel. You might get 8 on a very cold day. The Ps loss at 9g is pretty small but there is energy loss.

Edited November 12, 2021 by Frederf

[Hummingbird]

@ED 

Are there any plans to address this, or is this considered an area where realism must take a backseat to "balance"? (Honest question btw, not attempting to be passive aggressive)

 

Just wondering, as currently our pilots (esp. the F-16 one), seem to fall way short of documented average pilot capability in this regard:

 

https://www.sto.nato.int/publication...ARD-AG-322.pdf

Excerpt:

"The maximum G level obtainable using the anti-G suit and AGSM has never been systematically measured in the laboratry.: The maximum G level duration attempted in an upright seat using only an anti-G suit and AGSM was 9G for 45 seconds which was attained by 9 of 14 subjects in a study conducted at USAFSAM in 1972 "

 

This coupled with the earlier excerpts in the OP rather strongly indicates that we should be able to sustain 9 G's for longer in DCS, esp. in the F-16 which is documented as having at least 0.8 G advantage in max sustainable G tolerance due to seat angle alone.

 

It would IMHO only be fitting if this were simulated in DCS as well, for a more realistic experience, just as has previously been done in relation to other modules (F-86 vs MiG-15 for example).

Edited November 15, 2021 by Hummingbird

[RuskyV]

An option in the menu for reduced G effects would also be nice, you could have the audio and a little reduced vision around the edge but never black out.

[darkman222]

I get the point in doing a G warm up. And its good that ED is working on the pilots G tolerance. The best guess would be to look into the requirements about the required amount of time for real F16 pilots to withstand 9G. One year ago I did a side by side comparison with a Thunderbirds airshow 9G turn against the DCS F16 we had back then. Result, the DCS pilot was asleep while the Tunderbird pilot was still happily turning his jet. Its way better now.

I would not want to waste my time doing that comparison again, because I feel the F16 and whats related with it is developed in its own pace and re-worked if needed.

Edited November 16, 2021 by darkman222

[feipan]

Even Tricia Helfer, a tall thin blonde actress, who never sat in a fighter jet before is able to withstand 9.4g without problems:

 

[Baz000]

@BIGNEWY is PBG (Pressure Breathing for G) on the oxygen panel simulated in the DCS F-16C? Apparently this should give the pilot more G-tolerance than if not selected?

[Jayhawk1971]

Am 16.11.2021 um 13:52 schrieb feipan:

Even Tricia Helfer, a tall thin blonde actress, who never sat in a fighter jet before is able to withstand 9.4g without problems:

 

Well, she's a Cylon, so that doesn't count. 

[bkthunder]

Came here after a frustrating F-16 dogfight session... I feel this is really overdue now. It's great to see the FM getting close to RL performance, however that is all made pretty much unusable due to the unrealistic g-tolerance modeling of DCS. Plenty of official documentation and real pilots of any kind attest to that, so I take it for granted that there is no doubt on the fact a fighter pilot doesn't black out after a few seconds at 9g. Why this isn't considered a priority fix I don't know, but I hope it's not one of those things ED gets stubborn on not fixing despite crushing evidence. 

[BIGNEWY]

We have already said G-onset is on our list to tweak, I can not say when that will happen currently. 

thanks

[Torri]

This is regarding pilot G-tolerance, not FM G-onset rate

[MAXsenna]

Well, she's a Cylon, so that doesn't count. 

Sent from my MAR-LX1A using Tapatalk

[hawk4me]

Would be curious to know the block of that 16. It looks like a block 30 but he was not that fast and pulled 9g. I am guessing that is part of the g onset they working on? Being able to pull nose around with more authority would make the 16 far more deadly. Is pulling nose around more of an AOA thing or is it all related to the g onset?

[mvsgas]

22 minutes ago, hawk4me said:

Would be curious to know the block of that 16.

https://www.f-16.net/aircraft-database/F-16/airframe-profile/3506/

[SCPanda]

On 11/12/2021 at 8:39 PM, BIGNEWY said:

It can sustain 9gs but if you are pulling into it without warming up you may find the black out happen quicker. 

I'm sorry but I found even with G warm up, my pilot in the F-16 can only take 9G for about 2 seconds, and my screen just starts to turn black. I don't think this means our virtutal viper pilot can "sustain" 9Gs. 

On 12/1/2021 at 5:57 PM, BIGNEWY said:

We have already said G-onset is on our list to tweak, I can not say when that will happen currently. 

thanks

It's great knowing that ED is working on G-onset, but could you please share if ED is also planning to rework the G-tolerance/G-effect in DCS? If yes, will our F-16 virtual pilot get higher G-tolerance due to its inclined seat? 

Edited December 9, 2021 by SCPanda