Are the Fa18C mods realistic?

[AH64D]

I think the MFD mods are really cool looking. I was just wondering if they reflect real life. Do F-18's in the real world have MFD's like this? I was just curious, I am still going to check them out.

 

Thanks.

Edited August 28, 2020 by AH64D

[Bunny Clark]

Do you mean the user mods that change the colors of the MFDs? If so, then strictly speaking, no.

 

As far as I know all USN F/A-18Cs and Block1 F/A-18Es used the green/yellow/red vector DDIs with a green UI. Block2 Super Hornets got full color LCD MFDs with a white UI, and I think these were eventually retrofitted to many of the Block1 Super Hornets as well. Some foreign operators of the F/A-18C also upgraded the displays to color LCD MFDs.

[AH64D]

Thanks for the reply. Yes I was refering to the DDI colors. I was curious about the modders intentions. Meaning if the colors were just made up, or if it was realisitc in some sense.

[Harker]

I'm the author of such a mod, it replaces the CRT DDIs with LCD screens. Personally, I did it because I saw that some F/A-18A+ aircraft were using them and wanted to simulate that in DCS. I also created my own display reflection effect, about a year before ED added theirs.

 

I played around with changing font colors to the off-white font used in some such displays, as well as the central MPCD and converted the AG Radar and FLIR/MAV/SLAM etc image to grayscale, to reflect the fact that the displays were not green CRTs anymore. The sensor output IRL is in grayscale anyway. I do offer the option to keep the font and the sensor output green though, since these options were also used IRL.

 

I released it as a mod in User Files after I realized that a lot of people were having issues with reading things clearly on a green display, with green font. It got a lot of traction, so now I'm maintaining it.

 

Mostly though, I did it because I like fiddling with DCS and textures. I didn't use it for long, I switched back to the original green CRTs after a while, also slightly modded for looking closer to IRL, at least IMO. I prefer sticking to realism as much as possible and that means that I'll use the CRTs, but I realize that not everyone sees as well as I do or can afford and run a 4K monitor, so I still maintain the LCD mod.