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tgp loses position


doclucio

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hi guys, sometimes the tgp completely loses track after having been ground stabilized...is that normal?!?i mean it completely goes off track, not the fact the when under the wing loses the imaging while turning the other side, that is normal. it goes completely on another place so you have to repeat the procedure of searching the target again

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Well there's the gimbal roll problem where the head might roll too often while tracking a spot on the ground, so that it eventually has to un-tangle itself, so to speak. But when that happens, it'll usually show a big GIMBAL ROLL indication on the TGP screen, or something similar.

 

Otherwise, it should stay ground stabilized. If gimbal roll is not the cause, I'd check for unintentional button and axis assignments; other controllers like for instance an Xbox controller might send TGP slew inputs. And the Slave all to SPI command would naturally slew the TGP to your current sensor point of interest, and likewise Slave TGP to Steerpoint will slew it to the current steerpoint.


Edited by Yurgon
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  • 3 months later...
  • 1 month later...

I have the track file for reference. Please play the game and experience this. Not just one person has seen this problem. It may not be the case if you don't use the Hydra laser rockets.

I used to think it was me pulling Gs, but sometimes I got it even by flying straight. It happens when the CCIP recticle start to cover the TPG diamond. Sometimes the TPG will shift to somewhere else, go around the CCIP pipper, or funny enough, change my laser method from LSR to IR. We know the default laser mode is LSR unless I move my hand away from my joystick (I am in VR) and use the mouse to click the OSB to change laser type.  

What I did to avoid: use Area track (50% it will work the way I want), or Inr mode. never increase FOV or point track the target.... but, come on, laser rocket for moving target, that was the deal....

I have some IT knowledge, as a tester, you probably have to go through some really uncommon cases. Please run the game and do some hydra rocket run as it was not just one person have seen it, I bet you can reproduce it 80% of the time.

File exceed 5mb Download link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1PeyCNHc-8RkWFXtu-tSAwaWDPbsVIXBh/view?usp=sharing


Edited by jdfocus1985
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5 hours ago, jdfocus1985 said:

I have the track file for reference. Please play the game and experience this.

I saw you looking at mountain sides and ultimately crashing into a hill after shooting 3 quick bursts with the gun. I guess that's not what it looked like from your perspective? 🤣

Can you put together a short track showcasing the problem? That would be a big help!

6 hours ago, jdfocus1985 said:

It happens when the CCIP recticle start to cover the TPG diamond.

AFAIK, IRL pilots don't look at the TGP before rolling in with CCIP or gun attacks; they've located the target visually and use visual cues and references. So it may well be the case that the real TGP might do some funky wobbling when the aircraft is rolling in, and that no one cares about it.

That said, there seems to be a kind of blind spot with the TGP a few degrees below the waterline where the optics have to shift. Pitching the jet above and below that TGP blind spot can cause it to go completely bonkers. I'm not sure if that's a real life limitation, or a DCS approximation, or a plain and simple bug. But I'm also not sure that's what you're referring to. 🤔

6 hours ago, jdfocus1985 said:

or funny enough, change my laser method from LSR to IR. We know the default laser mode is LSR unless I move my hand away from my joystick (I am in VR) and use the mouse to click the OSB to change laser type.

I don't think the TGP does that on its own. You didn't accidentally hit DMS Right Short? Has happened to the best of us... 😄

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8 hours ago, Yurgon said:

That said, there seems to be a kind of blind spot with the TGP a few degrees below the waterline where the optics have to shift. Pitching the jet above and below that TGP blind spot can cause it to go completely bonkers. I'm not sure if that's a real life limitation, or a DCS approximation, or a plain and simple bug. But I'm also not sure that's what you're referring to. 🤔

It looks to me like that's a function of the sensor turret gimbal geometry.  Kind of like when it spirals to the boresight.
e.g. Because of the orientation of the turret on the front end of the pod, the sensor gimbal can't sweep left/right unless the base gimbal is rotated to horizontal.  But in that position, the sensor gimbal can't look up or down.
To hold a position on the ground requires simultaneous movement of both gimbals, and there are points where it has to "go the long way" to move to a particular point angle.

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On 1/3/2022 at 6:14 PM, Yurgon said:

I saw you looking at mountain sides and ultimately crashing into a hill after shooting 3 quick bursts with the gun. I guess that's not what it looked like from your perspective? 🤣

Can you put together a short track showcasing the problem? That would be a big help!

AFAIK, IRL pilots don't look at the TGP before rolling in with CCIP or gun attacks; they've located the target visually and use visual cues and references. So it may well be the case that the real TGP might do some funky wobbling when the aircraft is rolling in, and that no one cares about it.

That said, there seems to be a kind of blind spot with the TGP a few degrees below the waterline where the optics have to shift. Pitching the jet above and below that TGP blind spot can cause it to go completely bonkers. I'm not sure if that's a real life limitation, or a DCS approximation, or a plain and simple bug. But I'm also not sure that's what you're referring to. 🤔

I don't think the TGP does that on its own. You didn't accidentally hit DMS Right Short? Has happened to the best of us... 😄

Thanks for spending time download the Track file and watch it. It is not an assignment. I simply describing the symptom. I sincerely hope you could really give laser rocket a go. I do think a lot of people would agree with me that the track file doesn't replay the actual gameplay footage. If you would, you can also test the feature of replaying track file while you are on it. 

I read a lot of the posts in the forum and understand that Track file is the thing to be asked for. I have Tacview of the same footage be it doesn't reflect the issues on instruments that I described. 

About the HUD symbology, it is just my observation on what was happening when the TPG jumped. If you still think it is all because of me being a handicap or cumbersome, and not being a real life pilot, then I would just stop complaining about this. Because becoming a real pilot or Milsim is not going to happen, and I don't have the software to make videos, especially in VR. I am here to enjoy the game and not trying to be a difficult person. I knew someone is going to question that I touched buttons. I am afraid I can't proof that, but you have my word that these fingers on my dominant hand are steady, and the HOTAS I have (Winwing Orion) does not produce redundant inputs. I have 1000+ hours in DCS, have no problem with operating the TGP in both F18 and F16. All I ask is perhaps someone can give a go in the game.

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21 hours ago, No1sonuk said:

It looks to me like that's a function of the sensor turret gimbal geometry.  Kind of like when it spirals to the boresight.
e.g. Because of the orientation of the turret on the front end of the pod, the sensor gimbal can't sweep left/right unless the base gimbal is rotated to horizontal.  But in that position, the sensor gimbal can't look up or down.
To hold a position on the ground requires simultaneous movement of both gimbals, and there are points where it has to "go the long way" to move to a particular point angle.

By the way, the reason of me posting this as an issue is because it doesn't happen to everything. TGP would never behave like that when I do Laser bomb bombing, tight turn and pull G's. Sure I could ignore this single flaw and use Maverick and GBUs (love using them and they 100% works with my approach) to hit moving targets complete my task in a mission, just don't use the laser rockets, but I like the laser rocket.

If it is a non-guided rocket or guns, I don't use TPG, even boresighted it for sure.

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FWIW I read somewhere from a SME or other contributor that if you are going to be maneuvering hard, as you egress/ingress to a target, you should set to "INR Area" vs. "Point".

I have a habit now of switching to "INR Area" in the TGP after a target run, and setting up an ingress/egress run when I know I will be nosing over hard, or banking hard to do a short turnaround to come back in on a target. Once the maneuver is done, TMS up short to switch from "Area" to "Point" - works really well.

I only still have issues on a hard nose over to get pipper on a target, and my angle of attack is very steep, like 35 deg or higher steep.

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7 hours ago, jdfocus1985 said:

By the way, the reason of me posting this as an issue is because it doesn't happen to everything. TGP would never behave like that when I do Laser bomb bombing, tight turn and pull G's. Sure I could ignore this single flaw and use Maverick and GBUs (love using them and they 100% works with my approach) to hit moving targets complete my task in a mission, just don't use the laser rockets, but I like the laser rocket.

If it is a non-guided rocket or guns, I don't use TPG, even boresighted it for sure.

I'm not disputing it's a problem - And I've seen it happen when deploying other weapons.  I was just pointing out a potential reason for the "completely bonkers" movement Yurgon described.  It should still go back to where it was pointed though.

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The "wandering TGP" is definitely a thing and there have been plenty of prior threads and video caps.  I've haven't seen anyone with IRL knowledge confirm or deny that it occurs, but I speculate that it is accurate since the TGP in POINT and AREA mode are video image trackers, and there is a longitudinal rotation axis that could make image tracking problematic directly in front.  It's an area about 5 degrees wide about 10 degrees below the boresight circle (or about 5 degrees below the TVV in typical flight).  That does put it slightly above the rocket and gun reticles, so if you "pull" a target into the reticle for a shot, that's when it often happens.  With bomb CCIP and CCRP, that dead zone is much farther away from where the TGP is looking, so it's far less likely but still possible.

AFAIK, you do NOT get the "GIMBAL ROLL" warning with the wandering TGP.  If I'm correct, it's not a gimbal limit issue, it's an image tracking issue.

Like I said, the "why" is purely speculation on my part, but the upshot is you should not pull up to bring targets into the gun/rocket reticle while tracking with TGP in POINT or AREA mode.  Workarounds include rolling into the target with the TVV slightly above the target before rolling level, setting tracking mode to INR (TMS Aft short), setting a markpoint/slaving the TGP to it, and/or pitching down to get the pipper on the target.

I can't say I've seen or heard of a bug that changes the TGP from laser to IR pointer mode without using the HOTAS or OSB.

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15 hours ago, jdfocus1985 said:

I do think a lot of people would agree with me that the track file doesn't replay the actual gameplay footage.

Well, it does, but it can get desynchronized from what happened during the recording. Hence the request for a short track. 😉

I've shot several dozen APKWS and am not sure what to look for or how to reproduce what it is you're describing; I might think of the same thing, or maybe I'm not. It would really help if you could create a short track, showcasing this problem.

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With APKWS, it's usually plain old gimbal lock. It's actually caused by the fact that the sensor head can't elevate more than 90 degrees, that is to say, through the TGP centerline. So, if you've got the target directly in front, and it passes the centerline, it will try to flip over 180 degrees in order to try to continue tracking. This usually results in the track being lost, especially if it happens a few times, for example if the target is bobbing up and down in front of the pod's centerline. With the old A-10, this was rare, because there wasn't any real reason for the TGP to look forward in first place. With APKWS, this situation is encountered quite often. 

Now, I've had this problem trying to point track something well inside gimbal limits, and that one is harder to pin down. It's also an old bug, or at least I think it is. 


Edited by Dragon1-1
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11 hours ago, Yurgon said:

Well, it does, but it can get desynchronized from what happened during the recording. Hence the request for a short track. 😉

I've shot several dozen APKWS and am not sure what to look for or how to reproduce what it is you're describing; I might think of the same thing, or maybe I'm not. It would really help if you could create a short track, showcasing this problem.

Sorry not being specific on how to reporduce. If you could, please try APKWS laser Hydra on Moving targets, use point track to target and lasing, also please make the target move around. I guess the problem will occur. It never fail when I do Inr or Area track lasing on still targets.

If you could also fire after turning around. I mean accquire the target then turn around to fire. Thanks man!


Edited by jdfocus1985
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50 minutes ago, jdfocus1985 said:

If you could also fire after turning around. I mean accquire the target then turn around to fire. Thanks man!

Yeah, sorry. I was trying to help you figure this thing out, and possibly help you create a spot-on bug report from your findings. But if you can't be bothered to create a track or a video, I've got enough other things on my plate.

See, that's the thing about bugs and problems. There may be a million prerequisites (slightly exaggerated) for a bug to show up. Of course someone could try to replicate these, going off a broad description. But the idea about these forums is that we help our fellow flight simmers. And it's usually the best way when whoever experiences a problem, that that person also explores the path to the problem to generate a simple, short, spot-on, easy-to-reproduce error description. That, in turn, will increase the odds of someone in the loop filing a bug report to the internal bug tracker, which in turn increases the odds of the problem getting fixed in a timely fashion.

No one here gets payed for this, and while we all want DCS to be the best product it possibly I can, I'd rather lecture you once about how to file a bug report than take it on me to see if I can reproduce your problem on my own.

Best of luck, though.

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6 hours ago, Dragon1-1 said:

Now, I've had this problem trying to point track something well inside gimbal limits, and that one is harder to pin down. It's also an old bug, or at least I think it is. 

POINT and AREA have a much smaller volume limit than the camera does, it seems to be mostly under the aircraft.  I've never been able to consistently map out this volume (it may change with altitude and range), but you can see where it ends when it changes from POINT to P-INR.

I just posted this elsewhere, but one thing to consider is that when the TGP is tracking a moving target in POINT mode, if it goes outside that area and changes to P-INR, it continues moving the camera by rates instead of video tracking.  So if your tracking a vehicle on a straight highway, it will SEEM to be continuing to track the target, but it's fake and can lull you into believing it's still tracking.  It will eventually wander off.  Worse yet, if the vehicle makes a sudden right turn, the TGP will continue happily down the highway in the direction the vehicle was moving beforehand.  If you maneuver the plane so the camera is able to switch back to POINT mode, it suddenly locks onto whatever is in the camera at the moment which can be a bit jarring if you weren't paying attention.

This is not a problem with AREA mode, of course, since there's no moving target, when it switches to A-INR, nothing really changes

6 hours ago, jdfocus1985 said:

Sorry not being specific on how to reporduce. If you could, please try APKWS laser Hydra on Moving targets, use point track to target and lasing, also please make the target move around. I guess the problem will occur. It never fail when I do Inr or Area track lasing on still targets.

If you could also fire after turning around. I mean accquire the target then turn around to fire. Thanks man!

You could also do a quick search on the forums to find previous threads to see if the problem was already reported:

https://forums.eagle.ru/topic/280566-targeting-pod-wanders-off/


Edited by jaylw314
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6 hours ago, Yurgon said:

Yeah, sorry. I was trying to help you figure this thing out, and possibly help you create a spot-on bug report from your findings. But if you can't be bothered to create a track or a video, I've got enough other things on my plate.

It's not something I've found easy to reproduce at will.
Maybe if we had a way to cut it out of a long track, that would make it possible to get this apparently random bug into a short track...

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2 hours ago, jaylw314 said:

POINT and AREA have a much smaller volume limit than the camera does, it seems to be mostly under the aircraft.  I've never been able to consistently map out this volume (it may change with altitude and range), but you can see where it ends when it changes from POINT to P-INR.

Nothing to do with it. What I was talking about refers to TGP drifting off during an attempt to switch to point track. As in, you command track, and it wanders off the target, while you are in steady flight and completely within limits. 

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3 minutes ago, Dragon1-1 said:

Nothing to do with it. What I was talking about refers to TGP drifting off during an attempt to switch to point track. As in, you command track, and it wanders off the target, while you are in steady flight and completely within limits. 

oh, ok, never mind then, haven't run into that.  Once POINT catches a vehicle in limits, it tracks well unless it runs behind some cover or unless it turns into P-INR.

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On 1/6/2022 at 4:30 AM, Yurgon said:

Yeah, sorry. I was trying to help you figure this thing out, and possibly help you create a spot-on bug report from your findings. But if you can't be bothered to create a track or a video, I've got enough other things on my plate.

See, that's the thing about bugs and problems. There may be a million prerequisites (slightly exaggerated) for a bug to show up. Of course someone could try to replicate these, going off a broad description. But the idea about these forums is that we help our fellow flight simmers. And it's usually the best way when whoever experiences a problem, that that person also explores the path to the problem to generate a simple, short, spot-on, easy-to-reproduce error description. That, in turn, will increase the odds of someone in the loop filing a bug report to the internal bug tracker, which in turn increases the odds of the problem getting fixed in a timely fashion.

No one here gets payed for this, and while we all want DCS to be the best product it possibly I can, I'd rather lecture you once about how to file a bug report than take it on me to see if I can reproduce your problem on my own.

Best of luck, though.

Yeah, cheers. As a player just for the fun of playing video game, it is quite difficult to react that fast. Sometimes the bug and problem happen in a long play through, like the one I posted desync. It is not like I found out something then pursuing it. And... nothing is perfect, this is not a game breaking bug.

Today I just finished Enemy within campaign, 10 missions had past since my last post and It was bug riddling. Imaging there is this mission in pitch black darkness, low cloud deck with MANPADS, mountainous AO, a stupid wing man neglect my request, and your shots keeps missing because the TPG jumped and nowhere to be found.... However I overcome them with the time fast forward function: if bug ruined my game play I just restart, and this time I change my loadout to CBU 105s. Lucky we still have that in single player eh?

What I am trying to say is, the bug about TPG mentioned in this post is not an illusion, believe or not, it happened. I can leave it to people who get paid to test. 


Edited by jdfocus1985
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On 1/6/2022 at 9:36 AM, jaylw314 said:

POINT and AREA have a much smaller volume limit than the camera does, it seems to be mostly under the aircraft.  I've never been able to consistently map out this volume (it may change with altitude and range), but you can see where it ends when it changes from POINT to P-INR.

I just posted this elsewhere, but one thing to consider is that when the TGP is tracking a moving target in POINT mode, if it goes outside that area and changes to P-INR, it continues moving the camera by rates instead of video tracking.  So if your tracking a vehicle on a straight highway, it will SEEM to be continuing to track the target, but it's fake and can lull you into believing it's still tracking.  It will eventually wander off.  Worse yet, if the vehicle makes a sudden right turn, the TGP will continue happily down the highway in the direction the vehicle was moving beforehand.  If you maneuver the plane so the camera is able to switch back to POINT mode, it suddenly locks onto whatever is in the camera at the moment which can be a bit jarring if you weren't paying attention.

This is not a problem with AREA mode, of course, since there's no moving target, when it switches to A-INR, nothing really changes

You could also do a quick search on the forums to find previous threads to see if the problem was already reported:

https://forums.eagle.ru/topic/280566-targeting-pod-wanders-off/

 

If my task is to track then I am comfortable with it. I know the TPG is programmed to simulate target movements when the line of sight is blocked. My laser rocket never miss for static target, I could even do mark point SPI  laser rocket runs and kill 3-4 targets in one run.

The shifting only happens with firing laser rocket on target which "move along a line" in my case, it jumps as soon as I fired, sometimes TPG diamond goes around but falls back to the target (Lucky case, that target is dead for sure), sometimes it just vanishes. Shifting usually happens during dive attacks when I would look at my hud to line up with the target and checking the terrain. I keep diving down and down and down, soon as I fired I notice screen intensive movement from my right eye's right corner. 

I have TPG diamond and FOV turned to On in my HMCS, and tried so hard to find it. In the end I had to boresight or shut it down. It was quite chaotic during the mission... By switching to GBU12 the problem goes away.

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On 1/5/2022 at 9:10 AM, jaylw314 said:

The "wandering TGP" is definitely a thing and there have been plenty of prior threads and video caps.  I've haven't seen anyone with IRL knowledge confirm or deny that it occurs, but I speculate that it is accurate since the TGP in POINT and AREA mode are video image trackers, and there is a longitudinal rotation axis that could make image tracking problematic directly in front.  It's an area about 5 degrees wide about 10 degrees below the boresight circle (or about 5 degrees below the TVV in typical flight).  That does put it slightly above the rocket and gun reticles, so if you "pull" a target into the reticle for a shot, that's when it often happens.  With bomb CCIP and CCRP, that dead zone is much farther away from where the TGP is looking, so it's far less likely but still possible.

AFAIK, you do NOT get the "GIMBAL ROLL" warning with the wandering TGP.  If I'm correct, it's not a gimbal limit issue, it's an image tracking issue.

Like I said, the "why" is purely speculation on my part, but the upshot is you should not pull up to bring targets into the gun/rocket reticle while tracking with TGP in POINT or AREA mode.  Workarounds include rolling into the target with the TVV slightly above the target before rolling level, setting tracking mode to INR (TMS Aft short), setting a markpoint/slaving the TGP to it, and/or pitching down to get the pipper on the target.

I can't say I've seen or heard of a bug that changes the TGP from laser to IR pointer mode without using the HOTAS or OSB.

I see. You actually have a point here, it does happen at the said position, and think about the position where the TPG is mounted.... I guess it is not a bug, and player should aim the VV slightly to the upper-left...  

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