A good spot for intermediate training

[Wile E.]

I've been playing DCS for almost a month now. I decided to start with the P-51D, because it should be simpler for a newbie, but I also picked up the A-10C II and F-16C with the new user discount.

I watched every P-51D YouTube video I could find and went through the training missions. With an unarmed plane, I can take off well just about every time. With a full load of rockets or rocket/bombs mix, I have a tendency to bounce, get sideways, or roll to the left and crash. None of the training I watched covered how to take off with a heavy load. When I do take off, about 15% of the time, my engine will seize after a few minutes. When I look at the dials, everything is in the green.

I created two missions, one in the Caucasus, and one in Normandy for a change of scenery. Both consist of taking off, flying to a nearby airport, and hitting some ground targets including AAA to keep things exciting. But I suck at hitting ground targets. In a shallow dive/strafing run, I can get my plane pointed pretty well, but the munitions hit so far below the plane, that I'm shooting blind. If I go in a steeper dive, I have a lot of trouble aiming the plane at the target. The DCS training mission consists of a voiceover saying to dive at the target, skipping over how to do so.

So I'm looking for intermediate level training on topics like heavy take off, climbing after take off, and ground attack.

Does anyone have suggestions on where or how to learn these topics? I've been practicing, but I'm concerned I'm reinforcing bad behaviors on some of these.

[draconus]

On 1/30/2022 at 12:58 AM, Wile E. said:

When I do take off, about 15% of the time, my engine will seize after a few minutes. When I look at the dials, everything is in the green.

 

[Rudel_chw]

On 1/29/2022 at 8:58 PM, Wile E. said:

Does anyone have suggestions on where or how to learn these topics?

For ground attack, which isn’t the Mustang forte, this video from a little known channel is the one that helped me the most when I was flying the P-51 (a looong time ago):

 

 

[Pikey]

There's two things mentioned - aircraft handling/manufacturer based limitaitons and combat tactics and procedures.

For landing and takeoff, there is the printed real life manual with the limits and it's pretty much written in stone with maximums and minimums. Thats all you get for "written in stone" but it covers takeoff, climbing and weights and so on.

For combat procedures there is a way of looking at it in terms of "the manual" to do with safety and such and then there is tactics and procedures which is completely different.

There isn't a right/wrong way to bomb by absolute definition, for non bomber types with no bombsights. There are more a list of parameters that you would practice for. Sorry that is just stating the obvious, but everyone did practice techniques at the time and in the sim. Later when bombsights first came there were published parameters. By this I mean how the F-86 and F-5 would bomb, using a fixed deflection sight set to a specific number of mils for a specific speed, altitude and angle of dive.

So I think you already came to that realisation, but the next step is to practice a single parameter set until proficient, taking notes of your release points by noting canopy references.

For actual tactics, what profile to use and when in what combat conditions, I don't have any sources for WW2 stuff, but things that don't kill you as often and are accurate are the best tactics Typically, either the medium level 10K dive bomb and release at 4K or low level pop up which I find more fun but way more dangerous.

Edited February 8, 2022 by Pikey
sp

[Wile E.]

I watched the Luke Swann videos as well as the Grim Reapers videos. I'm trying to roll in from 5000 ft, like Luke suggests, but my roll in is terrible. On most dives, I spend most of the dive fighting the plane, trying to line up the shot, and end up pulling out without taking a shot. I put some cargo ships on the Marianas map and have had better luck with them. I also mistakenly added a modern Russian corvette and exploded about five minutes into the first attempt.

I'm still having issues taking off heavy, where I roll onto the left wing. I think it's from putting in so much rudder to keep the plane from rolling off the left side of the runway, even with 6 degrees of right trim.

[draconus]

2 hours ago, Wile E. said:

I'm still having issues taking off heavy, where I roll onto the left wing. I think it's from putting in so much rudder to keep the plane from rolling off the left side of the runway, even with 6 degrees of right trim.

You have to get to speed first, hold it down longer even if it can leave the ground already.

[Pikey]

yeah just sounds like a basic wing stall for any prop, they all do that if you are too early/rough.

[Wile E.]

I try to push the stick forward to keep the nose down until I hit 150 or so. Those are usually the successful takeoffs. I'm sure it's just a practice issue. But I wonder how we didn't have more pilots crash in training.

 

[draconus]

32 minutes ago, Wile E. said:

But I wonder how we didn't have more pilots crash in training.

You mean RL? They crashed... a lot. https://www.realclearhistory.com/articles/2019/02/12/staggering_statistics_15000_us_airmen_killed_in_training_in_ww_ii_412.html

[Pikey]

Not only in wartime was basic crashing during landing and takeoff a typically common event, but experienced pilots wreck millions of pounds of machinery every year today, which is heartbreaking on many levels.

One of the reasons I like the warbird flying experience is that combat with other planes is merely a side dish, you have to do combat with the aircraft and then the ground before that!

[Wile E.]

I didn't know it was that bad in WWII, but I do remember reading that in WWI the allies lost more planes to bad landings than to German pilots.

[Oddball52]

What kind of controls (hotas?), are you using? 

Have you done the Axis Tune to adjust the midrange/deadzone? 

Are you adjusting trim during flight?

[Wile E.]

I was using a Thrustmaster T.16000 HOTAS & rudder, because it was inexpensive and I didn't want to spend much money in case I didn't like flight sims. Over the weekend I set up a Warthog HOTAS and Logitech pedals on an NLR FS Lite chair, and started flying the Warthog. I've taken off at least a dozen times without any incident. I've also landed all but the time I lost half my tail to AAA. I was even able to land when AAA disabled my left engine. I haven't crashed on landing (but I did roll the plane on its back during taxi once), but I do flare too much  and/or too soon and usually touch down halfway down the runway.

 

I have the deadzones at 1 or 2, and the dot is still in the black box. I have the curvature on yaw, pitch, and roll all tuned to 20, based on what SuperCap suggested in his GrimReapers setup video. I tried reducing it to zero and the plane got really janky. With both planes, I'm constantly adjusting trim. I did notice with the T.16k rudder I was applying unintentional yaw, because there's not a lot of resistance to the rudder. On the Logitech rudder, I turned the tension knob up to about 25%, and I don't yaw unintentionally. I haven't tried the Mustang with the new setup. I might do that tonight.