Trimming the Aircraft with Targeting Pod Mounted

[brucewhf]

The targeting pod for F-16 is mounted at the right side, which results in inbalance after take off. I have to trim my aircraft everytime with targeting pod mounted.

This is very annoying because I'm unable to trim it perfectly. Is there a way to balance the aircaraft without trimming?

Edited September 2, 2022 by brucewhf

[Jel]

Flying means trimming, trimming means flying. Even on jets with FCS, your surfaces will produce different lift, depending on various factors like airspeed, angle, etc.. Although your FCS will compensate most of it, with every change in values you will have to re-evaluate your trimm settings. There is no "perfect" trimm with asymmetric loadout.

Try trimming a little more decently, small blips only, you will see it works quite well.

Edited September 2, 2022 by Jel

[skywalker22]

Sorry, but if I fly with only TGP installed (and/or with balanced loadout), I do not need to trim the aircraft. In case of uneven loadout, I can still simply trim it, few clicks and it flies leveled. Don't know does why you have issues with that? For flying use Auto Pilot (Altitute - level flight, or Attitude - for consant pitch).

[ARM505]

This isn't a TGP issue of course, no need to mention that really, but the issue is the 'granularity' of the trim. Sometimes, even with the shortest blip of the trim hat, you'll end up rolling either one way or the other. Sims have always suffered from this compared to real aircraft, which are almost always easier to trim in reality. It's the mathematical quandary of never being able to zero out 0.0002 roll input which still has results in a sim, unlike reality where things seek equilibrium more readily it seems. Plus the instant trim rate compared to real aircraft (electrically controlled trim being 'on' or 'off', which in the sim means 'instantly at full rate', unlike reality).

What ED should probably have, in all electrically actuated trim, is a slight 'ramp up' time at the beginning, where the trim system gets up to speed (slow as the full speed might be). This would allow for very fine electrical trim inputs by short blips (like reality).

[St4RgAz3R]

one trick i use that works relatively well is to carry whatever load you have and put an aim9 on the opposite wingtip. The downside is you have to leave the other wingtip empty . It doesn't balance it 100% but does the trick for me

[Jel]

vor 14 Minuten schrieb St4RgAz3R:

one trick i use that works relatively well is to carry whatever load you have and put an aim9 on the opposite wingtip. The downside is you have to leave the other wingtip empty . It doesn't balance it 100% but does the trick for me

which basically would be a real life solution  Would be nice if we´d get an addition to the loadout menu telling us not only the overall weight but also the balance.

[St4RgAz3R]

25 minutes ago, Jel said:

which basically would be a real life solution  Would be nice if we´d get an addition to the loadout menu telling us not only the overall weight but also the balance.

yes that would actually be a nice addition

[Ayabe]

1 hour ago, ARM505 said:

This isn't a TGP issue of course, no need to mention that really, but the issue is the 'granularity' of the trim. Sometimes, even with the shortest blip of the trim hat, you'll end up rolling either one way or the other. Sims have always suffered from this compared to real aircraft, which are almost always easier to trim in reality. It's the mathematical quandary of never being able to zero out 0.0002 roll input which still has results in a sim, unlike reality where things seek equilibrium more readily it seems. Plus the instant trim rate compared to real aircraft (electrically controlled trim being 'on' or 'off', which in the sim means 'instantly at full rate', unlike reality).

What ED should probably have, in all electrically actuated trim, is a slight 'ramp up' time at the beginning, where the trim system gets up to speed (slow as the full speed might be). This would allow for very fine electrical trim inputs by short blips (like reality).

This is really the core issue and for whatever reason is more acute on the Viper. The Hornet is pretty easy to trim, same with the A10 and Tomcat.

[Sacarino111]

7 minutes ago, Ayabe said:

This is really the core issue and for whatever reason is more acute on the Viper. The Hornet is pretty easy to trim, same with the A10 and Tomcat.

True. In the Viper most of the time you'll find yourself triming and counter triming; it is difficult to find the middle/balance point in Roll.

I thought that placing a HAD in the other side would balance more, even if you don't go SEAD, but I saw no difference. I read somewhere that the HAD pod has no weight simulated yet, could be, so let's wait until they add weight to the pod.

Saludos.

Saca111

[Dragon1-1]

Use the wheels, people! The stick hat in the Viper, or any aircraft, really, is a fairly coarse control. The wheels are there to precisely set just the trim amount that you want. It will change with flight parameters, of course, but the wheels can trim you out almost perfectly for any single situation.

HAD should balance the TGP out better. It's good to take it for added SA, anyway.

[scoobie]

Wheels are great provided you have them

3 hours ago, ARM505 said:

What ED should probably have, in all electrically actuated trim, is a slight 'ramp up' time at the beginning

Fun fact: such "ramp up time" is there in P-51 if you bind trim controls to buttons (e.g. a trim hat), even though the RL Mustang has normal trim wheel and knobs. No later warbird in DCS got this quality of life improvement. My impression is that... maybe something like 2/3 of all aircraft in DCS, or half of them, IDK, have trimming with buttons set too "nervous"/coarse/fast, so that trimming turns into a minigame on its own. IIRC that was the case back then in LOMAC, probably also Flanker 2 (can't remember this one clearly).

[Blinky.ben]

13 minutes ago, scoobie said:

Wheels are great provided you have them

I believe he’s talking about the wheel in the cockpit. It’s on the left side towards the rear. This is the same one I use also after someone mentioned it to me. It trims much more smoothly then the hat trim.

Edited September 2, 2022 by Blinky.ben

[Aquorys]

6 hours ago, Jel said:

Flying means trimming, trimming means flying.

unless it's an Airbus 

[Vortex225]

11 hours ago, Dragon1-1 said:

Use the wheels, people! The stick hat in the Viper, or any aircraft, really, is a fairly coarse control. The wheels are there to precisely set just the trim amount that you want. It will change with flight parameters, of course, but the wheels can trim you out almost perfectly for any single situation.

HAD should balance the TGP out better. It's good to take it for added SA, anyway.

This is the answer. I bound the roll trim wheel to a spare analog axis on my throttle, and it provides very fine control. Very satisfied with the result.

 

As mentioned in the quote, the trim hat provides steps of trim level, which may or may not perfectly balance everything out.

Edited September 3, 2022 by Vortex225

[SickSidewinder9]

I use alt+ a hat switch to trim rudder to the left.  Also, the HTS pod doesn't have much weight and can be useful, and it help a little.  You can trim up to 6 doots for takeoff, but you have to go back down to around 3 once your airborne, so I keep it around 3 and just try to compensate on takeoff.

It is hard to believe, though, that the T Pod affects it as much IRL as it does in game.  It's so near the center line!

TL;DR, rudder trim is your friend.

[Dragon1-1]

The TGP makes for both asymmetrical weigh and airflow. Remember that the Viper is a very lightweight fighter. Even small CoG shifts can have a profound effect on trim, you can throw a Cessna out of trim just by leaning forward in the back seat, and WWI airplanes could literally be "trimmed" in a limited fashion by shifting your body around to balance the plane. Aircraft depend on a very particular arrangement of forces in order to stay in trim, and any deviation from that arrangement will produce a rotational moment.

[Exorcet]

Trim in DCS is unfortunately not fine enough to be precise. Fortunately the F-16 has autopilot. If you're straight and level attitude/altitude hold will do most of the work for you. You can even set the AP to follow waypoints.

[NineLine]

54 minutes ago, Exorcet said:

Trim in DCS is unfortunately not fine enough to be precise. Fortunately the F-16 has autopilot. If you're straight and level attitude/altitude hold will do most of the work for you. You can even set the AP to follow waypoints.

From the Viper Team: It is correct. One click of trim should be 0.1 G of trim

Thanks

[SickSidewinder9]

3 hours ago, NineLine said:

From the Viper Team: It is correct. One click of trim should be 0.1 G of trim

Thanks

The problem is the control window is uselessly small.  Look at the A-4 control window, it's great.  I just assumed it was copied from an ED module.  You should use that for the F-16.

[brucewhf]

11 hours ago, NineLine said:

From the Viper Team: It is correct. One click of trim should be 0.1 G of trim

Thanks

I guess the point is how much time do you 'hold' the button in one click. I usually press and hold the trim button and I lost track of how many '0.1G' did I trigger.

[BIGNEWY]

Hi 

try not holding, use a click which is .05g

[RuskyV]

Why not add an audio click for every 0.5g steps? it doesn’t have to be anything obnoxious just some sort of audio feedback that can determine how long it was pressed.

[cmbaviator]

On 9/2/2022 at 11:34 AM, Jel said:

Flying means trimming, trimming means flying. Even on jets with FCS, your surfaces will produce different lift, depending on various factors like airspeed, angle, etc.. Although your FCS will compensate most of it, with every change in values you will have to re-evaluate your trimm settings. There is no "perfect" trimm with asymmetric loadout.

Try trimming a little more decently, small blips only, you will see it works quite well.

 

Even the old M2000C, will auto tri i role after firing a missile, it stays level perfectly. in the F16, you cant trim perfectly in roll because even one bip in roll trim is a huge trim modification so it will either roll right or less over time. In the jeff, you can pinpoint more accurately your roll trim

On 9/4/2022 at 12:05 PM, Dragon1-1 said:

The TGP makes for both asymmetrical weigh and airflow. Remember that the Viper is a very lightweight fighter. Even small CoG shifts can have a profound effect on trim, you can throw a Cessna out of trim just by leaning forward in the back seat, and WWI airplanes could literally be "trimmed" in a limited fashion by shifting your body around to balance the plane. Aircraft depend on a very particular arrangement of forces in order to stay in trim, and any deviation from that arrangement will produce a rotational moment.

Yes but FBW is there for that well for the french planes at least. Even in a very old 2000c, the plane flies perfectly level after firing a missile, you dont need any roll trimming to do and its the same thing with the modern rafale. I would guess the C* law of the F16 would compensate for that but they didn't bother doing so in the F16 for a reason

[cmbaviator]

Besides, if theFBW maintians your current Bank angle, after firing a missile, why would it let the plane roll, ie changing the bank. As far as I know the C* law which basically what the F16 is based on and that airbus used 80% of that law to implement on their 320s, you order a roll rate when moving the stick, when stick is neutral, you are ordring a roll rate of 0°/s, therefore maintainng the current bank angle as long as its in the fligth enveloppe. I wonder why its not the same in the F16, why the FBW would not move accordingly the flight control surfaces to maintain that 0°/s roll rate, ie keeping the current bank angle after firing a missile or bombs ?

[Dragon1-1]

Roll FLCS in the Viper is kind of dumb. IIRC, the F-16 uses the C* law in pitch channel, but the roll channel is much simpler. I think it was because they didn't know whether FLCS will work out, so they decided not to complicate it further. The French are much more comfortable with high level of automation than the US aircraft companies, notice that the Mirage also has a much better autopilot than the Viper (which is also kind of dumb). You can see the same thing comparing Airbuses to Boeings, and even French cars to US designed ones.