cannot repoduce and missing track file What is going on here? AH 64 is a space sim?

[Dejmos]

19 hours ago, Floyd1212 said:

I'm not going to stand in the way of you buying a quality stick, but there are lots of people flying the Apache with all kinds of joysticks.  How about a track file?

Track file? What for?

[Dejmos]

16 hours ago, Hammer1-1 said:

central stick trim mode means that when you select trim, you let go of the stick and it will return to center...when that happens, the sim will recognize input signals from the joystick again. Basically this is it in a nutshell:

Central Stick Trim: Trim button

DCS: ignores any input from the stick until stick returns to center. You can literally pull your stick in ANY direction as far as you want and nothing will budge until you bring your stick center.

You: release the stick or bring stick back to center

DCS: ok, your stick is centered, your stick works again.

It literally takes some getting used to because its just a workaround for people who dont have FFB sticks. Trim functions in helicopters is vastly different than in  aircraft. Best way to trim a helicopter is to hold down your trimmer button and adjust your stick while in flight to the desired flight profile, then release the trim button....and then center your stick.

The problem is that even with delicate hotas movements, ah64 reacts too violently and I can't even hover. With hover training, collective 55 percent and the helicopter is already moving. When trying to stabilize, at some point the helicopter lies on its side. And the propellers... The propellers are gone.

[Hammer1-1]

 Well, thats where you learn the fine art of finesse. There is a lot you have to know when flying a helicopter, and the first thing one has to do is get comfortable. Get comfortable means setting up your flight simulator in such a manner as to where its comfortable for you to sit, comfortable for you to rest your hands on your controllers, comfortable for you to move around your workspace. The majority of us place our joysticks between our legs and use both hands on the cyclic (and use our fingers to manipulate it, not the palms). Mine is mounted on the floor between my legs and I just pull up to it. Always has been since I started flying the Huey many moons ago. You're in it for the long haul, but you absolutely need to get comfortable first and foremost before starting anything.

Edited May 8, 2023 by Hammer1-1

[Floyd1212]

1 hour ago, Dejmos said:

Track file? What for?

To maybe give you some pointers as to what you can do to get things under control.  Or to rule out that you don't have something weird going on with your controls. 

It's not a requirement, just a way to get some constructive help from the community.  There are lots of people flying the Apache in its current state without issue, but it takes a lot of practice...

[Dangerzone]

There's a reason it takes hours of training... with a real life instructor, just to learn the basics of hovering and taxiing with helicopters that are more friendly than the AH64. 

A track file allows people to see exactly what is happening. What your conditions are (wind, direction your facing into wind, your power levels, your inputs, etc) and to in some ways do what a RL instructor would do - observe and give feedback. Without it - it's like a real life instructor trying to instruct over text messages - very handicapped. 

As I understand it - flying the Apache is no simple task. I think when we have access to it as a 'game' we think - "Oh - it's a game - it should be easy to get into and fly - I want to go shoot something", and when it's difficult and we experience dynamic rollover, or settling with power, or VRS, or mast bumping, etc we think "It must be a bug - it's not flying right". However since we're talking about a simulator and not just a game (like WT) - the emphasis is on being realistic, not being simple - and it's going to be a challenge. 

A better quality stick may help - but it's not going to correct bad habits, and could actually be more damaging. (Cover up bad habits). My suggestion is to take up the offer for people to help you with what you have first with track files of what you're doing. Then, with a bit of training - if you are able to master it with those controls (some people are doing it with much less like a Logitech 3D pro), and once you have good habits - if you still want to upgrade to a new stick - you'll get the most benefit of the new stick instead of it just being a bandaid for potentially doing it wrong. 

[Dejmos]

22 hours ago, Floyd1212 said:

To maybe give you some pointers as to what you can do to get things under control.  Or to rule out that you don't have something weird going on with your controls. 

It's not a requirement, just a way to get some constructive help from the community.  There are lots of people flying the Apache in its current state without issue, but it takes a lot of practice...

training track. It's possible that something will help

AH-64_TRNG_02_CAUC_TXHovTO.miz_09052023_21-48.trk

[Dejmos]

One more

AH-64_TRNG_09_CAUC_Hover Landing.miz_09052023_22-02.trk

[BitMaster]

Just for reference, do you fly any other helicopter in DCS ?

 

I haven't flown the Ah64 a lot in DCS but others I have for many years. It takes practice over and over again and it also takes a fundamental understanding how a helicopter works, what a swash-plate does when you pull collective and what it does when you push the cyclic-stick left-forward and what it does when you do all that together plus rudders.. and what each blade does on it's way around the 360° circle. If you have no clue of what I am saying there will be limits of what you will understand when the Heli tells you something.

If I hadn't flown R/C Helis I would honestly have no idea about most of this, it's hardly ever really explained and shown, in many documentations in also often plain false.

 

 

 

[Floyd1212]

@Dejmos I watched both tracks. 

For the first one, my recommendation would be to fly the instant action mission "Runway Start" which puts you out on the runway with nothing around you.  Practice lifting up to about 5 feet and trying to hold a stable hover.  Doing that training mission where you are in a confined space seems like a recipe for disaster.  You might consider starting with a curve of 25 on your cyclic axis until you get used to how subtle the movements should be to control the aircraft.  Going back to your previous question about getting a better stick, I think a lighter spring would definitely help you in making smaller, controlled movements. 

Also, don't spend a lot of time right at that "light on wheels" transition.  As you start drifting around it's easy to catch a wheel and tip over.  You will be safer in the air at 5-10 ft where you can get the feel for countering the drifting movements.  You can also enable ALT Hold so you can take your focus off of the collective (mostly) and just worry about the cyclic corrections.

For the second track, you had too much left pedal input for the speed and torque they have you setup for your approach.  This is causing the rolling moment to the right, (and the subsequent barrel rolls).  I took control and got it stabilized for the approach, and you can see where my pedal position is vs. where yours was (the magenta mark).  Give that a try.

Hope that helps!

Edited May 9, 2023 by Floyd1212

[Hammer1-1]

Its also beneficial to pick your aircraft up slowly and see trends. If your helicopter is starting to lean left, give it a tad bit of right stick until you level it out. Keep lifting your helicopter until you come up. You dont have to fully leave the ground to notice which direction your heli is going to tip over. In the Ka50, the heli wants to roll backwards and to the left; the AH64 wants to to yaw left and roll left; the UH1H wants to pull left and roll right (been a while, probably incorrect). you can notice these trends before you even go skids up, its just a matter of testing the waters first. Pick it up without picking it up and see where the trend is going and then correct for it. The trick is to learn how to stay on top of it. If the rotors are turning right, give left pedal to counteract the torque and vice versa.

Edited May 10, 2023 by Hammer1-1

[admiki]

7 hours ago, Hammer1-1 said:

Its also beneficial to pick your aircraft up slowly and see trends. If your helicopter is starting to lean left, give it a tad bit of right stick until you level it out. Keep lifting your helicopter until you come up. You dont have to fully leave the ground to notice which direction your heli is going to tip over. In the Ka50, the heli wants to roll backwards and to the left; the AH64 wants to to yaw left and roll left; the UH1H wants to pull left and roll right (been a while, probably incorrect). you can notice these trends before you even go skids up, its just a matter of testing the waters first. Pick it up without picking it up and see where the trend is going and then correct for it. The trick is to learn how to stay on top of it. If the rotors are turning right, give left pedal to counteract the torque and vice versa.

 

You got this backwards

[Dejmos]

17 hours ago, Floyd1212 said:

@Dejmos I watched both tracks. 

For the first one, my recommendation would be to fly the instant action mission "Runway Start" which puts you out on the runway with nothing around you.  Practice lifting up to about 5 feet and trying to hold a stable hover.  Doing that training mission where you are in a confined space seems like a recipe for disaster.  You might consider starting with a curve of 25 on your cyclic axis until you get used to how subtle the movements should be to control the aircraft.  Going back to your previous question about getting a better stick, I think a lighter spring would definitely help you in making smaller, controlled movements. 

Also, don't spend a lot of time right at that "light on wheels" transition.  As you start drifting around it's easy to catch a wheel and tip over.  You will be safer in the air at 5-10 ft where you can get the feel for countering the drifting movements.  You can also enable ALT Hold so you can take your focus off of the collective (mostly) and just worry about the cyclic corrections.

For the second track, you had too much left pedal input for the speed and torque they have you setup for your approach.  This is causing the rolling moment to the right, (and the subsequent barrel rolls).  I took control and got it stabilized for the approach, and you can see where my pedal position is vs. where yours was (the magenta mark).  Give that a try.

Hope that helps!

 

Honestly? All answers help. I understand all dependencies. I'll loosen the spring and see what happens. But something seems to me that the pedals in the helicopter play a very important role. The problem is that I am simulating the pedals on the keyboard. In planes, I had the rudder set in the Z axis of the stick, which means that half a turn of the lever allowed me to control the pedals (I don't have pedals physically - yet). The problem is that when I had the pedals set on the hotas, I noticed a slight flicker and tilt in this axis at rest - no movement (I mean the list of joystick axes assigned to the commands - I hope you know what I mean) which gives me think that I have damaged elements that receive the movement of my hand in this axis.
P.S
I hope I was able to explain it in an understandable way.

21 hours ago, BitMaster said:

Just for reference, do you fly any other helicopter in DCS ?

 

I haven't flown the Ah64 a lot in DCS but others I have for many years. It takes practice over and over again and it also takes a fundamental understanding how a helicopter works, what a swash-plate does when you pull collective and what it does when you push the cyclic-stick left-forward and what it does when you do all that together plus rudders.. and what each blade does on it's way around the 360° circle. If you have no clue of what I am saying there will be limits of what you will understand when the Heli tells you something.

If I hadn't flown R/C Helis I would honestly have no idea about most of this, it's hardly ever really explained and shown, in many documentations in also often plain false.

 

 

 

And what is the difference in trying to understand flying the Ah64 and other helicopters? Are the flight physics different in others?

[Dejmos]

9 hours ago, admiki said:

You got this backwards

Well, the KA-50! I have this helicopter in DCS and I flew it. Now I remember thanks to your text! And I had no such problems there. The fact that it has two rotors. You think it makes it easier?

[Fastbreak]

21 hours ago, BitMaster said:

Just for reference, do you fly any other helicopter in DCS ?

 

I haven't flown the Ah64 a lot in DCS but others I have for many years. It takes practice over and over again and it also takes a fundamental understanding how a helicopter works, what a swash-plate does when you pull collective and what it does when you push the cyclic-stick left-forward and what it does when you do all that together plus rudders.. and what each blade does on it's way around the 360° circle. If you have no clue of what I am saying there will be limits of what you will understand when the Heli tells you something.

If I hadn't flown R/C Helis I would honestly have no idea about most of this, it's hardly ever really explained and shown, in many documentations in also often plain false.

 

 

 

Exactly this!

 

11 minutes ago, Dejmos said:

Well, the KA-50! I have this helicopter in DCS and I flew it. Now I remember thanks to your text! And I had no such problems there. The fact that it has two rotors. You think it makes it easier?

I dare to aver that it does not really matters how many rotors your heli has. Strictly speaking the crucial factor is your approach, your learning strategy (...) which is fundamental to master helicopter flying - for sure, it is very punishing. If i.e. you are going to fly a R/C helicopter without paying attention to the complex background theory ('the Heli tells you something'), practicing becomes a very short but expensive mistake. In a simulation -not an action game- these basic considerations might be a smart approach, too. 

[Floyd1212]

1 hour ago, Dejmos said:

But something seems to me that the pedals in the helicopter play a very important role.

That is for sure.  Every adjustment you make to the collective should be accompanied with a slight adjustment to the pedals to compensate for the change in torque presented at the main rotor because of the new pitch of the main rotor blades.

I have never tried, but I would think simulating the pedal inputs via keyboard would be very tricky.  If you really want to invest some time into the Apache, and other conventional helos, I would invest in a set of good pedals with removable springs.

The Ka-50 behaves differently with its twin main rotors spinning in opposite directions.  You don't get the forces acting in the yaw axis when you make changes to the collective because the two rotors cancel each other out.

Think of the Apache (and most conventional helos) like a car with just the left-rear wheel driven from the engine.  When you accelerate and the left rear wheel starts moving the car forward, the car is going to want to pull to the right, and you would need to add some left steering input to keep it going straight.  The harder you step on the gas, the more left steering it needs, and every little change in the throttle will need a slight adjustment to the wheel to compensate.  The Ka-50 would be like a car with both the left-rear and right-front wheels driven, so as you accelerate they impart forces opposite of each other and the car moves in a straight line.

Edit: To take that analogy of the car a bit further, Russian helos would have their right-rear wheel driven instead, so you would have to steer to the right when you accelerate to keep it moving straight.  This is because their main rotor spins in the opposite direction to western helos.

Edited May 10, 2023 by Floyd1212

[Hammer1-1]

12 hours ago, admiki said:

You got this backwards

if I got it backwards, then I got it backwards...its been a while since I was actively paying attention lol...but when I referred to "if the rotor is turning right give it left pedal" I wasnt referring specifically to the AH64.

Edited May 10, 2023 by Hammer1-1

[admiki]

7 minutes ago, Hammer1-1 said:

if I got it backwards, then I got it backwards...its been a while since I was actively paying attention lol...but when I referred to "if the rotor is turning right give it left pedal" I wasnt referring specifically to the AH64.

 

I know, but if rotor is turning right, your nose will turn left. Giving left pedal is not counteracting the torque, it is adding to torque

[Hammer1-1]

3 hours ago, admiki said:

I know, but if rotor is turning right, your nose will turn left. Giving left pedal is not counteracting the torque, it is adding to torque

again if Im backwards then Im backwards.Been flying a long time  I dont even pay attention to small things like that. Doesnt matter, I believe the point came across.

[Dejmos]

23 hours ago, Floyd1212 said:

That is for sure.  Every adjustment you make to the collective should be accompanied with a slight adjustment to the pedals to compensate for the change in torque presented at the main rotor because of the new pitch of the main rotor blades.

I have never tried, but I would think simulating the pedal inputs via keyboard would be very tricky.  If you really want to invest some time into the Apache, and other conventional helos, I would invest in a set of good pedals with removable springs.

The Ka-50 behaves differently with its twin main rotors spinning in opposite directions.  You don't get the forces acting in the yaw axis when you make changes to the collective because the two rotors cancel each other out.

Think of the Apache (and most conventional helos) like a car with just the left-rear wheel driven from the engine.  When you accelerate and the left rear wheel starts moving the car forward, the car is going to want to pull to the right, and you would need to add some left steering input to keep it going straight.  The harder you step on the gas, the more left steering it needs, and every little change in the throttle will need a slight adjustment to the wheel to compensate.  The Ka-50 would be like a car with both the left-rear and right-front wheels driven, so as you accelerate they impart forces opposite of each other and the car moves in a straight line.

Edit: To take that analogy of the car a bit further, Russian helos would have their right-rear wheel driven instead, so you would have to steer to the right when you accelerate to keep it moving straight.  This is because their main rotor spins in the opposite direction to western helos.

 

Someone above wrote-I dare to aver that it does not really matters how many rotors your heli has.-But it seems to me that it does, as you wrote. The fact that the rotors rotate in opposite directions I knew. And in this simulation, the KA50 is easier to control than ''Winnetou''. I checked after a long break. Regarding the pedals. Any specific model you have in mind? What can you recommend?

23 hours ago, Fastbreak said:

Exactly this!

 

I dare to aver that it does not really matters how many rotors your heli has. Strictly speaking the crucial factor is your approach, your learning strategy (...) which is fundamental to master helicopter flying - for sure, it is very punishing. If i.e. you are going to fly a R/C helicopter without paying attention to the complex background theory ('the Heli tells you something'), practicing becomes a very short but expensive mistake. In a simulation -not an action game- these basic considerations might be a smart approach, too. 

You present everything in black colors. And on You Tube, all instructional videos look like the flight is a piece of cake.

[Hammer1-1]

15 minutes ago, Dejmos said:

Someone above wrote-I dare to aver that it does not really matters how many rotors your heli has.-But it seems to me that it does, as you wrote. The fact that the rotors rotate in opposite directions I knew. And in this simulation, the KA50 is easier to control than ''Winnetou''. I checked after a long break. Regarding the pedals. Any specific model you have in mind? What can you recommend?

You present everything in black colors. And on You Tube, all instructional videos look like the flight is a piece of cake.

Ive had several types of rudder pedals, and without a doubt my favorites were MFG Crosswinds. They currently have a damper mod specifically to help with helicopter torque that help hold the pedals in place (or in most cases at least relieve some resistance), but any set of rudder pedals will do. The first thing I think you should do though is make your cockpit comfortable though, set your joystick up in a place where you can use it two handed and rest your arms on something at the same time. Then join a helicopter group with a bunch of instructors who can help guide and assist you with everything from setting your sim up to getting qualified to fly your favorite helicopter. A cheap pair of rudder pedals will do just fine, but dont expect precision from them. A lot of groups out there with a lot of experienced RW aviators, SME's and what not that are willing to help. Low Level Hell would be the first discord channel I would suggest joining too.

Edited May 11, 2023 by Hammer1-1

[Floyd1212]

I also have the MFG Crosswinds (with spring removed, and the damper kit installed).  They work great for me, though they may not work under everyone's desk, depending on your seating position and amount of space you have.

You might check out the "Falcon S1" pedals available all over ebay.  For around $200 they appear to be solidly built, includes the damper, but does not give you toe-brakes.  Here is a thread with some user feedback. (I do not personally own them.)

 

[pii]

19 hours ago, Floyd1212 said:

I also have the MFG Crosswinds (with spring removed, and the damper kit installed).  They work great for me, though they may not work under everyone's desk, depending on your seating position and amount of space you have.

You might check out the "Falcon S1" pedals available all over ebay.  For around $200 they appear to be solidly built, includes the damper, but does not give you toe-brakes.  Here is a thread with some user feedback. (I do not personally own them.)

 

I started that thread and they are very well-built pedals and the damper gives you lots of options for how you want them to feel. One thing though try to find someone local or in the country to ship them to save time and money but I know that may not be an option for everyone. 

[Dejmos]

5 hours ago, pii said:

I started that thread and they are very well-built pedals and the damper gives you lots of options for how you want them to feel. One thing though try to find someone local or in the country to ship them to save time and money but I know that may not be an option for everyone. 

Thank You.

[pii]

On 5/6/2023 at 8:08 AM, Dejmos said:

I just pulled the collective https://youtu.be/b9nZDhTKDqA

Roto RPM low Roto RPM low Roto RPM low Roto RPM low 

[salsantana]

On 5/7/2023 at 11:31 PM, Hammer1-1 said:

central stick trim mode means that when you select trim, you let go of the stick and it will return to center...when that happens, the sim will recognize input signals from the joystick again. Basically this is it in a nutshell:

Central Stick Trim: Trim button

DCS: ignores any input from the stick until stick returns to center. You can literally pull your stick in ANY direction as far as you want and nothing will budge until you bring your stick center.

You: release the stick or bring stick back to center

DCS: ok, your stick is centered, your stick works again.

It literally takes some getting used to because its just a workaround for people who dont have FFB sticks. Trim functions in helicopters is vastly different than in  aircraft. Best way to trim a helicopter is to hold down your trimmer button and adjust your stick while in flight to the desired flight profile, then release the trim button....and then center your stick.

Thanks for the clarification on trim types and how-to......... flying around today I was thinking about how to teach somebody how to set trim with Instant Trimmer... When I've got a good stable cruise going, I tap "T". Currently trying Center Stick Trim and it's quite different...... as in I'll "stick" to Instant Trimmer....... yeah, pun intended. I am badgered by something from several years ago in which trim settings were "cumulative". Just wondering if that's still a thing and perhaps the issue in Dejmos' case.