Jump to content

banking turn before final approach in carrier landing is deadly


Ddg1500

Recommended Posts

Recently I’ve practiced quite a lot on f14a and b’s carrier landing, I basically overcame numerous difficulties such as trimming the aircraft; trying to catch the E brackets for extended period with mature use of dlc to control the sink rate and E bracket and so on.

Despite considerable improvements, I found that the most deadly phase(personally)in carrier landing is not the final glide down to the deck, but the banking turn before the glide down. 
 

Because at this phase, f14B (fuel 7500 clean load out)would need 90% rpm at around 140 knots to ensure not stalling, which is a very low speed, if you stay below 90% rpm or slightly below such as 87% rpm while staying at 140, you will highly quickly find the aircraft is still slowing down rapidly and is stalling fast instead of remaining at around 140 and being stable at banking.( many people have speed around 150 or beyond when banking, without catching the E bracket, that’s just not the correct way to do carrier landing, the correct way would be the one done by reflected simulations)

At this moment, you either throttle up immediately to full military power or even afterburner to gain speed , or crash the airplane, which I experienced both multiple times.

Furthermore, you still need to catch the E bracket, and when you begin your banking below the mentioned power and speed(90% 140) you will immediately find the E bracket plummet down to a very low position and you literally are stalling

To solve this problem, I would recommend advance the throttle immediately to 90%( f14a would need around 85%) while maintaining at around 140 knots accompanied with dlc adjustment to making sure the banking is stable, while catch the E bracket.

I’ve strong respect to those real tomcat pilots, if this is exactly what they experienced in real life, then they are absolutely elite of elite, because they are risking their life to tame such a hard aircraft many times a month, which would make landing hornet apparently easier.

Disclaimer: this article only represents personal opinion of the handling characteristics of Tomcat, it does not represent the opinions of other people.

 

 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The Cat You're flying with heart not numbers. This is not the flying computer as F/A-18 does. 😉 There's constant work on all axles including the throttle, You can't set it to specific position/value and expect the plane will keep the parameters You expected from this setting.
And about the HUD symbology, when I started learn this monster, I discovered, that CASE1 is way easier to me to perform with HUD totally disabled, just by reckoning visually the situation outside (yes, same way as the GA pilots do) and AOA indexer.
Nowadays, I use HUD, but it's more because I am lazy enough to reach to the HUD brightness rheostat, than I find any indications usefull to me.
Of course everything changes in CASE3, but it's different story.

Natural Born Kamikaze

-------------------------

AMD Ryzen 5 3600, AMD Fatal1ty B450 Gaming K4, AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT, 32 GB RAM Corsair Vengeance LPX, PSU Modecom Volcano 750W, Logitech G940 HOTAS, Turtle Beach VelocityOne Rudder.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You can off course use auto throttle. I don't know how to put the cat down without it.

AMD Ryzen 5600G, RX7900 XTX, 48GB 27" 1440P monitor and Oculus Quest 2. WinWing Orion 2 w/ FA18 throttle, VKB Gladiator EVO w/ F14 grip, Logitech G rudder pedals, TrackIR 5, WinWing MFD and Voice Attack.

Planes: F14A/B Tomcat, mostly the B, F/A 18 C Hornet

Modules/ maps: Super carrier, Nevada, Persian Gulf

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 6/2/2023 at 4:31 PM, Ddg1500 said:

Recently I’ve practiced quite a lot on f14a and b’s carrier landing, I basically overcame numerous difficulties such as trimming the aircraft; trying to catch the E brackets for extended period with mature use of dlc to control the sink rate and E bracket and so on.

Despite considerable improvements, I found that the most deadly phase(personally)in carrier landing is not the final glide down to the deck, but the banking turn before the glide down. 
 

Because at this phase, f14B (fuel 7500 clean load out)would need 90% rpm at around 140 knots to ensure not stalling, which is a very low speed, if you stay below 90% rpm or slightly below such as 87% rpm while staying at 140, you will highly quickly find the aircraft is still slowing down rapidly and is stalling fast instead of remaining at around 140 and being stable at banking.( many people have speed around 150 or beyond when banking, without catching the E bracket, that’s just not the correct way to do carrier landing, the correct way would be the one done by reflected simulations)

At this moment, you either throttle up immediately to full military power or even afterburner to gain speed , or crash the airplane, which I experienced both multiple times.

Furthermore, you still need to catch the E bracket, and when you begin your banking below the mentioned power and speed(90% 140) you will immediately find the E bracket plummet down to a very low position and you literally are stalling

To solve this problem, I would recommend advance the throttle immediately to 90%( f14a would need around 85%) while maintaining at around 140 knots accompanied with dlc adjustment to making sure the banking is stable, while catch the E bracket.

I’ve strong respect to those real tomcat pilots, if this is exactly what they experienced in real life, then they are absolutely elite of elite, because they are risking their life to tame such a hard aircraft many times a month, which would make landing hornet apparently easier.

Disclaimer: this article only represents personal opinion of the handling characteristics of Tomcat, it does not represent the opinions of other people.

 

 

Hey mate, shared this about a month ago, maybe it could be of some help:

 

Modules: FC3, Mirage 2000C, Harrier AV-8B NA, F-5, AJS-37 Viggen, F-14B, F-14A, Combined Arms, F/A-18C, F-16C, MiG-19P, F-86, MiG-15, FW-190A, Spitfire Mk IX, UH-1 Huey, Su-25, P-51PD, Caucasus map, Nevada map, Persian Gulf map, Marianas map, Syria Map, Super Carrier, Sinai map, Mosquito, P-51, AH-64 Apache

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Although the turn to final is dicey, it really is not that much of a problem and when done right, you wont' be near stall speed at all.  If anything, you will be in danger of sinking too fast and going into the water, but not of stalling.

First of all, make sure the bird is trimmed trimmed trimmed.  You should be able to let her fly straight and level hands off the stick.  This will help ensure that you are on AOA and thus on speed all the time.

Next, as someone pointed out above, you should not be turning more than 30 degrees of bank (as a guideline) or less than 27 degrees.  This is determined by how far abeam from the boat you are.  1.0 miles would be 30, 1.3 would be 27.  Adjust accordingly for this range.

When you are turning, are you also making sure you are in coordinated flight?  That left turn will cause a skid, you have to put it some left rudder to center the yaw ball.  You don't need alot, and when the ball centers, you can let go of the rudder and it will stay centered pretty much.

Ignore the E-bracket.  It doesn't update fast enough and is ratchety.  IRL F-14A and B pilots ignore it too.  Concentrate more on the AOA indexer and your altimeter.  You can see the trend if you are climbing or descending with the altimeter and if you are slow or fast with the AOA indexer.

Likewise, use of the flight path marker should not be dependent on. In that turn to final, the most I would say use it is to place it on the horizon as you turn.  The act of you trying to do that naturally gives your plane a slight descent from the 600 ft AGL you should be on downwind to the 450 you should be at final.  You can use it to get you pointed at the crotch of the ship for landing, but that's it--don't use it to place you on the deck, the LSO can tell you are "spotting the deck" and that makes your approach dangerous.

Your throttle shouldn't have to move in such gross motions to keep you in the air or even on the numbers.  You should always be putting in discrete amounts of power or taking it out.  3 small power adjustments will net you better and more controlled effect rather than one huge power adjustment on a whole.  If you are familiar with the "three point power correction" concept, use that.  If not I can explain it further.

The only thing I feel is difficult but takes skill to master at that phase of the approach to final is how the Tomcat seems to have alot of dynamic stability (I think that's the term).  ie, you turn left, and you want to turn straight and level, but she still wants to keep turning left.  Then when you get her to turn right to straight and level, she wants to keep turning right.  It's constant corrections.

v6,

boNes

  • Like 1

"Also, I would prefer a back seater over the extra gas any day. I would have 80 pounds of flesh to eat and a pair of glasses to start a fire." --F/A-18 Hornet pilot

Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 hours ago, bonesvf103 said:

This is determined by how far abeam from the boat you are.  1.0 miles would be 30, 1.3 would be 27.  Adjust accordingly for this range.

Also adjust for wind. With natural wind going down the angled deck it's going to be pushing you inside the turn. With 10+ knots of natural wind and 1.0nm abeam 30AOB in the first 90 leads to needing close to 45AOB in the second 90 to avoid an overshoot.

If the mission designer gave low natural wind, or has the wind going down the BRC instead of the angled deck you don't have to worry about it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...