Mk-82 Snake Eyes - DCS vs actual footage

[Captain Orso]

Actual footage

DCS - 0.25 slow motion

DCS - from a different angle - 0.25 AND 0.1 slow motion

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The shovels deploy far too early and too slowly. The actual footage shows the bombs gaining a larger separation from the aircraft before the shovels deploy, and when the shovels deploy, they are far quicker. In DCS they actually may be clipping into the aircraft; it's hard to be 100% certain, but it does look like it with drops from certain ejectors.

[Raven (Elysian Angel)]

Unless the current effect in DCS is only visual, I reckon this will be non-trivial to fix: the shovels opening later AND faster will have an effect on the trajectory of the bombs... 
That would mean pretty much every module in DCS that can use Snakeyes needs to have their ballistics computer updated...

[Captain Orso]

I have NO idea how accurate the DCS Snake Eyes fall compared to Real-World™ Snakes Eyes, and I'm not contesting that in the least, only the visuals.  

Edit: With more and more Cold War jets being introduced, I think the Snakes Eyes are going to become more popular than ever. I grew up seeing them in the nightly news on TV.

Better to get them fixed now than when, for example the brand-spanking-new F-4 Phantom II appears and suddenly there are dozens, or even hundreds of videos on YT showing shovels popping open and hitting the airframe or other bombs and just looking bad.

Edited January 8, 2024 by Captain Orso

[Andrew8604]

There is currently some amount of delay in the opening drag device "pedals" or "shovels" in DCS.  I would think just adding a 1/4-second more delay would probably do it.  Unless it is a calculated distance from the rack that determines when they open (simulating an arming wire).  Either way, just about double the delay or distance...we're talking a small amount here.  And I assume the drag of the bomb makes an instantaneous change from a low drag coefficient to a higher one at the moment the drag device opens in DCS.  I think the animation of the fins opening could be done away with, or maybe just three visual states in the animation sequence: closed, 1/3-open, and fully open.  The testers will tell.  As well as evaluating whether this change will have any appreciable impact on accuracy.  

One other thing, it seems (per expert testimony of a former ordnance man on Heatblur's forum, as well as my observation of the mechanism diagram in an F-4B Phantom II NATOPS manual) the activating cartridge (impulse cartridge) in the ejector release unit (ERU) not only retracts the hooks from the bomb's suspension lugs, but also drives a piston out a few inches that gives a slight push to the bomb straight away from the rack mechanism.  In the case of the MER (multiple ejector rack), there are normally attached 6 ERU's, three forward on the MER beam and three aft.  The bottom ERU aligned with vertical and the left and right ERUs aligned with an angle of roughly 45 degrees to vertical, to the left and right, respectively.  So, when released (ejected) from the MER, the bomb on the left side will be nudged slightly left and downward.  The bomb on the right rack nudged slightly right and downward.  The bomb on the bottom ERU nudged slightly, straight downward.  The MER recoils just a bit in response to an ERU kicking a bomb away...action causes opposite reaction.  But I don't think it's worth modeling that.  And then the same with the TER (triple ejector rack), but with only three ERUs.  Anyway, I mention this kick away force if you think it's worth modeling.