Flying in Formation

[TripleTapper]

Is there a trick to flying in formation with Biff?  I have him hooked, but struggle to maintain his speed.  Any tips you all can give?

[bjdy]

I'm a n00b, and I generally suck at formation flying.

As far as I can remember you don't have to be that close to biff (other than in the 4th of july mission where you should be glued to his wing). He did call out his speed and where he was tunring, didn't he?

I usually come in way to fast, so I have to throttle all the way back, and use the airbrakes as well. For most of the campaign you'll fly lead, so there's no problem with this.

I must say that Iron flag is a brilliant campaign for someone like me. Most of the missions are very long, but I kind of like that. I only have one mission left, but do I feel battle ready? Not so much... I need Iron flag part II 

[DD_Fenrir]

10 hours ago, TripleTapper said:

Is there a trick to flying in formation with Biff?  I have him hooked, but struggle to maintain his speed.  Any tips you all can give?

1. Trim - having any aircraft well trimmed for the phase of flight you are in will benefit your ability to maintain airspeed/distance regarding your lead. It'll mean less deviations from the proper course and altitude; given that with each deviation you travel further than your lead for any given distance, meaning more airspeed required by you (and thus greater power required to compensate) you'd be surprised how much a well trimmed aircraft helps in this regard.

2. Lead your Lead - if opportunity allows, always take the inside of your Leads turn - you'll need less power to stay there and it's a lot easier to stay in position; staying on the outside requires extra power you may not have and a moments misjudgement of the correct angle of bank or power requirement can very quickly leave you "sucked" (the state where you're lagging behind the position you should be) and struggling to catch-up.

When you are first attempting to initially join your Lead, don't forget to use geometry to close the distance wherever possible; if he's in a turn, don't just put your nose on him and follow him around, fly a direct intercept path to where he is going to be. You'll be amazed how quickly you can affect a re-join with as little as +10 knots overtaking speed if you apply the proper lead and fly the geomtry rather than chasing his tail at +20 or +30 knots.

3a. Reference Points - The abilty to discriminate displacement trends, and correctly identify whether it is a power correction that is required or nose position correction (or both) cannot really be taught - you need to know/have specific reference points you are looking to maintain on your lead; there should be at least two that in combination help you figure out when you are in the correct positions, laterally, vertically and longitudinally.

From these you can work out whether you are too close, too far away, too far forward, too far aft, a combination of these or transitioning between them, relatively quickly. But practise is required.

3b. Little and More Often - the sooner you are able to identify a displacement trend the smaller your corrective inputs will require to be, and the less you will deviate. Thus I refer back to point 1. Smaller diplacements means smoother flying = less work to maintain formation. Eventually these become instinctive, but it takes time and, again, practise is required.

 

Edited June 27, 2024 by DD_Fenrir