Carrier landing AOA for F-4

[wjmzwx]

I find that approach a little fast and make AOA lower to 16 or17 ，then in the flare pitch more to on speed can make field landing easier. It makes me wonder，what is like when this beast  is used on carrier. Do pilots try to maintain on speed all the time？ Or do they try to land with a little nose down. （A lot of Rios may retire bscause of disability or too short to sit in a jet）

Edited August 12, 2024 by wjmzwx

[Zabuzard]

This variant of the Phantom is not carrier capable and was not used to land on ships.

Actual carrier capable variants had several changes and modifications, including on the gear, which also results in AoA changes that cant be translated onto the E directly. So you have to be careful when applying any IRL techniques for those other Phantoms onto our E, they might not work.

Edited August 12, 2024 by Zabuzard

[Lt_Jaeger]

She don't like to be on the ship.

 

Did my trials on flying that thing on speed to land on the carrier. The only time the hook grabbed was when I was fast and way to low (close to a ramp strike). With on speed it's bolter after bolter with the occasional broken main gear in the mix. 

Too bad, would be fun to pretend to be navy

Edited August 12, 2024 by Lt_Jaeger

[Phantom12]

Yeah something about it is definitely either not modeled as fully as the other aircraft or just some difference in the aircraft prevents it from engaging the wires if you fly it the navy way. It seems to warp through the wires if you fly onspeed or just hookskip everytime. I mentioned it in one of the pinned threads and Grover also suggested flying a bit faster than onspeed but for me the only way it reliably engages is landing short and taxiing to the wires. The hook is the same structurally AFAIK but could be the hydraulics are setup differently for the E. Taxiing through the wires is how the field arresting gear seems to normally be used so makes sense from that perspective.

Nothing to do but wait for the Naval Phantom I guess

[Dragon1-1]

Because the onspeed AoA is different, but the overall layout the same, the relative positions of the hook and the landing gear are different from the naval Phantom for a given AoA indication. Hence, if you touch down "on the donut", the hook will skip, since it'll be the same as if you had wrong AoA. You need to have the same "stance" as the naval Phantom, since that's what counts.

[Kalasnkova74]

3 hours ago, Phantom12 said:

Yeah something about it is definitely either not modeled as fully as the other aircraft or just some difference in the aircraft prevents it from engaging the wires if you fly it the navy way.

Thats because the AoA is different between the U.S.N and land based F-4s. Yes the tail hook is the same, but the AoA is different because the slats and airframe configuration are very different from the Naval versions. Between the gun in the nose (more weight= lower nose authority), the extra fuel tank in the tail (which balances the weight of the nose but changes the aircraft’s pitch behavior), and the wing slats vs the early Naval models’ blown boundry layer control leading edge slats , the F-4E is an aerodynamically different animal. Further, the landing gear is different as it’s engineered for land operations. 

[wjmzwx]

Really helpful guys！ This module and your answers make me more interested in the history and variants of F-4. 

Edited August 12, 2024 by wjmzwx

[Phantom12]

4 hours ago, Kalasnkova74 said:

Thats because the AoA is different between the U.S.N and land based F-4s. Yes the tail hook is the same, but the AoA is different because the slats and airframe configuration are very different from the Naval versions. Between the gun in the nose (more weight= lower nose authority), the extra fuel tank in the tail (which balances the weight of the nose but changes the aircraft’s pitch behavior), and the wing slats vs the early Naval models’ blown boundry layer control leading edge slats , the F-4E is an aerodynamically different animal. Further, the landing gear is different as it’s engineered for land operations. 

Im aware of the differences. Like I already said I discussed it with Grover in another thread. I also spent plenty of time looking through the flight manuals for both the E and the J as well as all sorts of flight test reports from the DTIC treasure trove, including graphed comparisons of the Flight Test probe AoA values vs Production AoA units & Deg for hard and soft wing F-4Es. Grover suggested using 17 Units vs the normal 19 or so that give the "on speed" indication in the E. I made a bunch of passes and still the most reliable way to get the hook to engage is to do it totally wrong and taxi through the wires. Flying On speed or slightly fast the hook will skip or just not catch a wire so reliably Im almost convinced it just isnt modeled to work that way... Not that its a huge issue as this isnt supposed to be a Navy F-4, but anyway. In theory at least AFAIK flying too slow usually encourages inflight engagements (which are also very dangerous) and not necessarily hook skips. Of course it is possible that the hydraulic setup of the maingear, hook etc and the combination of a slightly wrong AoA is the perfect combo for hook skipping but I tried all sorts of different methods and anything resembling the "normal" technique just didnt work at all.

Whilst it is very poor technique, you can also make unsafe or dodgy passes with totally wrong AoAs in the other naval aircraft in DCS and still somewhat reliably engage the wires. Nothing else Ive tried in DCS seems to so consistently blow through the wires as if the hook wasnt even there at all.

[Zabuzard]

11 hours ago, Phantom12 said:

or just not catch a wire so reliably Im almost convinced it just isnt modeled to work that way

I cant comment on the proper AoA and speed, but the Phantom hook uses the same physics based model that our Tomcat hook uses as well. If you bump the hook into the ground, it bounces based on the forces reported by the sim. Similar for catching the wire. There is no code or anything trying to tune this hook for airfield landings, nor anything that specifically tunes it for a carrier landing only.

I would suggest you go external view and make some sideways comparison screenshots of your plane with gear and hook down when you touch down. Do that in the configuration you think should be correct and repeat it for the configuration that seems to work.

I wouldnt be surprised if the screenshots reveal that if you fly with the configuration that "looks correct" on the screenshots (angle-wise) the hook also catches the wire properly.

Edited August 13, 2024 by Zabuzard

[Phantom12]

Fair enough. TBH Id have been surprised if HB hadnt modeled it to the extent you say even if its a secondary/unimportant feature. Just that I tried it a fair number of times and struggled much more than I ever have in any other aircraft, and IIRC one of the content creators in the pre release livestream had very similar issues. As far as the field vs CV comment I meant more as in whether the hydraulics or dampening etc etc was altered in the real USAF aircraft vs the Navy ones. I understand its a similar situation with the gear where the basic structural components are all the same but the tires and some tuning of the hydraulic struts etc are different.

Ill see if I can determine a proper AoA next time I boot up DCS and try it again.

Edit: had another quick look through some charts and I think in the E somewhere around 14-15 units might give the same attitude as the Onspeed attitude for the J. Assuming the hook and gear dimensions are the same thats probably not a bad starting point. Very fast though, probably a destructively high descent rate given that the 19 unit approach speeds are already significantly higher than for the Naval F-4s.

Edited August 13, 2024 by Phantom12

[Phantom12]

14-15 looks right and feels pretty good too. But the hook still doesnt engage. Tried 5 or 6 passes again about 2 or 3 each with 14-15 and with 17 or so.... A couple pretty good right on the ball all the way down to the 3 wire... bolters every time. If I fly a cut pass and taxi it through the wires it caught one on the 1st attempt.

[Naquaii]

34 minutes ago, Phantom12 said:

14-15 looks right and feels pretty good too. But the hook still doesnt engage. Tried 5 or 6 passes again about 2 or 3 each with 14-15 and with 17 or so.... A couple pretty good right on the ball all the way down to the 3 wire... bolters every time. If I fly a cut pass and taxi it through the wires it caught one on the 1st attempt.

Even if it's the same hook as on the navy variants the different gear setup etc makes it different. Trapping like on a carrier just wasn't a consideration as they used it for emergency braking only really, kinda just running over the wire on the ground like you described when taxiing.

So it's no wonder really if you have to experiment a bit with it to trap reliably.

Edited August 15, 2024 by Naquaii

[guitargamery]

After trying and studying a lot the procedures to land this Airforce version of the F4 on the carrier, i finally did it, yes ...you can't use the standard AOA or the donut to guide your right speed and AOA, you need a bit more power to decrease the Default AOA .  For the carrier with this F4 version i found that  between 13-15 AOA is actually easy after you get the hang of it, you need a bit more speed , be stable with leveled wings on touch down while aiming for 2wire, otherwise you will damage the gear that touches first, its very fun and to be honest i really hope HB releases the Navy version soon.

Edited February 1 by guitargamery

[felixx75]

17 hours ago, guitargamery said:

i really hope HB releases the Navy version soon

Whenever that will happen, but it certainly won't be “soon”, sry.

Edited February 2 by felixx75