How to accelerate to Mach 2? Is there a recommand method?

[YATEIFEI]

I just read mirage F1 manual, which tells me a supersonic climb schedule. Therefore, I want to know a recommand method for F14A/B to Mach 2.

Unfortunately, I couldn't find it in manual and my friends don't know it either.

Does anyone knows or test it in DCS?

[wwWolfcom]

On performance manual, check out 'specific excess power' chart. This will give you a hint. Ps=0 line will give a fastest speed at its parameters.

[ASW]

When the rockets ran out and the fuel tanks were dropped, the fuel is less than 10,000 and the altitude is above 42,000. 1.8M according to the instrument.

[ASW]

10 минут назад, wwWolfcom сказал:

On performance manual, check out 'specific excess power' chart. This will give you a hint. Ps=0 line will give a fastest speed at its parameters.

I couldn't find it. There are 2 manuals in the airplane folder, and I didn't see it there.

[r4y30n]

Not the Heatblur manual, the real world performance manual issued by the navy, NAVAIR 01-F14AAA-1.1 for the F-14A

[YATEIFEI]

6 hours ago, r4y30n said:

Not the Heatblur manual, the real world performance manual issued by the navy, NAVAIR 01-F14AAA-1.1 for the F-14A

 

16 hours ago, ASW said:

When the rockets ran out and the fuel tanks were dropped, the fuel is less than 10,000 and the altitude is above 42,000. 1.8M according to the instrument.

 

16 hours ago, wwWolfcom said:

On performance manual, check out 'specific excess power' chart. This will give you a hint. Ps=0 line will give a fastest speed at its parameters.

thanks

[ASW]

And where can I get it? This manual? Although, in my understanding. For the F-14, the M2 is only needed to escape. Usually you fly in the range of 300-350 knots and wait for the victim. I usually fly it in the RIO cockpit and give commands to the pilot. As on MSFS.)

I manually score the necessary navigation points and tell the pilot where and at what speed to fly. So up to 1000 feet before landing. Try. Lots of fun!

Edited January 1 by ASW

[RustBelt]

Gotta use the search engines. They can’t be posted or linked here. Just search for NAVAIR 01-F14AAA-1.1 pdf. 
 

Also don’t forget the Tomcat’s original job, fleet defense intercept. Then the goal is to get to the bombers faster than they get to you.

Edited January 2 by RustBelt

[YATEIFEI]

2 hours ago, RustBelt said:

Gotta use the search engines. They can’t be posted or linked here. Just search for NAVAIR 01-F14AAA-1.1 pdf. 
 

Also don’t forget the Tomcat’s original job, fleet defense intercept. Then the goal is to get to the bombers faster than they get to you.

thank you. I just downloaded that pdf yesterday and read it.

[Mr_sukebe]

One thought that does spring to mind.  As I understand it, above mach .8, drag increases significantly.  For a reason that I have no understanding of, drag decreases again above mach 1.2.  To get over that "hump", my usual method is to get to above angels 30, climbing at mach .8, then put the aircraft in a shallow dive and hit the burners to get over mach 1.2.  Once that's been hit, then start climbing again.

[RustBelt]

It’s to do with the shockwave building up in-front of the aircraft at transonic speeds. The air is “pilling up” in front of you becoming denser and air density going up means drag goes up.  Once you break through to supersonic speeds the shockwave front is sort of “behind” you. You’re still plowing through the air hard. But the build up is managed by the specific design of the airframe for supersonic flight. So your drag is max at transonic speeds. 
 

And it’s past M1.0 because the airspeed on the gauge isn’t Equivalent airspeed it hasn’t been corrected for Density or Compressibility. And transonic that can matter especially with static port position as you overrun your bow shockwave. 

[wwWolfcom]

F-14 Flight Model Update – Part I – Heatblur Simulations

[WarthogOsl]

6 hours ago, RustBelt said:

And it’s past M1.0 because the airspeed on the gauge isn’t Equivalent airspeed it hasn’t been corrected for Density or Compressibility. And transonic that can matter especially with static port position as you overrun your bow shockwave. 

FWIW, transonic is considered to be up to around Mach 1.2, regardless of the airspeed gauge.  That's because even at somewhat above Mach 1, some of the local airflow can still be subsonic.

[cheezit]

Once you get the perf charts (NAVAIR 01-F14AAP-1.1), look at Figure 8-6 [Deck Launched Intercept] (page XI-8-24, XI-8-25, XI-8-26) for climb schedules that will put you at Mach 1.4 at 45k feet in various configurations.  The schedule they will put you on will basically follow this 'route' (obviously the DLI chart will take the change in weight during the flight into account in a way that the following illustration doesn't):

 

Spoiler

 

You may want to also play around with alternative routes, such as the obvious one sketched out here:

Spoiler

... although it won't be quite as straightforward to follow as the route in 8-6.  And of course, the same thing can be played around with if you look at the perf charts for the A.

[Nealius]

NAVAIR 01-F14AAP-1.1 doesn't appear to be available anywhere except eflightmanuals.com for a $65 purchase, "not for export" so I assume only US-based IPs can buy it.

Edited January 5 by Nealius

[RustBelt]

Dig harder, it's floating around a couple places. Be sure to use WEB search not the now default <profanity>ty AI "search" that the big search pages default to now.

[ASW]

В 02.01.2025 в 15:51, RustBelt сказал:

It’s to do with the shockwave building up in-front of the aircraft at transonic speeds. The air is “pilling up” in front of you becoming denser and air density going up means drag goes up.  Once you break through to supersonic speeds the shockwave front is sort of “behind” you. You’re still plowing through the air hard. But the build up is managed by the specific design of the airframe for supersonic flight. So your drag is max at transonic speeds. 
 

And it’s past M1.0 because the airspeed on the gauge isn’t Equivalent airspeed it hasn’t been corrected for Density or Compressibility. And transonic that can matter especially with static port position as you overrun your bow shockwave. 

I've never thought about how it happens. I just knew how to do it. In 1984-1985, I visited the city of Tashkent. This is Uzbekistan. The border with Afghanistan. More precisely, I lived in the small town of Chirchik. Every morning, three Migs flew over the house, in complete silence. And the flood was an explosion like a thunderstorm. It was impossible to even say words to each other at that moment.)

[Nealius]

9 hours ago, RustBelt said:

Dig harder

There is no harder. Google and Bing only gives three pages of results, showing the payware site and about a dozen discussion boards or documents referencing the manual but not the manual itself. Duck duck go says "no results found."

Edited January 6 by Nealius

[Rhrich]

A few points:

For fighters M2+ is basically only good for bragging rights. Even the most powerful like the Eagle or Tomcat will consume a decent portion of their fuel to reach it, and time. Most M2 capable planes will only reach it clean or with a smallish load. Therefore, it has little use in actual combat. 
 

However, high speed sometimes does. I have no knowledge of the Tomcat, but to briefly give an overview of one frequently used method, at least for less powerful planes: climb subsonic, then unload and also trade som altitude to get through the transonic region (up to ca. M1,2) then continue supersonic. 
I would assume that you would need a quite clean airframe in DCS to reach M2 in the tomcat, but not sure. 

Edited January 6 by Rhrich

[r4y30n]

Unloaded acceleration definitely helps in the F-14 as with just about anything else. I seem to remember half a G positive for the push over being a rule of thumb somewhere… You want to avoid zero G so the engines don’t starve.

[Spurts]

I'm actually doing tests right now of fighters in the "F-4" configuration of 4 Fox1 missiles and 4 Fox2 missiles.  The F-14A can rapidly exceed Mach 2.0 9 minutes from brake release using the Rutowski profile (climb, dive, level at 36,000) starting with the two drop tank and releasing them when empty (why do you have to burn almost 3,000lb of internal fuel before the drop tanks are actually empty?) but the poor TSFC of the F-14A, 2.74 in AB IIRC, means you run out of gas shortly.  I was down to 2,000lb remaining 12.25 minutes from brake release which lasted me another 25 min at econ settings, having ultimately reached a speed of 2.22M.  I only spent 90 sec above 2.2M.

The F-15C is another story. Taking off with three bags of fuel and using the Rutowski profile I accelerated through 1.8M before emptying the bags 13 minutes into the flight, dropping them, then accelerating past M2 30sec later ultimately reaching M2.3 and I didn't get to 2,000lb remaining until 20.25min after brake release. a full 5 min was spent above 2.2M

Trying to do the test in the F-14B but the game keeps crashing.  Did the test in the Su-27 though. Crossed M2 at 9.75min, crossed M2.2 at 11min, was down to 1,000kg fuel at 14.25min doing 2.3M.

The F-4E topped out at 1.9M by 18 min and held that for 4 min before reaching 2,000lb remaining.

[WarthogOsl]

14 hours ago, Spurts said:

 (why do you have to burn almost 3,000lb of internal fuel before the drop tanks are actually empty?)

It's because it also takes fuel from the wing tanks while the drop tanks are attached, for whatever reason.

[Rhrich]

On 1/7/2025 at 12:15 PM, Spurts said:

I'm actually doing tests right now of fighters in the "F-4" configuration of 4 Fox1 missiles and 4 Fox2 missiles.  The F-14A can rapidly exceed Mach 2.0 9 minutes from brake release using the Rutowski profile (climb, dive, level at 36,000) starting with the two drop tank and releasing them when empty (why do you have to burn almost 3,000lb of internal fuel before the drop tanks are actually empty?) but the poor TSFC of the F-14A, 2.74 in AB IIRC, means you run out of gas shortly.  I was down to 2,000lb remaining 12.25 minutes from brake release which lasted me another 25 min at econ settings, having ultimately reached a speed of 2.22M.  I only spent 90 sec above 2.2M.

The F-15C is another story. Taking off with three bags of fuel and using the Rutowski profile I accelerated through 1.8M before emptying the bags 13 minutes into the flight, dropping them, then accelerating past M2 30sec later ultimately reaching M2.3 and I didn't get to 2,000lb remaining until 20.25min after brake release. a full 5 min was spent above 2.2M

Trying to do the test in the F-14B but the game keeps crashing.  Did the test in the Su-27 though. Crossed M2 at 9.75min, crossed M2.2 at 11min, was down to 1,000kg fuel at 14.25min doing 2.3M.

The F-4E topped out at 1.9M by 18 min and held that for 4 min before reaching 2,000lb remaining.

Yeah. The F-15C isn’t realistic from what I’ve gathered. 

What you have tested here is not applicable anywhere, but if I had to name something it would have been for a point defence interceptor like the Lightning. 

in real life we would have used other tactics. 
 

but you have proven why M2 isn’t applicable in modern combat, with some minute exceptions. 
 

[The_Tau]

On 1/7/2025 at 12:15 PM, Spurts said:

Trying to do the test in the F-14B but the game keeps crashing.  

Why would the game crash on empty mission?
Anyway, thanks for the numbers, its very interesting. But yeah, i think there is something wrong with F15C drag model, especially when you take missiles on stations 1,3 and 9, 11

Anyway, in combat, I would say acceleration is way more important. With Rutkowski profile, F-14B in dive can accelerate to 1.2 mach - over the transonic drag, in 30s. And with F110s it can easily climb to 40k with just dry power with 4/2/2 loadout

Edited January 15 by The_Tau

[draconus]

22 hours ago, The_Tau said:

But yeah, i think there is something wrong with F15C drag model, especially when you take missiles on stations 1,3 and 9, 11

Please report if you have any relevant data here: https://forum.dcs.world/forum/249-f-15c-for-dcs-world/