incorrect procedure What is wrong with the Hornet Flight Model?

[Steel Jaw]

This has been an issue for me now for a while.

Below 300 knots when beginning the landing cycle, as I deploy half to full flaps, the nose jumps up to very high Alpha and stays there until stall.

Seriously, please, what is the issue?

Edited January 7 by Steel Jaw

[Hiob]

You need to trim down when flaps are deployed. 

[GrEaSeLiTeNiN]

Just got back into the Hornet. Yeah this happens to me too. With a light plane (no weapons or fuel tanks except A2A) I find I need to be well below 200knts (about 160?) to avoid this nose up problem. If it happens and messes up my AoA trimming process, I just pitch down with stick and wait for the speed to drop and for the plane to 'settle'. If I don't, then it pitches up until stall occurs. This takes a while to do so it's not good if it happens before final approach. For me the other main issue is the burble before touchdown. With turbulence on (IIRC it affects the burble) I feel like the plane floats before touch down and it messes up my landing/AoA esp when flaps are at full. Leaving flaps at half reduces this floating effect. I am no expert at landing the Hornet, just my observations as a casual simmer.  

[Hiob]

Dropping the gear should counteract the nose up tendency of the flaps to a certain agree. Maybe check the procedures again and make sure you make the steps in the right order at the right speeds. However, the need to trim down with flaps deployed is mandatory.

[GrEaSeLiTeNiN]

1 minute ago, Hiob said:

Dropping the gear should counteract the nose up tendency of the flaps to a certain agree. Maybe check the procedures again and make sure you make the steps in the right order at the right speeds. However, the need to trim down with flaps deployed is mandatory.

Just curious, if full flaps require a trim down, why not just do half flaps and avoid or minimise the trim down?
Thanks

[Hiob]

Flaps are meant to decrease the landing speeds. The more flaps the more lift per speed so to say. The sudden increase in lift is what makes the nose rise and requires retrimming. 

When flaps are deployed the chord line of the wing profile is pivoted up to a higher alpha. (the trailing edge is lowered)

Edited January 6 by Hiob

[Cab]

32 minutes ago, Steel Jaw said:

This has been an issue for me now for a while.

Below 300 knots when beginning the landing cycle, as I deploy half to full flaps, the nose jumps up to very high Alpha and stays there until stall.

Seriously, please, what is the issue?

300 knots? Just a reminder the gear and flaps should be lowered at 250 or below.

[Muchocracker]

TEF and Aileron scheduling in HALF and FULL flaps configuration has been a problem for ages. 

Best practice is to drop to HALF below 200 knots. Then select FULL at 160 and lower. It'll stop the ballooning. 

Edited January 6 by Muchocracker

[Cab]

20 minutes ago, Cab said:

300 knots? Just a reminder the gear and flaps should be lowered at 250 or below.

FWIW I just tried a quick instant action with a clean Hornet. Gear down at 250kts followed by full flaps did not result a pitch up of any kind. It was quite stable in level flight.

Update: There is a gentle nose up movement as the jet slows to on-speed, but it quickly settles back even with no trim input.

Edited January 6 by Cab

[Leva80]

Lower gear and flaps during turn to final to avoid balloning. Or just dirty up closer to 160 knots on a straight in. 

[Cab]

23 minutes ago, Leva80 said:

Lower gear and flaps during turn to final to avoid balloning. Or just dirty up closer to 160 knots on a straight in. 

You balloon lowering gear and flaps at 250 kts?

[Cab]

Here is a track of gear and flaps being lowered at 250 knots. Flaps go straight to Full. 

 

 

Hornet landing config 250 knots.trk

[Raven (Elysian Angel)]

It depends on which landing approach you use. Around the boat you'll be in a turn when you deploy gear and flaps so the nose-up won't hinder you - quite the opposite - so you can go full flaps right away.

If you're going straight-in on a runway, deploy undercarriage at 250, half flaps at 180 and full flaps at 160.

[wiwa23]

It's just so annoying. A hornet for years and years in early acces with a promise for a reworked flight model. Then finally it gets out of early acces (silently) with a reworked flight model ... but still not finished with an even bigger flaw of this flap issue. It's totally unrealistic and just hard to work with. After all this years I still balloon to the moon with the hornet when selecting full flaps. And now, more annoyingly, you almost lose pitch authority (down) when in full flaps. Pitch authority degrades with each step of flaps selection. I  just feel so hopeless and frustrated that not only this issue has made things worse but the endless waiting for a solution. There are modules being made in the mean time with flight model built from the ground up...but correcting this takes forever without an apparent aknowledgement of the problem. Sorry to complain but it really is so frustrating for a thing I/we love so dearly.

 

Edited January 9 by wiwa23

[fagulha]

I deploy the landing gear below 250 kts while on the break and deploy Flaps at 210 kts below. No issues on my side for a long time at these speeds.

[Tenkom]

1 hour ago, wiwa23 said:

It's just so annoying. A hornet for years and years in early acces with a promise for a reworked flight model. Then finally it gets out of early acces (silently) with a reworked flight model ... but still not finished with an even bigger flaw of this flap issue. It's totally unrealistic and just hard to work with. After all this years I still balloon to the moon with the hornet when selecting full flaps. And now, more annoyingly, you almost lose pitch authority (down) when in full flaps. Pitch authority degrades with each step of flaps selection. I  just feel so hopeless and frustrated that not only this issue has made things worse but the endless waiting for a solution. There are modules being made in the mean time with flight model built from the ground up...but correcting this takes forever without an apparent aknowledgement of the problem. Sorry to complain but it really is so frustrating for a thing I/we love so dearly.

 

It's not a problem if you do it correctly. I don't know what's realistic. But if you follow the advice in the posts above you will do fine.

[=Mac=]

I think there is another (perhaps minor) problem with the Hornet's flight model. Carrying four pods of rockets, the aircraft can't pass 300 kts. This is fine and understandable considering the huge amount of drag those pods create. However, if I get busy and distracted (often!) and I allow the airspeed to drop down to 150 kts or even lower depending on how stupid I am at the time, the problem arises here then (after realizing my impending death), I select full afterburner. I would expect a more brisk rise in the airspeed yet the poor Hornet just sits in the sky counting the clouds. Eventually the airspeed rises but, to me... a professionally untrained chair warmer... well, realistically, should those four pods cause that much drag at low airspeeds?

[razo+r]

5 minutes ago, =Mac= said:

I think there is another (perhaps minor) problem with the Hornet's flight model. Carrying four pods of rockets, the aircraft can't pass 300 kts. This is fine and understandable considering the huge amount of drag those pods create. However, if I get busy and distracted (often!) and I allow the airspeed to drop down to 150 kts or even lower depending on how stupid I am at the time, the problem arises here then (after realizing my impending death), I select full afterburner. I would expect a more brisk rise in the airspeed yet the poor Hornet just sits in the sky counting the clouds. Eventually the airspeed rises but, to me... a professionally untrained chair warmer... well, realistically, should those four pods cause that much drag at low airspeeds?

On one hand, at low speed they should not create as much drag as at high speeds, on the other hand your aircraft will create more induced drag at low speeds, so it's a bit more complex.

[Cab]

Would someone who’s seeing this ballooning or excessive nose up post a track demonstrating it? 

[GrEaSeLiTeNiN]

13 hours ago, Cab said:

Would someone who’s seeing this ballooning or excessive nose up post a track demonstrating it? 

Hornet Ballooning Test.trk

Light plane, straight in, 250knts, gear down, flaps full - ballooning does not occur unless you're trimmed for AoA, in which case you'll need to be below 150knts to avoid nosing up. 

[Cab]

55 minutes ago, GrEaSeLiTeNiN said:

Hornet Ballooning Test.trk 3.21 MB · 0 downloads

Light plane, straight in, 250knts, gear down, flaps full - ballooning does not occur unless you're trimmed for AoA, in which case you'll need to be below 150knts to avoid nosing up. 

Trimmed for AOA? On-speed trim at 250KIAS?

Edited January 10 by Cab

[GrEaSeLiTeNiN]

8 minutes ago, Cab said:

Trimmed for AOA? On-speed trim at 250KIAS?

No, I am just showing that when you are AoA trimmed and stable at 140-150knts, ballooning will start happening when you start exceeding 150knts. If you are gear down and have not trimmed for AoA at all, you can accelerate from say 140 to 350+knts with full flaps without ballooning. (Not saying you begin trim for AoA on-speed at 250knts.)

[Cab]

1 minute ago, GrEaSeLiTeNiN said:

No, I am just showing that when you are AoA trimmed and stable at 140-150knts, ballooning will start happening when you start exceeding 150knts. If you are gear down and have not trimmed for AoA at all, you can accelerate from say 140 to 350+knts with full flaps without ballooning. (Not saying you begin trim for AoA on-speed at 250knts.)

Thanks for the clarification.

[wiwa23]

Still I hope that we can still see the difference here between a 'workaround' and a 'solution'. As such all the socalled 'solutions' I see here are just 'workarounds'. As such this topic has the wrong tag on it. I hope we can find a real solution in the form of a corrected flight model that seriously adresses the issue and not putting it away with a workaround. In short:

- No, flaps/ballooning behavior is not implemented correctly at this point.

- yes I am aware of the workaround (not the solution) method of deploying flaps at lower speeds.

- yes for me it matters because I love realism and especially around the boat the procedures (case 1 overhead break into pattern for example) is such thet the current flap behaviour requires more workarounds... (Deploying flaps later alters the turn radius, etc. Those who fly case 1 procedures know what I mean).

- If the previous point doesn't matter to you than I can imagine a workaround is enough for you.

 

[Cepheus76]

For me it worked for a long time to extend the gear and deploy half flaps when decelerating through 250 knots and deploy full flaps when on speed. 

Funnily, after the last "just campaigns" update, the above described procedure doesn't work as well anymore and I also noticed that the aircraft is much more sensitive to pitch trim inputs.