New on F-14 - Questions about HUD and Vmax

[Black Viking]

After two years on the Hornet, I moved on to the Tomcat, which is much more complicated to get the hang of…

Unless I’m mistaken, I don’t think I’ve found answers to the two questions I have at the moment:

1. HUD animation
   In Takeoff mode, the vertical scrolling of the pitch lines is choppy, whereas everything is smooth in Cruise mode. Is that normal?
2. Vmax
   I can barely get past Mach 1 even with afterburner… what could be the issue?

Thanks for your help!

[Hiob]

1. can‘t tell without seeing it

2. Probably too heavy and not at the right altitude. You won’t reach M2 at sea level….. (not even close)

[JupiterJoe]

1:  I'm no expert, but I suspect the F-14's HUD is pretty 'laggy' compared to more modern aircraft.  HB are due to release an updated HUD (Sparrowhawk) for the F-14B at some point.  That will be more like what you're used to in the Hornet.  In the meantime, it's just part of the Tomcat's charm 

2:  Which variant are you referring to Buddy?  The A has Pratt & Whitney TF-30 engines and the B has General Electric F110's.  The latter are more powerful at lower altitudes, but the former start to perform better much higher up.  As far as acceleration goes, altitude and drag are huge factors. I'm not sure it's modelled in game, but I think air temperature is also a factor in engine performance.  I seem to get better performance on maps like Kola, where the air would be cooler and denser, but it might be my imagination.

Some detail regarding the engines:  HOME OF M.A.T.S. - The most comprehensive Grumman F-14 Reference Work - by Torsten Anft!

Edited Sunday at 03:12 PM by JupiterJoe

[ValhallaAB]

1: The HUD updates quite slow yes, but from my short testing it seems they update at the same rate on all HUD modes but the pitch ladder is more decluttered in cruise mode, about one unit per second in whatever resolution the HUD repeater glass is rendered in. Should be normal. Many say that the A-A mode is even smoother but that quite hard to confirm, the different ladders, gun pipper and systems are said to have different repeaters or collimators too but I can not confirm this at this time. 

2: Get up high and don't take too draggy weapons and remove fuel tanks after they're empty. I did clean (no weapons), 100% fuel, 102% RPM (first AB gate) on F-14A (late) at 4000m and just break the sound barrier, in the F-14B at 100% fuel, 100% RPM (max mil power) at 4000m and break the barrier with some speed to spare.

F-14B full weapons load (4x AIM-54 and 2x Sparrows and 2x AIM-9's) 100% fuel + tanks and first AB gate 102% RPM at 12000m, I could almost break the barrier without any AB (150kph under). so I imagine after taking off and dropping tanks and staying around 80% fuel (dropped tanks) with full weapons at 12000m+ you could probably just kiss the barrier without AB depending on temperature and more. I usually climb to altitude 10000 meters +, dropping tanks when empty before turning into bandits and try to stay around mach 1.0 or faster when engaging at max 45nm with AIM-54C + jammer on then crank at max radar turn and slowly pitch down.

The F-14B has much better mil power and the acceleration is important too. It mostly comes down to altitude, weight and time. I usually stay at mil power in all models but need more AB performance before missile launch in the A than the B. The B likes to mil cruise and sip fuel like wine and doing ground missions is good because the cruise is quite efficient unless I am completely wrong. 

 

Here is crazy smooth HUD footage from 1981 F-14A's 

 

[Black Viking]

Thank you for your answers .

I attach here a short video in order to support the description of my problems. There are two parts :

1 - To mode : we can see the lag (no problem with the F-18)

2 - Cruise mode : everything is smooth

Because your answers show a very good knowledge about this jet, I would like to add two questions :

a - Is there a way to have a cockpit without scotch nor lock wires?

b - If the HUD reticle is not the velocity vector, what is it?

Again, thank for your help.

[Ivandrov]

1 hour ago, Black Viking said:

Thank you for your answers .

I attach here a short video in order to support the description of my problems. There are two parts :

1 - To mode : we can see the lag (no problem with the F-18)

2 - Cruise mode : everything is smooth

Because your answers show a very good knowledge about this jet, I would like to add two questions :

a - Is there a way to have a cockpit without scotch nor lock wires?

b - If the HUD reticle is not the velocity vector, what is it?

Again, thank for your help.

Yeah, that looks about right. Don't try to use it as the primary flight instrument, it's not meant to be used for more than an eyes up reference. It'll be slightly off more often than not.

 

A: Not at the moment

B: Aircraft Wings Symbol if you're talking about the center reticle. You use it with the pitch ladder for a quick attitude reference among some other small things.

Edited Sunday at 06:39 PM by Ivandrov

[Black Viking]

Okay thank you 

[draconus]

On 11/9/2025 at 6:13 PM, Black Viking said:

a - Is there a way to have a cockpit without scotch nor lock wires?

It's random atm so restart the mission a few times and you might get one. But if the RL pilots flew with it you can too.

On 11/9/2025 at 7:36 PM, Ivandrov said:

If the HUD reticle is not the velocity vector, what is it?

There is velocity vector - looks the same as in the Hornet - just not in all modes, check landing mode for example or A2G.

[Panny]

You can break the sound barrier and more with 4 AIM-54s, 2 AIM-7s, 2 AIM-9s in the F-14A no problem.

For example there's an intercept profile based on that except with only 2 AIM-54s, starting on the deck to get up to 45k feet M1.4 at the end in 9 minutes(I think?). With four Phoenixes it takes a couple minutes longer, but you've used a lot of fuel to get there! You can also take tanks and jettison them once you've used the fuel from them, but they are pretty draggy to have, especially supersonic.

 

A good trick to practise is the Rutowski climb, which involves performing an aggressive dive when at around M0.95 to break through the sound barrier, and once at M1.1 to continue climbing. Roughly speaking, performing it at 27,000 feet and starting your climb again no lower than 23,000 feet will do it. But you need to be quick with the manoeuvre (roll the aircraft and pull some Gs) to get the nose down, roll wings back, bust through the barrier, and with 4-6Gs pull back up (but not too much that your speed drops to 'just' M1.0; I find that provided you're close to or above M1.1 the future acceleration is much better). Then from there you can get pretty fast. Once you're past M1.2 you can go pretty fast with a chunky loadout. I think 6/0/0+ I've done M1.5+, certainly M1.4.