DCS A-10C QUESTIONS

[JayPee]

DCS A-10C QUESTIONS

 

Im pretty sure MapleFlag training missions and/or ED training missions advise a 180 kts climb speed from take-off to about angels 6.

 

Since flap auto retract speed is indicated to be 200 kts on the ASI I found my question a fair one.

Edited February 10, 2014 by JayPee

[Zaz0]

from Technical Order...

 

AFTER TAKEOFF.

1. Landing Gear - UP. (When safely airborne)

2. Flaps - UP. (10 Knots above takeoff speed)

3. Pitch attitude - Maintain as necessary to accelerate to

climb speed.

[PFunk1606688187]

Im pretty sure MapleFlag training missions and/or ED training missions advise a 180 kts climb speed from take-off to about angels 6.

Well the official A-10 performance documents would disagree with such an advisory, at least in terms of gaining maximum climb performance and fuel economy.

 

Since flap auto retract speed is indicated to be 200 kts on the ASI I found my question a fair one.

 

Definitely a fair question, but in general you want to get rid of flaps as soon as possible to get the best climb performance, lowest drag, etc.

[GGTharos]

Never. They just add drag and actually hurt your climbing performance.

 

When climbing out from the runway to let's say a cruise altitude of angels 18 to avoid AAA fire, do you leave the flaps extended while climbing at 180 kts until you've reached angels 18? Or do you generally retract them at around 170 kts as per training instructions and continue climbing at 180 kts?

 

Also, do you extend them if somewhere along the route you are going to increase cruise altitude by 6k or 7k?

[JayPee]

DCS A-10C QUESTIONS

 

Ok thanks. I actually thought the main advantage of extended flaps -generating more lift at slower speeds by increasing wing surface- would be beneficial regardless of the additionally induced drag but I'll climb out with no flaps from now on.

 

Also, do fighters, especially an A-10 with its relatively poor climbing performance, incorporate turns in their initial climb out to remain on flight path? Or do they take off, level, set course for the first WP, and only then start their climb? I find the latter feels much more efficient than combining turns to remain on route within the initial climb out, no scientific proof tho.. Just a feeling from within the virtual pit.

Edited February 10, 2014 by JayPee

[SkateZilla]

I use flaps for take off, once Im clear of the deck they go up, and I trim.

 

Flaps induce drag, and can block AGM-65s from firing (i think).

[GGTharos]

Ok thanks. I actually thought the main advantage of extended flaps -generating more lift at slower speeds by increasing wing surface- would be beneficial regardless of the additionally induced drag but I'll climb out with no flaps from now on.

 

Flaps reduce your stall speed and change your AoA slightly at the cost of quite a bit of drag. They do not offer 'increased performance' in this case. There are cases where they were used in dogfights in WW2, but if you try to do that with most modern jets you'll destroy the flaps in one way or other (they may rip off, or become stuck where they are, or get stuck closed, etc).

 

Also, do fighters, especially an A-10 with its relatively poor climbing performance, incorporate turns in their initial climb out to remain on flight path? Or do they take off, level, set course for the first WP, and only then start their climb? I find the latter feels much more efficient than combining turns to remain on route within the initial climb out, no scientific proof tho.. Just a feeling from within the virtual pit.

 

Heh, the A-10's climb performance is actually quite good. Just don't climb with more than one weapon per pylon, and avoid 2000lb weapons and CBUs if you can. You can climb and turn regardless, your turn just has to be suited to your power curve.

 

You have a couple options. Travel light(er) and you can climb and turn with a 30 to 60deg bank as you climb, or if you travel heavy, you're going to end up with less than 30deg of bank.

 

Your other option is to climb to safe altitude, level out and then turn, or accelerate and turn.

 

All of these are available and to be used as required. There's no single prescribed way of doing it since circumstances will dictate your take-off profile.

 

In an airport where you might have MANPADS close, max-performance takeoff might be mandated, ie. takeoff, and get out of sight/to altitude as fast as you can. That usually means no turns, possibly accelerating on the deck to end of runway or past it and then climb, it may mean you need to take off and turn right right away to a direction that is known safe while staying low in order to destroy LOS, etc.

[JayPee]

Thanks for the explanantions. And I made it more or less a rule of thumb to never carry more than a single weapon per pylon. Exception being 2x2 MAVs when it is absolutely necessary but that means no TGP. Otherwise it's just one or two MAVs, 4x 500 lb of whatever type, one or two rocket pods (depending on number of MAVs) and a TGP. AIMs and ECM only when the threat dictates it and 50% rounds when I'm pretty sure I won't need to get up close.

[sleepara]

Hi does anyone know what the OD OG or the OD 7R stands for? it appears on the a-10c HUD when pressing enter on the ufc //?

[Flagrum]

Hi does anyone know what the OD OG or the OD 7R stands for? it appears on the a-10c HUD when pressing enter on the ufc //?

Delta Radar/EGI GPS Altitude Numerics

see manual p. 395-396

[kontiuka]

Maverick Screen Width / Height

 

The manual says the maverick screen is 44 mils high and 44 mils wide. I read somewhere on here that "mil" means milliradian but that still doesn't make sense to me because 44 mils is only about 2.5 degrees. That doesn't seem like a very large viewing angle.

[JayPee]

DCS A-10C QUESTIONS

 

44 mils would suggest that e.g. at 10 km out the width of the screen covers slightly less than 1/1000 * 10.000 * 44 = 440 metres. That's quite a lot actually. I'm saying slightly less because 440 is technically the bow length of the 'pie slice' whereas we are treating it if it were the straight line between the edges of the bow length.

 

By the way, are you talking about the normal FOV or narrow FOV, given the values I assume the normal one.

Edited February 13, 2014 by JayPee

[JayPee]

DCS A-10C QUESTIONS

 

Is it possible to disable the gun CCIP cross in rocket CCIP mode? I keep having huge trouble distinguishing the decimal seperator dot for the gun cross' range indication from the centre dot of the rocket CCIP reticule.

 

Or put simply, this freaking cross is blocking my vision!

Edited February 13, 2014 by JayPee

[Scrim]

Simples, turn off the cannon.

[JayPee]

Yeah but then I'll be switching it on and off all the time..

[ApoNOOB]

Try if the following does have the desired effect on the gun piper with rockets too:

 

IFFCC -> TEST mode -> HUD -> DISPLAY MODES -> CCIP GUN CROSS OCCULT -> to N

[Yurgon]

The manual says the maverick screen is 44 mils high and 44 mils wide. I read somewhere on here that "mil" means milliradian but that still doesn't make sense to me because 44 mils is only about 2.5 degrees. That doesn't seem like a very large viewing angle.

 

From "Warthog - Flying The A-10 In The Gulf War" by William L. Smallwood on flying night time missions in the A-10A (without NVGs!):

 

"[...] the hard part came when we started getting close. That's when we would have to put our heads down and start looking through our soda straw.

 

"Everybody uses the term 'soda straw' because looking through a Maverick is like closing one eye, taking a straw out of a drink and walking around trying to find something while sighting through that straw. We had two fields of view with the IR Maverick. Going in, we would use the wide field of view, which was only a 3-degree field and which also gave us 3X magnification.

 

2.5 degrees doesn't sound too far off from that.

Edited February 14, 2014 by Yurgon

[kontiuka]

Thanks Yurgon and JayPee for your answers.

[kontiuka]

Can CBU-97s be dropped in CCIP mode?

 

I can drop them fine in CCRP mode but when I try CCIP, I have to point the nose near vertically down to see the bomb reticle. Are there settings in the DSMS that I need to adjust?

[Flagrum]

I can drop them fine in CCRP mode but when I try CCIP, I have to point the nose near vertically down to see the bomb reticle. Are there settings in the DSMS that I need to adjust?

No. The impact point that is calculated in CCIP mode is determined primarily by physics and that can't be tweaked. :o)

 

Following a ballistic path to the ground, the weapon will always impact somewhere beneath your aircraft. The forward motion (resulting from the forward moving airplane) will rather quickly dimish and result in a steeper fligh path of the weapon. So, all in all, you just have to look down quite a bit to see where the impact point will be - and the higher your altitude, the more the ratio of vertical-to-horizontal movement will shift to vertical. Or the other way around, if you fly low, the horizontal part of the flight path will be predominant. Therefore you then have a better chance to see the impact point in front of you (up to the point where you get the CCIP pipper in level flight).

[kontiuka]

No. The impact point that is calculated in CCIP mode is determined primarily by physics and that can't be tweaked. :o)

 

Following a ballistic path to the ground, the weapon will always impact somewhere beneath your aircraft. The forward motion (resulting from the forward moving airplane) will rather quickly dimish and result in a steeper fligh path of the weapon. So, all in all, you just have to look down quite a bit to see where the impact point will be - and the higher your altitude, the more the ratio of vertical-to-horizontal movement will shift to vertical. Or the other way around, if you fly low, the horizontal part of the flight path will be predominant. Therefore you then have a better chance to see the impact point in front of you (up to the point where you get the CCIP pipper in level flight).

Is it possible this is a bug with the CBU-97? I can get the CBU-87 to work in CCIP mode, no problem. For both, I'm just using straight CCIP. No consent for release.

 

EDIT: The CBU-97 doesn't seem to work in the A-10A either.

[Flagrum]

Is it possible this is a bug with the CBU-97? I can get the CBU-87 to work in CCIP mode, no problem. For both, I'm just using straight CCIP. No consent for release.

 

EDIT: The CBU-97 doesn't seem to work in the A-10A either.

I am not aware of any CCIP related bugs for the A-10C, but what do you mean with "this"? As I said, the area you can see in your HUD lays waaaay in front of you - a ballistic weapon will not go that far if dropped from an altitude higher than a few 1000 feet. Instead the impact point will be much closer, benath your aircraft and therefore you will have to dive.

 

Just tested it: I had to dive and the pipper was starting to show up at the bottom of the HUD at a dive of about 45 deg. (for both, CBU-97 and -87)

 

Or do you get a message in the HUD, like "INVALID FUZING"?

 

edit:

during beta 1.2.7 there were some CCIP problems reported for FC3 aircrafts, but I can't remember if it was the Su-25T or(and?) the A-10A. But there there the CCIP pipper was "glued" to the bottom of the HUD, no matter of the aircrafts attitude. So, yes, there could still be some problem.

Edited February 15, 2014 by Flagrum

[kontiuka]

I am not aware of any CCIP related bugs for the A-10C, but what do you mean with "this"? As I said, the area you can see in your HUD lays waaaay in front of you - a ballistic weapon will not go that far if dropped from an altitude higher than a few 1000 feet. Instead the impact point will be much closer, benath your aircraft and therefore you will have to dive.

 

Just tested it: I had to dive and the pipper was starting to show up at the bottom of the HUD at a dive of about 45 deg. (for both, CBU-97 and -87)

 

Or do you get a message in the HUD, like "INVALID FUZING"?

 

edit:

during beta 1.2.7 there were some CCIP problems reported for FC3 aircrafts, but I can't remember if it was the Su-25T or(and?) the A-10A. But there there the CCIP pipper was "glued" to the bottom of the HUD, no matter of the aircrafts attitude. So, yes, there could still be some problem.

ok. I tried diving at 45 degrees and I could see the CBU-97 reticle. I guess what's confusing to me is why the CBU-87 reticle is able to appear so much sooner since the two bombs are the same size and roughly the same weight. At a speed of around roughly 300 kts and an altitude of roughly 5000 ft, I can make the CBU-87 reticle appear at around 15 degrees. I'd have a hard time doing that with the CBU-97.

[Flagrum]

ok. I tried diving at 45 degrees and I could see the CBU-97 reticle. I guess what's confusing to me is why the CBU-87 reticle is able to appear so much sooner since the two bombs are the same size and roughly the same weight. At a speed of around roughly 300 kts and an altitude of roughly 5000 ft, I can make the CBU-87 reticle appear at around 15 degrees. I'd have a hard time doing that with the CBU-97.

You are right, there is a difference between both CBU types. I never really paid attention to that. So, that is a good question ... and after some experimenting and meditatin (lol), I think I have an explanation.

 

The difference between the two is the way the CBUs work, together with the selected HOF setting:

The trajectory of the 87 is similar to that of a dumb Mk-82 - a pure ballistic path. This is true for the container itself, but also for the bomblets when they are released. Both follow the same path (ignoring the fact that the aerodynamics might differ a bit). The HOF setting does not affect the impact point of the bomblets (again, just ignoring aerodynamics here).

Now the 97 works differently. The container follows the same trajectory as the one of the 87. But when the submunitions are released, the horizontal movement almost immediately stops while they descent vertically on their parachutes.

 

That means, the impact point of the 97 submunition is closer to the release point than the impact point of the 87 submunition (at otherwise identical release parameters). This effect is even more pronounced the higher the HOF is set.

 

Therefore you have to get into a steeper dive when delivering a CBU 97.:smartass:

Edited February 15, 2014 by Flagrum

[kontiuka]

^

ok. thanks a lot.