Hung Stores

[GGTharos]

For all the reasons mentioned above, bad idea :) If you press the trigger, the weapons should do only one thing: Get off the rail and hit the target.

 

If for ANY reason it did not come off the rail, it should hang and become unuseable because it is now in an unknown configuration. You don't just 'reboot' weapons on the rail. You don't know why they've hanged exactly and if they will function correctly any more. In general, not a risk you want to take. You bring that thing back and let the armory crews deal with it.

 

Now, in WAR, you MAY have ways of overriding that, but that isn't modeled in A-10C.

 

I was just curious if the game had it right, and if there was a reason mechanical or otherwise for why the plane simply didn't rearm itself. Again it sounds fairly dangerous to have a weapon just cease to function just because you didn't hold a button pressed long enough.

[nomdeplume]

I was just curious if the game had it right, and if there was a reason mechanical or otherwise for why the plane simply didn't rearm itself.

Okay, I am actually curious about this as well. I'm pretty sure I've read somewhere on the forums that pilots don't really just reset hung stores and re-use the munition, they'd either jettison it or bring it back to base.

 

I think the reasoning is that a hung store means the launch cycle was interrupted, and there's no guarantee it was interrupted in a manner which is reversible or restartable. i.e. even if you reset the plane's systems, the weapon itself may be in an inconsistent internal state, and it's very risky to rely on it for anything.

[Eddie]

Weapon batteries are more often than not one shot chemical reaction deals, and once activated they can't be switched off again. That is once reason why you can't just reset it and try again.

 

There are other processes that take place, such as BIT tests, gyro alignment, guidance systems coming online etc that once started don't like being inturrupted.

[Irregular programming]

Ok, that makes sense.

[Rusty_M]

heh...you mean like turning off your computer whilst windows is still starting? It doesn't like that!

[Eddie]

heh...you mean like turning off your computer whilst windows is still starting? It doesn't like that!

 

Yeah, only said computer is attached to a rather large amount of high explosive.

[Seanner]

you'd bloody well better be 100% committed to releasing the weapon on your target.

 

Silence! or HUD-makers are liable to add a popup dialog asking if you really want to consent to weapons release.

 

You should be 100% committed before you got to the weapons release point. At weapons release point, all you should do is indicate to your machine friend that you would like the terrorist to catch your 500 lb football, be it verbal, button press, thought control, etc. There's no reason the button can't be a single press with software to carry out the few seconds of whatever has to be done once initiated. The machine's job is to work properly, and the pilot's job is to operate the machine. As soon as the machine starts second guessing the pilot, the machine will be "upgraded" with more override switches.

[GGTharos]

Not only there IS a reason, but that's the way it is.

 

There's no reason the button can't be a single press with software to carry out the few seconds of whatever has to be done once initiated.

[Seanner]

If you press the trigger, the weapons should do only one thing: Get off the rail and hit the target

 

Not only there IS a reason, but that's the way it is.

 

You lost me in between where you said what I said and where you disagreed with what I said ?!

[GGTharos]

Yeah, I lost you where you didn't read the rest of what was said :)

[Seanner]

If you mean the part about malfunctions prohibiting weapon release, the software would handle that just as it already does. In my hypothetical design, the weapon would only launch in exactly the same conditions as it currently does, minus the one where you have to pickle JDAMs for 5 seconds.

 

The only possible benefit to the current system is the 4.99 seconds of thought the pilot gains to reconsider his attack run. The balance between less finicky delivery systems and popup dialogs to ensure you aren't accidentally bombing the white house are surely in favor of superior systems?

 

Btw while I tend towards having a smart-ass attitude my intent here is to have an actual discussion on the matter, so please ignore anything that seems hostile (like my previous post). You can respond in kind anyway..

[GGTharos]

Unfortunately there's only one way I can answer you here: You'll just have to talk to lockmart, or the USAF.

 

I don't know the actual details of the reasoning behind having things function this way. As I said, mavericks had a similar problem and it was corrected - but mavericks also have a safe and abort in-flight capability, JDAMs do not AFAIK. The launch could be interrupted for any number of reasons - broken wire, or a false signal going down the wire (acting as if you had pickled for a moment), or you might simply have no idea why the signal is interrupted at all, and thus it's best to stow and hang and weapon rather than releasing it if the very deliberate pickle hold is not achieved.

 

If you mean the part about malfunctions prohibiting weapon release, the software would handle that just as it already does. In my hypothetical design, the weapon would only launch in exactly the same conditions as it currently does, minus the one where you have to pickle JDAMs for 5 seconds.

 

The only possible benefit to the current system is the 4.99 seconds of thought the pilot gains to reconsider his attack run. The balance between less finicky delivery systems and popup dialogs to ensure you aren't accidentally bombing the white house are surely in favor of superior systems?

 

Btw while I tend towards having a smart-ass attitude my intent here is to have an actual discussion on the matter, so please ignore anything that seems hostile (like my previous post). You can respond in kind anyway..

[nomdeplume]

The balance between less finicky delivery systems and popup dialogs to ensure you aren't accidentally bombing the white house are surely in favor of superior systems?

A few thoughts...

 

Firstly, why do you even consider it an issue? I had hung stores on a semi-regular basis while learning, but now that I actually know how to operate the weapons system I can't remember the last time I accidentally aborted a weapons release... and I'm just an armchair virtual pilot. Holding a button down firmly for a few seconds isn't exactly an onerous undertaking, and anyone who can't manage that probably has no business flying an attack jet in the first place.

 

Secondly, the only significant delays in the firing sequence seem to be from the JDAM in its target of opportunity mode, and is a result of technical requirements - it simply takes time to prepare the weapon for release. Everything else seems to come off the rail pretty quickly. This plays into my next point...

 

Thirdly, your general theme seems to be that the requirement to keep the pickle button depressed for the entire arming sequence reduces the pilot's control. I'd argue the opposite. In your proposed system, the pilot presses the button, and then has to wait for the fire control system to do its thing. The pilot becomes a slave to the machine: he has to keep flying in a manner suitable for the weapon's release until the system gets around to releasing it. Even if someone launches a missile at him and he wants to go evasive, or his idiot wingman flies into his path. ;)

 

In conclusion, the release delay is unavoidable for technical reasons. Holding down a button for the entire duration is an elegant solution to the problem of "what happens if circumstances change during those few seconds?". The only excuse for the pilot's finger to "slip" is if they are forced to maneuver violently, and you probably don't want to be releasing weapons in that situation, anyway. In every other case where the release is interrupted, it's either because the pilot chose to release the button for whatever reason, or because of a technical fault. Neither of those are scenarios where releasing an armed weapon is a better choice than flagging the weapon as unusable.

[Seanner]

The pilot becomes a slave to the machine: he has to keep flying in a manner suitable for the weapon's release until the system gets around to releasing it

 

Exactly as he must do in the current implementation. You make it sound as if by holding the button down you are clear for evasive maneuvers. If your point is that you can release the button and then maneuver...the software in my version would handle the fact that you just aborted with say a 3g turn and would stop the release just as sure as letting go of the button would. If you try to argue that well maybe 2gs won't abort it but still mess up the release, then make that the cutoff point. The system can even be programmed to handle multiple parameters based on altitude, temperature, bomb weight, gs, etc. Either the bomb can be safely dropped or it cannot, and no mistake will be made because it's by a deterministic computer program that has had the bugs removed. Sufficient margins would be present to account for instrument inaccuracies. If you are really unsure you can give it an override switch that lets you press the button down as long as you want.

 

Another benefit of a single press / single consent is it is the gateway to a more complex automated release system that would for example prosecute multiple targets using the marks you set up prior. My A-10D will have a program that drops 4 JDAMs as fast as possible on targets pre-selected with 4 marks added to the attack plan...the CDU would have flightplan/mark/mission/attack for example. You fly to your release area, pickle, and 4 tanks die, as opposed to pickle for just long enough to let one drop but quick enough so you drop 3 more before you leave your launch window. It requires more skill and effort than strictly necessary, however small you may think the requirement is. Why not automate it? Speaking of which, my A-10E will have a few cameras instead of a pilot, and I'll fly it from my home. My A-10F will be flown by skynet, and I'll be asleep. This A-10F will not have a pickle button AT ALL, let alone some arbitrary requirement to hold it. Perhaps the software can run an infinite loop in a background thread while awaiting weapon release to simulate doing nothing productive?

 

The overall philosophical debate is man vs machine. Giving more power to the machine obviously reduces the relative power of the man, but the machine is already more powerful than the man (you cannot punch as hard an Mk-84). With advances in processor speed / memory / etc, machines are also becoming smarter than men. One day nobody will even be there to consent to weapons release, because future scientists proved the weapon sub-program to be superior to the best human pilots with 99.9% confidence, along with the fact that it can be mass-produced. Of course by now war would have to be obsolete, and we would be living in Star Trek TNG utopia where all food is replicated. (What would be the purpose in sending automated machines to attack other automated machines? They would be too powerful in their mass-production-ness, intelligence, speed, firepower...a threatened enemy would be forced to launch all nukes...and the world would basically end except a few lucky people that would be back to bow and arrow. This is probably the more likely scenario than the Star Trek version, and I predict the world to end before the next century. Computers are simply too powerful. In conclusion, the real reason we SHOULDN'T make pickling easier is it is the slippery slope to the end of all. Unfortunately, this route cannot be avoided so easily, so for as long as tech improvements are seen as improvements, my A-10F is better than the A-10C.)

 

One must see the big picture. Billy Mitchell saw a bigger picture than most, but smaller than the whole picture. He saw that planes could change war, because planes are good at war, but in a still bigger picture, more advanced planes (more generally: more advanced weapon systems) threaten human existence, which is perhaps a portion of an even bigger picture where what does it mean for the world to end? Maybe it doesn't even matter because all of life is merely your brain hooked up to some electrodes and you don't even exist in form, and nobody else exists (your brain is running on fake signals sent through the electrodes similar to the illusion of the Matrix). This argument therefore is not real, and you are more or less dreaming it. Philosophical issues can sway even the tiniest arguments one way or another because the issue rapidly diverges into asymptotes such as "the world ends / doesn't end / doesn't exist in the first place". Future A-10 and other military improvements may end the world. If they will, should we abandon improvements? Without being able to answer these questions definitively, the current trend seems to be towards technological advancement. Going with this, I want my future A-10s faster, smarter, and more automated. I'll be damned if I press the pickle.

 

EDIT: Rereading the OP, one sees that this thread wouldn't even exist if my change had been in effect.

Edited March 16, 2011 by Seanner

[Eddie]

My A-10D will have a program that drops 4 JDAMs as fast as possible on targets pre-selected with 4 marks added to the attack plan...the CDU would have flightplan/mark/mission/attack for example. You fly to your release area, pickle, and 4 tanks die, as opposed to pickle for just long enough to let one drop but quick enough so you drop 3 more before you leave your launch window. It requires more skill and effort than strictly necessary, however small you may think the requirement is. Why not automate it?

 

You mean like a pre-briefed mode? What a good idea, I wonder why no one has thought of that........

 

Oh wait, they have, it's just not used by the A-10.

 

As for the rest of your post, I suggest you put a paper together than pass it the the USAF. I'm sure neither them, nor the aircraft/avionics designers have ever thought of any of this stuff. ;)

[159th_Viper]

...the software in my version....

 

Your Software = 100 000USD

 

Current Software = 10 000USD + reliable SSI

 

 

Money talks - Simple ;)

[Seanner]

You mean like a pre-briefed mode? What a good idea, I wonder why no one has thought of that........

 

Oh wait, they have, it's just not used by the A-10.

 

As for the rest of your post, I suggest you put a paper together than pass it the the USAF. I'm sure neither them, nor the aircraft/avionics designers have ever thought of any of this stuff. ;)

 

In other words, it really IS a good idea since apparently everyone else in the world knows it? So you are agreeing with me?

 

Your Software = 100 000USD

 

Current Software = 10 000USD + reliable SSI

 

 

Money talks - Simple

 

This no doubt is why the F-15 is being phased out as America's air superiority fighter in favor of the P-51. Also what is "SSI"?

 

The software needed to check some parameters for weapon release is minimal:

 

if master arm & g force < # & alt > # & bomb armed & bomb selected & etc

drop bomb

 

As for skynet powered A-10s being more expensive, that is the eventual future. We in turn will have more and smarter (possibly automated...perhaps a genetic algorithm will accidentally produce the world's best combat aircraft) computer scientists with better tools by then to assist in development, keeping costs more stable. It might cost a trillion dollars per plane, but only by the time the GDP is in the quintillions. Otherwise I offer you a piston engine triplane for your thrifty combat needs. I also offer Falcon 3 as a sufficiently fun flight sim, instead of this fancy, expensive DCS nonsense. TrackIR and real HOTAS and pedals approaches a grand. Multiple monitors could be another grand. The highly complex software that has to run or simulate the software the A-10 runs, AND simulate the A-10, AND simulate the world around it only costs $60. Software is pretty much the cheapest commodity in the universe when you consider it's freely reproduced. That effectively drives the cost per copy to 0 as the number of copies approaches infinity. One guy spends time and writes a solid weapon delivery program and mankind is forever improved (or worsened...).

 

If the two of you (Eddie, Viper) could consider your two posts taken together:

 

Eddie: the idea is obvious and widely used already

Viper: the idea is too expensive

 

I realize I made myself the target in this discussion so the psychological effect is to try to prove me wrong, but it would appear you guys are contradicting each other in your attempts to do so.

[nomdeplume]

The system can even be programmed to handle multiple parameters based on altitude, temperature, bomb weight, gs, etc. Either the bomb can be safely dropped or it cannot, and no mistake will be made because it's by a deterministic computer program that has had the bugs removed. Sufficient margins would be present to account for instrument inaccuracies.

You're obviously not a programmer, but I'm now wondering if you've ever actually used any software of beyond a trivial complexity. Your post goes on into an unexpected tangent about a future world where the magic of Science has made mankind obsolete/extinct/omnipotent, which is fine and all, but we are so very far from that point it's meaningless to make plans around that eventuality.

 

Computers do not have any common sense. Every single aspect of their behaviour has to be meticulously programmed, with careful consideration given to how all the various parameters and states of the program can interact with each other. Humans simply aren't very good at doing this, which is why software is so buggy.

 

Another benefit of a single press / single consent is it is the gateway to a more complex automated release system that would for example prosecute multiple targets using the marks you set up prior.

I don't see how the particular mechanism the pilot uses to tell the aircraft to release weapons has any bearing at all on the capabilities of the weapons system.

 

Anyway, you seriously think it's practical to a) envision every possible scenario in which you might want to abort a weapons release; b) program the system to correctly abort in all those cases but proceed in others; c) have some kind of failsafe way to determine when the data you're processing is actually incorrect; and d) thoroughly test every possible combination of parameters to ensure the system always works as expected?

 

That's a massive undertaking. And what's the benefit? So the pilot doesn't have to hold down a button for a few seconds? I mean seriously, I still don't understand why you have an issue with that at all. If you're going to turn a simple system into a very complex system, you'd be better be solving an actual problem.

 

P.S. This thread wouldn't exist if the OP had read the instructions. ;) I haven't had a hung store since I understood "you have to hold the button down until the weapon is released". It's not exactly a difficult concept to grasp, and it's a lot easier to explain than "you have to maintain +/- 5 degrees in pitch/roll/yaw and not change the speed brake setting or max the throttle or do any other thing the system interprets as a reason to abort the release".

[winz]

@Seanner

One big problem I see in your design is the break of the mental connection

"i'm pressing the pickle button = I'm releasing ordance = I know I'm releasing ordance only when I'm pressing the buttom = I should fly the plane like I'm releasing ordance when I'm depressing the pickle button". The pilot knows he is safe to maneuver as long he is not pressing the button. He can break the attack at any point and be sure the weapon will not come off the rail (because that's why he'll most likely release the button, not because of "oh f*ck I forgot I've to press it to 5sec"). He doesn't have to think 'hell, I've to pull 3g or the damn thing will come off"

 

You also bring inconsistency into weapon releasing, making the system less predictable for the pillot. The inconsistency would be between releasing dumb munition in ccrp, riple (you still have to depress the buttom before 3/9, 5mil conditions are met, and during the whole ripple delivery) vs releasing jdams.

[159th_Viper]

....but it would appear you guys are contradicting each other in your attempts to do so.

 

Alas, the misunderstanding is yours alone.

 

Limit your discussion to the relevant Airframe, ie the A10C and light will dawn ;)

 

Oh yeah: SSI = Seat-Stick Interface (the Human who actually does what he is told, ie hold down the weapons release until deployed)

Edited March 16, 2011 by 159th_Viper

[Steel Jaw]

This is nothing... in the old F-4 Phantom depressing the pickle switch to launch the "great white hope" (AIM-7 Sparrow) took 5 SECONDS!!!! Not good when you have a maneuvering mig in the HUD!

 

LMAO...I remember that too. :thumbup:

[StrongHarm]

There was a relevant previous discussion about forcing important changes.

 

Seanner, could you put a lithium (or maybe a superior psychotropic drug of your own design) dispenser in your A-10D cockpit? I would also suggest an angry midget duct taped over the sniper pod to facilitate better situational awareness.

 

After reading your posts I am forced to request a sanity refund. I invested a large amount and must insist that you return it. I will now un-read those posts.

 

 

The midgetPod could save lives...

 

[Seanner]

You're obviously not a programmer

 

That is my job. I wrote my own flight simulator as it happens.

 

, but I'm now wondering if you've ever actually used any software of beyond a trivial complexity.

 

I use DCS: A-10 and it crashes frequently!

 

but we are so very far from that point it's meaningless to make plans around that eventuality.

 

I'm not convinced of this at all, nevertheless I won't be doing anything drastic myself. One possibility is the world oil supply dwindles, and less-than-superpower countries will freak out when they lose the ability to defend themselves because they don't yet have solar powered tanks. So they invade another country for oil, and as the more and more countries end up in this situation and freak out further, nukes start flying. Oil is running out in the meaningfully near future, btw. Less reliance on ever advancing warmachines as a means to "keep peace" and more reliance on not hating different religions will assist with the transition into the oil free future.

 

Computers do not have any common sense.

 

Your brain is a biological computer. With enough processing power/memory, one could write a program to simulate what the brain does, and then you would have a computer brain (Data on Star Trek TNG). I don't know how you are defining common sense, but not every program has to be a rigid series of steps to execute. Some programs "learn" as we say, even though at the lowest level neurons are simply being re-weighted to produce new output (just like in your brain...one example is jellyfish: a worldclass backgammon program that taught itself to play). If a computer that thinks like a human has no common sense, then neither does the human.

 

Every single aspect of their behaviour has to be meticulously programmed, with careful consideration given to how all the various parameters and states of the program can interact with each other. Humans simply aren't very good at doing this, which is why software is so buggy.

 

I agree, but you have to be careful with that line of thought. Software that works works perfectly minus hardware failure. I've never had a calculator to blame for getting a wrong answer on a test. If you are implying that complex software is too dangerous to be relied upon, that is too vague of a statement to resolve the current debate.

 

We increasingly rely more and more on software as it consistently outperforms the alternatives. Your car uses software to control the engine. Software can defeat Gary Kasparov. Software can defeat Ken Jennings. Software makes your TAD more than a chart. Software can determine that a bomb can or cannot be dropped, and importantly, more accurately than the pilot can. Software can be so good that software enhanced humans are called cheaters (aimbot, wallhack, norecoil...). To make a statement like "software is buggy" as your official counter argument... Well my official counter counter argument is pilots make mistakes... In fact it's precisely that humans make mistakes that software ends up buggy, but where software can be improved as bugs are found, humans will still be clumsy humans.

 

======================================================

 

The inconsistency would be between releasing dumb munition in ccrp, riple (you still have to depress the buttom before 3/9, 5mil conditions are met, and during the whole ripple delivery) vs releasing jdams.

 

In each case, the pilot presses Consent whenever he consents, and the bombs drop when the program determines that the bombs should drop. I see no inconsistency...the program would be designed to ensure (as much as possible) a successful attack...the pilot is only there to say "ok go ahead" i.e. consent. Why does he have to sometimes say "consssssssssseeeeeennnnnnttttttt"?

 

========================================================

 

After reading your posts I am forced to request a sanity refund. I invested a large amount and must insist that you return it. I will now un-read those posts.

 

You are the first person to have nothing to say on the matter other than "I don't like your posts" with a link to a thread where the OP essentially says "screw everyone that has an idea" ... and of course it's your thread. This is where the discussion turns from barely heated into flame war.

 

*Makes own relevant thread*

 

http://forums.eagle.ru/****you

[StrongHarm]

ROFL!

 

I'm sorry, but I'm going to need a second refund.

[Seanner]

I have enjoyed our conversation very much.