Hover/Flight Maneuvering help

[elproducto]

I'm getting fairly proficient with the weapons systems.. but goddamit, I can not fly this thing worth a damn.

 

I'm having a ton of trouble setting up in a nice stable hover, so that I can actually deploy the weapons. It seems like I try and get setup to scan for targets and shoot, but I'm constantly fighting the bird to stay put. I watch some videos on youtube, and some of the training missions and the bird is in a basically perfect hover.

 

Any tips on hovering, and also evasive maneuvers?

Edited February 2, 2012 by elproducto

[159th_Viper]

Post a track and we'll be able to advise you where you might need improving.

[Nate--IRL--]

I may have already replied on SimHQ - however....

 

Read this, and then read it again, until it makes perfect sense.

 

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=36246&highlight=autopilot

 

Nate

[elproducto]

Thanks Nate.

 

I'm going to print out the flight maneuver section of the manual, and run through those.

[Bushmanni]

If you haven't learned the trimming yet, then learn it as stable hands-free hovering is impossible without it. Ka-50 is in a stable hover attitude with nose 5 degrees up and wings level in zero wind conditions. The amount of pitch up will depend on your center of gravity that shifts with fuel and weapons load a little bit but the 5 degrees is usually pretty much in the spot. The correct hover attitude is important to know as that's when the aircraft will not accelerate in any direction. There's no instrument for indicating lateral acceleration, only for speed and as such attitude is the only way to see if you are accelerating or not.

 

Here's an easy way to get in to hover and maneuver the aircraft around accurately while in it. First reduce your speed as much as you can easily, but at least get under about 30km/h and then trim for hover attitude. If you have FD on then disable it before trimming. After trimming you are still moving slowly in some direction but your aircraft is now kept in a neutral attitude by autopilot so it will not try to accelerate in any direction unless you want it to. Reset the weapons system to get the HUD in NAV mode and get the velocity vector visible if you haven't already. You can now easily control the velocity vector with cyclic stick. If you are moving left push the cyclic to the right until velocity vector is centered in left/right axis. The same applies for forward/backward axis. When you have reduced velocity vector to a dot you are in the hover. You may need to adjust your trim a little bit at this point as it's likely the velocity vector will want to creep a little at some direction as your first trim was with some lateral speed which affects trim.

[elproducto]

That's very helpful.

 

At any time, should I be engaging the autohover/hover hold?

[Jona33]

That's very helpful.

 

At any time, should I be engaging the autohover/hover hold?

 

When you're controls are trimmed to a hover. Being in a hover is not enough as the autopilot only has 20% control authority. Using Turn to Target is useful as well.

[GGTharos]

Engage it if you need to maintain a hover hands-free. Do not use it to enter a hover - you must already be hovering or near hovering (very very slow speed).

 

That's very helpful.

 

At any time, should I be engaging the autohover/hover hold?

[elproducto]

OK, sounds like I need to practice maintaining a hover just with pilot input.

 

Thanks all, this is helpful.

[Puddlemonkey]

Engage it if you need to maintain a hover hands-free. Do not use it to enter a hover - you must already be hovering or near hovering (very very slow speed).

 

I would say this is not strictly true. I think that so long as the aircraft is trimmed to the 5 degrees nose up and level, and you are moving slowly then engaging auto hover is a good way of bringing it to a halt. Call me lazy! :huh:

 

When auto hover is engaged, the AP will apply up to 20% in any direction to try to keep you stable. If you are trimmed well, this will keep the aircraft on the spot with your hands-off the joystick. However, you can also think of this as a '20% dead zone' to any input you apply.

 

Even with auto hover engaged, you can still provide your own input. If you are trimmed roughly to hover attitude and drifting forward at 5kph, you can leave auto hover engaged, pull back slightly on the stick until you are no longer moving, pull back a little more so that you are comfortably within the 20% AP limit, hit trim and you will stay hovering. The point is that you don't have to keep dissengaging hover, perfecting and trimming and then re-engaging hover. This may seem obvious but it took me a long time to click!

 

With auto hover engaged, you will always be closer to a hover than with it dissengaged!

 

Another technique that I use is when auto hover is engaged and I am drifting, I compensate with my own input and then hit and hold trim (so AP stops compensating), I then have to add more input, I get it closer to hovering than it was and then release trim. If this didn't quite do the trick, I do it again until I'm stationary.

 

I have found these techniques become very useful when using auto turn to target mode in windy conditions because as you turn, you have to adjust your trim to remain in a hover.

 

It is really frustrating that as soon as you uncage the SHKVAL, you lose the all important velocity and velocity vector indicators in the HUD. If anyone knows of a way of bringing them back whithout caging the SHKVAL, I'd love to be able to!

[elproducto]

After doing some more reading (thanks), it seems I'm trying to initiate hover hold, before actually getting the chopper in a proper hover manually.

[GGTharos]

I won't just call you lazy, I'll call you a bad instructor! :P

 

The student must be taught to do things the right way from the very start, or the student will end up having loads of bad habits.

 

AFTER knowing how to reliably do things the right way the student may then elect to adopt a relaxed attitude towards said procedures.

 

I would say this is not strictly true. I think that so long as the aircraft is trimmed to the 5 degrees nose up and level, and you are moving slowly then engaging auto hover is a good way of bringing it to a halt. Call me lazy! :huh:

[Puddlemonkey]

I won't just call you lazy, I'll call you a bad instructor! :P

 

The student must be taught to do things the right way from the very start, or the student will end up having loads of bad habits.

 

AFTER knowing how to reliably do things the right way the student may then elect to adopt a relaxed attitude towards said procedures.

 

I think maybe I watched too many episodes of The A Team and Airwolf!

[GGTharos]

You're pointing that argument in the wrong direction. ;)

[elproducto]

Thanks for all of your help all. I spent an hour tonight getting familiar with the AP systems. Turns out I was trying to hover without them.

I can now get myself into a nice hover, and maintain it most of the time.

I was literally raining FIRE on those chumps at the shooting range!

 

Now for my next question. What's the best technique for starting a controlled attack run from a hover? Like when I've exhausted my Vikhrs, and want to come in with rockets and cannons.

Edited February 3, 2012 by elproducto

[Jona33]

With rockets get your heading almost perfect. Disengage autohover and slowly increase speed. Hit one target with a burst and then break off at speed. I prefer to use cannon first though. Maximum range of 4km and it's enough to take out most vehicles except MBT's.

[EtherealN]

Accuracy is horrible at 4km though. If the vehicles are in a group I'll typically line up with a medium salvo setting (assuming 8cm rockets, I pretty much never use the 12's), stabilize on the target in the attack run and release my ordnance, than use gun for mopping up (usually "walking" the target box from vehicle to vehicle on the Skhval - that is, no individual locks).

 

Obviously, this all depends on what the opposition is in the enemy formation and what it is doing. But generally speaking - for rocket use, there's two things to think about:

 

1) Bursts. Don't try to snipe with them, they're not precision weapons.

2) Make sure your bird is stable. Don't just throw the pipper onto the target and launch as the pipper walks over - you'll have an axial moment that will get transferred to the weapons, and your accuracy will suffer greatly. Stable launch platform is what you want.

3) Remember that even units that aren't killed may be damaged - though the game does not show partial damage. So even if you don't see much dying, it might have done enough to let you finish the job with just a quick spray of the good old 30mm afterwards. :)

(And, if it's targets that have machineguns, their weapon accuracy will be reduced when damaged, which is nice if you end up having to get close for whatever reason.)

[159th_Viper]

....and want to come in with rockets and cannons.

 

Your cannon is a Dragunov. Don't go treating it like a PP-91 :)

 

For rockets, yeah, as others have said, it's a scattergun approach that works best. Quick on the pedals, trim correctly and you'll be good to go. Should you wish, example tracks can be posted - just state what scenarios you'll be interested in, ie moving convoys etc etc.