Flying the Ka-50?

[BuzzU]

I wonder if we could have a little feedback from testers, or Ed on what it's like to fly the Ka-50? I've never flown a real helicopter, but I did fly an RC version in competition when I was younger. I remember how difficult it was, and it took 100% of my concentration. I can't imagine having to operate the combat systems at the same time.

 

So, how difficult is it to fly?

[GGTharos]

We're not testing it yet, we're testing 1.12, but to give you an idea, it'll probably be easier than your RC, but harder than flying the jets.

 

Naturally the issue at hand is that, flying so close to the ground, it'll be one of your biggest foes ;)

[BuzzU]

Ah yes. The evil ground.

[GGTharos]

I understand the workload in the cockpit will be quite big. From what i've seen in existing movies, it appears to fly easily enough though.

[BuzzU]

I never thought of this until now, but does it have auto pilot?

[Pilotasso]

Ah yes. The evil ground.

 

No problem!!

 

 

I can only imgaine its flight model. We would need so mighty big air brakes!!!

[SimFreak]

I never thought of this until now, but does it have auto pilot?

 

IIRC it has auto-hover mode.

[pudknocker]

Ah yes. The evil ground.

 

Remember:

Its not the Fall that kills you, its the sudden Deceleration .

 

Flying isn't dangerous Crashing is.

 

 

[Sleek]

Na..should be a piece of cake to fly..i mean u'v "only" got to deal with a few things like..

Vortex ring..

Blade stall..

cross coupling..

over torque..

transitional lift..

and of course the weapon's system,wind and weather to name but a few lol...

 

Piece of cake!

 

Can't wait!! :D

[RvETito]

Autopilot system

 

All modern helicopters(including Ka-50) have 4-channel fully automatic flight control system. Along with the default functions(stabilisitaion of all the 3 axis, trajectory autoflight, semiautomatic guidance) it should be capable of auto-hover mode over designated point and automaticaly move to another hover point. I've read also that Ka-50 should be capable of returning and landing at the home base even after the pilot has been killed.

[Sleek]

yea??..lol then whats the point of piloting it :)

 

seriously tho..interesting fact's ;)

[RvETito]

These systems, no matter how capable they are, can screw up sometimes. I think we are still too far from removing the pilot, not only for this particular situation. Men are still more reliable than machines.

[Yellonet]

I'm betting that it will not be as hard as flying a RC helicopter.

But people without a HOTAS might be in trouble. Me included :(

 

Another thing, a mission at about 30 minutes with a plane will take several hours with the Ka-50... they aren't meant for the same type of missions of course, but it's just something to think about.

[Sleek]

I fly alot with EECH so the sooner black shark comes out the better!

 

It's about time a decent COMBAT heli sim was released ;)

 

Just hope my pc will run it ok.

[BuzzU]

I'm wondering if you can really hover for the attacks? It seems like you'd be a sitting duck. Maybe i'm thinking this out too much. Time will tell.

[GGTharos]

You wouldn't just stop and hover - a hovering attack would be done from pop-up ... pop up from behind a ridge or building or what have you, guide the missile till it hits, then 'pop back down' :)

[BuzzU]

You wouldn't just stop and hover - a hovering attack would be done from pop-up ... pop up from behind a ridge or building or what have you, guide the missile till it hits, then 'pop back down' :)

 

You don't always have something to hide behind.

 

Even if you pop up, you're still stopped..;)

[Weta43]

Hover, lock, fire, dodge, un-pop ?

[Cosmonaut]

I'm betting that it will not be as hard as flying a RC helicopter.

But people without a HOTAS might be in trouble. Me included :(

 

Nah .. you shouldn't have a problem. I don't have a HOTAS and I fly Helicopters in FS9 with out any issues what so ever. The only problem people might have is if their control set up doesn't include some sort of intuitive rudder control i.e. Rudder pedals or a twist grip. I can bet though it won't take long for players to adapt to what ever they have and after some practice they'll be in full control of the Ka50 and its systems.

 

What I'm hopping for is a realistic hover and transition experience that's as difficult or as easy as the real thing. The counter rotating blades should make things easier in the hover and transitioning into the hover but hovering should still be a challenge.

[Dudikoff]

I'm betting that it will not be as hard as flying a RC helicopter.

But people without a HOTAS might be in trouble. Me included :(

 

I understand your concern. I used to fly EECH before I had HOTAS and I had trouble landing on the pad.. I always missed it by a lot. After I got my X36, I landed correctly on the pad from the first try so it's that much easier when you have analog collective control.

[axelthorpe]

I understand your concern. I used to fly EECH before I had HOTAS and I had trouble landing on the pad.. I always missed it by a lot. After I got my X36, I landed correctly on the pad from the first try so it's that much easier when you have analog collective control.

I agree, it's much easier controlling both aircraft and helicopters using HOTAS (not that I hit the pad every time in EECH, but that's another story :D )

 

Not to mention that it's much more fun to fly with HOTAS! I didn't think it mattered as I have had HOTAS for as I've been playing real sims (since I got Flanker 2, and gave up IAF and F-22 lightning :) ).

But when I got this "Logitech Extreme 3d pro" thingy with a small throttle and twist handle for my old computer at my dorm, I noticed how much you lose of the feeling of flying. It's not even close to even the X-36 I got at home.

 

The difference between a Logitech or Microsoft joystick and a HOTAS, is almost as evident as the difference between keyboard and a joystick! (No not really, but you get my point)

 

/Axl

[Sealpup]

Na..should be a piece of cake to fly..i mean u'v "only" got to deal with a few things like..

Vortex ring..

Blade stall..

cross coupling..

over torque..

transitional lift..

and of course the weapon's system,wind and weather to name but a few lol...

 

Piece of cake!

 

Can't wait!! :D

 

Vortex ring: Eh...what?

 

Blade stall: Short of an extreme case of blade stall causing a collision of blades between disks, non-factor in the Shark.

 

Cross coupling: If this is collective-tailrotor coupling, not a factor as the tail rotor does not exsist on a Shark.

 

Overtorque: Hmmm, probably a bigger problem, due to a more complex transmission system for a coax rotor.

 

Translational lift: I forsee alot of fixed-wing transfers becoming SAM targets frequently because of this :D

 

EDIT: Friggin' IE, it didn't show the other 2 pages of stuff that grew out of this thread.

[Iron Legionnaire]

Vortex Ring State, aka Settling with Power. Basically if you descend at high RoD, steep angle, low forward airspeed, you start falling into your own downwash. Because the inner area of the rotor generates less downward air velocity (as the blades spin more slowly near the center), you can reach a point where air actually starts going UP through the center of the rotor. Causes loss of control, lots of rattling.

 

That Marine Osprey went down because of this. One of the proprotors went into VRS and caused the aircraft to roll over into the ground.

[Yellonet]

Yeah.. you're in a pretty bad seat if something happens in a chopper.

 

http://www.micom.net/oops/HelisHitRotors.mpeg

[Yo-Yo]

Vortex ring: Eh...what?

 

Blade stall: Short of an extreme case of blade stall causing a collision of blades between disks, non-factor in the Shark.

 

Cross coupling: If this is collective-tailrotor coupling, not a factor as the tail rotor does not exsist on a Shark.

 

Overtorque: Hmmm, probably a bigger problem, due to a more complex transmission system for a coax rotor.

 

Translational lift: I forsee alot of fixed-wing transfers becoming SAM targets frequently because of this :D

 

EDIT: Friggin' IE, it didn't show the other 2 pages of stuff that grew out of this thread.

 

1. Strong blade stall as well as overflapping is a very dangerous factor in Ka-50 because of blade crossing risk. Blade crossing of upper and lower rotors destroys rotors and leads to instant accident.

2. Overtorque leads to rotor deceleration because the turbine power is cut off at max power automatically. I think transmission system will be OK but not the rotors because of flapping magnitude increasing. See #1.

3. You must be very careful to avoid vortex ring especially when you hovering before landing.

4. If you fly within resrictions the flight is very pleasant. There is neither autopilot yet nor any SAS in Ka-50 model but it's not hard to fly it even now.