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Hey Driftwood....share your approach?


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You were sharing lots of data while you flew last week and started describing how you organize your thoughts to be able to fly with all instruments no HUD.

Could you post a typical cock pit view with an aircraft of choice and mark it up or explain what you are doing?

I found it interesting but was too tired to listen very well last week.

Thanks!

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Yes, I have been doing a lot of what driftwood has been talking about (watching ata vs % throttle), and trying to keep airspeed up over 350kmh

Brinson also suggested I get my ata at where I want, and take my hand off the throttle, which seems to help, until a pesky  i16 throttles me so I go flying past it...

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Okay, way too long winded! 

I'll make a video and do the best I can to show you how I fly without technical tips. I did add the compass to the hud display so if I need to give quick accurate headings I can turn it on as needed. If flying the Spitfire Mk.V I'll leave it on most of the time since you have to wait 30 sec for the gyro to start working if you fly past 50 degrees bank and the wet nav is too hard to see and read when needed. 

2 planes I use for training are the BF109 F4 & Spitfire Mk.V, I flew the FW190 A3, A5 the most when I started out so when I start flying the 190's more again the transition wont' be that hard. The hardest part about flying without technical tips is the gauges being in different spots depending on the plane. So you fumble around with your head in the cockpit until you have a natural flow allowing a quick glance to get the info you need which is faster and less distracting than reading technical tips and your eyes are where they should be when flying. Plus you don't have to move your throttle, prop pitch/rpm, flaps, or whatever to get the technical tip to sow you your setting. 

Brins advice on taking your hand of the throttle is good advice. I'll fly at continuous and combat power, take my hand off the throttle and fly by exchanging energy only to get used to it. Same with when practicing managing my energy in general at any power setting. But then practice with hands on throttle with quick glances at your ATA/manifold gauge to make sure you did not throttle into your emergency power and slowly burn up your engine without realizing it. The more efficient you are, the more the temp gauge is useful to catch when your on your way to heating up the engine. Early on the temp gauge meant nothing to me because I would damage or blow the engine before the temp would indicate a problem. RPM needle starts jumping around problem!, engine starts making noise, problem! temp looks okay what the heck? Full throttle without regard for your engine will do that. 

BF109 F4 - With only 1 minute emergency power, you have to be very aware of your power setting at all times. Good to set it and forget ATA/manifold pressure. Treat the emergency power like a boost you only use for 10-30 seconds at a time unless your in real trouble.  

Spitfire Mk.V - Has the most cockpit management for an angle fighter plane, Great for instrument gauge awareness and heavier workload if you want to get the most out of the plane. Canopy is awesome to see what's going on especially if you need to glance down into the cockpit a bit more.

But you have to use both prop rpm and boost/manifold pressure (your throttle) independently on top of making sure your radiator is open and if flying continuous power closing the radiator off to keep your water temp closer to 110. Combat power which is RPM 2850 / Boost +9, leave the radiator wide open, 30 min is a good set it and forget it, Then leaving your RPM's at 2850 so you don't need to adjust it; just adjust your boost/throttle to full and press your boost button when you need instant power. You have 5 minutes with RPM's at 3000 but leave it set to 2850 and operate your boost button/+full throttle for only 1-3 minutes as needed and you'll get more out of it. RPM 3000 / Boost button / full throttle / 5 min if your in trouble. But it will take you 5-10 minutes to get your engine oil temp down. If your running combat power at 2850, water radiator wide open, and using the boost button/full throttle for 1-3+ minutes as needed; keep an eye on your oil temp. Water should stay cool but the oil temp will creep up on you. Then you will need to reduce RPM to 2650 Boost +4 to +7, if you have altitude; shallow dive to let the air cool things down. Actually works in sim, cool. 

So all that may seem extreme to keep an eye on but you will be surprised at how little work it becomes once you get used to it. All that workload turns into flying by feel with minimal glances at the gauges. 

What I was trying to do the other night was to simply take off, climb to 1000 m, left hand circle around the base. But even at low power, doing it efficiently put me there pretty fast. Something I learned flying with Gripho's (king of efficient flying). How in the world did Gripho's get to 1000-1500 m at 1.0 ATA in the F4 as I fell behind and every effort led to burning up my engine. (his simple response, I'm flying more efficiently) 

F4 - So the tip is, pitch for speed / set your power, allow your speed to reach best climb speed (280) or above, then pull back on your stick as much as you can without going under your climb speed. I use 300 kmh, then as my speed increases, keep pulling back on the stick to keep the speed at 300-320. Depending on your power setting will depend on how fast you climb, just use 300-320 as your range and shoot for 300-305 kmh. 

So if (I am) flying lead, and immediately reduce power to 1.15 ATA as the wheels leave the ground, fly low/vary little pitch or level while raising your flaps, then as you hit 300 kmh, reduce power again 1.0 while maintaining 300 kmh and continue pitching for 300  at 1.0. All the wingman taking off after you should have enough power to get into formation. You do the exact same thing, pitch for 300 khm only adjust your power between 1.15 - 1.3 as needed. 

However, if your the last wingman up and feel like your falling behind, and you don't wait for your speed to hit 300+ for your pitch to climb, and try to pull back on the stick to fast and increase your power to much into your emergency power. All that will happen is you will not catch up and burn up your engine. 

Trust that lead will keep the power at 1.0 or lower or as needed and will level off flying "flat and level" then you should be able to fly at 1.3 ATA, pitched for 300, climb to altitude of your wingmen, leave your power set to 1.3 as you level off; and have enough speed to catch up, or reduce power a bit and BnZ into position. 

If lead says, I'm at 1.15 or continuous, or 85%, this means nothing if there not flying flat and level or have a different fuel and weapons setup or a different plane, a simple shallow dive that's hard to see and they just keep pulling away. 

So what's your speed might be the better question, followed by the same question 1-2 minutes later so you can tell if they are climbing or diving based on the difference in speed. 

It would be nice to try and start applying some kind procedure to basic takeoff and forming up each time. Even if it is as simple as takeoff/left turn / circle the base while climbing to 1000 (or any #) maintain 1000 m / 350 kmh to allow wingmen to form up. But you actually have to maintain 1000 / or 900-1100 so everyone knows where to look. Taking off 1 sec apart would be great when possible. Every time I have the opportunity to do this I waste no time getting into position. 

I'll make a couple videos to demo,

 

Edited by WWDriftwood
F4 Best climb speed said 180, should be 280!
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Hope this helps, this is what I see when I fly. What I was trying to explain the other night. As far as clock reference, that is just a way to explain where the needle should be on the gauge I'm talking about. So ATA 1.3 is about 1 O'clock, etc. Then as you get comfortable looking at the gauges you start looking at the needle position when glancing at the gauge. This comes in handy with some gauges like the ATA in the F4, or the Oil/water temp in the spit, I know I don't want my water temp to go past 12 on the gauge which is 110 degrees and typically I'll see it more around 10, or the oil temp going past 4 O'clock, etc. Your eyes start to recognize a problem at a glance base on the needles clock position reference. 

I'm trying to get my skills up so I can fly at speed/altitude as consistently as I would driving my truck down the road.  

Not sure this is what you were looking for. 

 

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I'm assuming he's talking about back pressure on the stick as you try to maintain pitch angle.  Also impressed with the coordinated turns.

Now do it in the Jug while managing fifty million levers and getting shot at.  :classic_wink:  Just kidding of course, this is a great video Driftwood!

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12 minutes ago, WWSittingduck said:

at the risk of sounding stupid...what is back pressure?

I have tried to "fly the ball", and eventually just gave up...it was impossible for me.  Was pretty impressed how you kept it centered during your turn.

Back pressure - pull back on the stick / stick aft / etc. so your just adding a little (back) pressure to adjust your pitch

Flying the ball is a pain to adapt as part of my regular scanning of the gauges. I'm only paying attention to that about 30% of the time when it needs to be 100% of the time while traveling from A to B (not dog fighting, etc though if I'm in trail and tracking or working an angle out of gun range I'll check the ball, adjust my trim or H-Stab etc. to stabilize my nose. I'm not staring at the ball, just recognizing it's placement as I do my scan.

Goes back to scanning the gauges and recognizing the needle position in my scan. Flying the F4 I don't want to go over 1.3 which is 1 O'clock which I don't really have to look at the gauge, I can see it when it comes into view as I scan the skies and my eye picks up if it's going past 1 O'clock. Now with a big screen I can actually read the gauges when I'm zoomed out. Before it was a blur and I had to know the numbers based on a blurry gauge and needle position. Peripheral vision for SA or read the gauges were my choices, now I have both. Muhahahaha finally!

26 minutes ago, WWChunk said:

I'm assuming he's talking about back pressure on the stick as you try to maintain pitch angle.  Also impressed with the coordinated turns.

Now do it in the Jug while managing fifty million levers and getting shot at.  :classic_wink:  Just kidding of course, this is a great video Driftwood!

Your absolutely right, can't imagine the work load, that's why I like the Spitfire Mk.V. You can choose to manage it simple or you can manage it with more detail and squeeze every drop out of it and not blow up the engine. Which means your using your clock minute hand on the fly in the middle of your dogfight and constantly checking your temps and adjusting your water radiator on top of adjusting the Prop RPM on the fly which I hate doing, then add a lot of on the fly trim adjustment.

Still not a Jug... are you flying by gauges or technical tips? 

Glad you liked the video. 

BLUE FLIGHT Practice or anyone

I'd like to practice our taxi/takeoff/circle the airbase/ follow the bombers - bombers can be anyone in a plane taking off while we circle, or imaginary. Oh and keep the taxiing to a minimum...  

But basically try to take off seconds apart while lined up left 1 to right 4 (so you can look left while banking left and easily see your wing lead inside your turn, provided you stay to outside.)  or on the runway/active side by side.... It would be really cool when were in a large field/runway area to have everyone line up on the runway/active in order of flight and take off one after the other like a heard of buffalo stampeding into the air. 

I always forget my basic nav reference, figure out which direction were taking off / note the heading for your upwind / calculate your downwind heading / +200 -20 or -200 +20 Don't worry about crosswind and base headings

This way lead sets the initial turn radius but knows to turn onto the downwind heading for the initial climb, everyone else just has to gauge the turn visually but knows to lineup on the downwind heading without asking, Then turning base to upwind is a visual reference but again as you turn to upwind following lead you know which heading your going to line up on before turning to crosswind and so on. 

Then agree on a wingtip reference, like wingtip on the edge or outside the circumference of airbase, or put the edge of the airbase under your wing for tighter, etc. 

So at the beginning of each flight we simply:

  • Reference our takeoff/landing headings
  • Lead sets the altitude we circle at if circling - I think lower like 700-800 might be easier to see what's going on below. 
  • Lead sets the pitch speed if above 300 otherwise everyone knows to use the best climb speed for the plane plus 10-20 
  • This should take all of 2 minutes to clarify. 
  • Then line up as needed and don't take off until everyone is ready knowing were taking off one after the other in succession.... 
  • If someone messes up, spins out and were lined up, I'd recommend the other planes continue taking off as intended, whoever is on the ground, just line up and take off ASAP and will adjust to pick you up at altitude as we circle, we should be easy to see and find and you don't even have to check to see where we are, just take off as practiced and will be right where were supposed to be. 
  • At altitude, we can use "speed" as our reference as opposed to power settings, %, etc. which don't account for fuel weight and weapons differences. Speed is speed at level flight. Power and speed mean nothing to me if your diving or climbing etc. and power is only relevant as a guide unless we have the exact same planes and load outs flying level.  

I don't think this is something that has to be practiced a lot, just practice to get the basic process down and then put to practice each flight since is the same every time.

Let me know if you interested. 

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I fly the 190's primarily and I prefer the A3; although the pilot workload on all of the 190's is minimal.  When I do fly the Jug it is via the gauges.  I flew the A2A version on FSX/P3D so often, that I didn't even need to reference how to fly this version.  It's a MASSIVE workload to get the most out of the R-2800, especially when combat is added into the mix.  That being said, I enjoy the Jug a bunch.  Not as much as the Focke Wulf, but it's close.  :classic_wink:

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The only thing I was flying more by the numbers prior to IL2 was the C172 in XPlane which is pretty easy. But I could go to skyvector and make a simple flight plan and load it into the planes Garmin for some spot in the US and go fly using some best practices. But this was relaxing, plenty of time to think and enjoy the ride without someone shooting at you or needing to make split second decisions. Not used to trying to fly so many different planes and adapt to there little differences. 

I love flying the 190; the A3 is more agile than the A5, easy workload, just watch the ATA and mind your time in emergency power. Other than that, probably better off treating it as an energy fighter. A lot of angle fighting being done in the 190 instead of taking advantage of it's strength. Angle fight for a moment, then BnZ and come back for more, as opposed to angle fight ant blow your engine or die refusing to disengage and reacquire. If I fly it right, the 190 can be a bit like flying a jet, high speed, bigger turns, keep pecking at our target or become a dead eye dick and destroy bandits on a first pass that leaves them wondering, what the hell was that

Someday I'll pick up a throttle quadrant and yoke for some twin engine fun. Probably will take a while with the crazy workload. 

If I can actually relax when lining up my gunsite and using the button on my throttle for guns I might actually become dangerous, but it's still sloppy targeting and a little guess work as I'm learning to lean in using my TrackIR and line up a more accurate shot, same with leaning to look out the window while inside the bandits turn or I'm blind inside. That's a bit tricky. 

Anyways, lots to practice............. 

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39 minutes ago, WWDriftwood said:

... If I can actually relax when lining up my gunsite and using the button on my throttle for guns I might actually become dangerous, but it's still sloppy targeting and a little guess work as I'm learning to lean in using my TrackIR and line up a more accurate shot, same with leaning to look out the window while inside the bandits turn or I'm blind inside. That's a bit tricky. 

 

I set PgUp, PgDn and Home as thumb activated buttons for a hat switch on my stick. Zooms in, out and resets view. Keep my TIR-head in place, zoom in to fire, out to re-acquire, TIR to look around... Sounds more troublesome than it is to do. Alleviates much leaning in and out when searching, too.

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That's what I need, pgup/dn to raise and lower my head/seat, I have zoom in/out, I sacrificed my default zoom for a guns on my throttle. i just use my zoom in/out. Leaning forward is a bit different than the zoom and I'd adjust my head position to see the gunsite better, but pgup/dn would work better for this. Typically I'll use zoom more than lean for basic search, but lean in/out for cockpit or as I look over shoulder. Whenever it makes more sense than leaning in/out/back or just zoom; so I have options. Thanks.... 

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I’m looking forward to having more time to get back in the air and fly with Driftwood, and the rest of the WW’s of course. 

I love, LOVE the A3. It is my favorite aircraft/variant of all time. Boom and zoom is so much fun, and flown right, it is a masterpiece of aerial combat. The Würger got heavier and less agile as the variants grew, but the A3 was everything Kurt Tank wanted the 190 to be. 

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