The slatted version of the F-4E supposedly vastly reduced adverse Yaw at slow speeds and high angle of attack if that is what they are getting at. Hard Wing F-4s were a different story and needed a lot of rudder at low speed according to anyone that flew them. Several were apparently lost in combat because of it.
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Interesting. I would love to know how much “a lot” is and where.
I mean, to most jet guys I would say that “a lot” was what, say a Skyraider pilot, would call “any”.
I think swept wing jets are just so squirrelly that a strong Yaw Damper is almost a requirement. Interesting that the early model Phantoms might have had an underwhelming one. 
I’m excluding the air combat kind of high AOA here naturally. At very high AOA, I can’t think of a single jet I flew that I didn’t hear about the ol’ “Flat Scissors Stomp on the Rudder Reversal” technique. Hell, they brought it up in Airbus enhanced maneuvers training.
The effectiveness of the rudder, not the Flat Scissors part, of course. 
It would be quite fun if the much hoped for hard wing Phantoms one day were modeled as true “Sabre Dancers”!
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Makes total sense to me, now that you’ve pointed it out.
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The Tomcat is more or less similar. My turns got really clean when I stopped using rudder 
The ball will displace when entering and exiting turns, but the nose doesn’t show any apparent uncoordination, so I always assumed that movement was simply inertia of the ball wanting to stay where it is, and lagging to catch up where the jet settles after my bank.
EDIT: Perusing the -1 today and found some interesting notes.
Rudder use: “Adverse yaw is negligible…and ailerons are effective for roll control to 25 units AOA. The most effective roll technique is a combination of rudder and aileron in the direction of turn.”
That last sentence is vague and conflicting to a language-nerd like me. “Most effective roll technique” at all regimes, or specifically in reference to above 25 units? And what about the ARI, that should be producing rudder in combination with aileron automatically. And if adverse yaw is negligible, then why would rudder and aileron by the most effective technique?
On pitch control at low speeds: “The control of AOA at slow speeds is difficult because stick forces are lighter and aircraft stability is reduced.”
Well that explains why I’m struggling so much on the approach.
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The rudder has a considerable moment arm on the longitudinal axis, less than the ailerons, but it also introduces a roll moment.
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The wording of the Dash 1 is so contradictory though. It will say adverse yaw is negligible, aileron-only rolls are effective up to 25 units AoA, and later that the ARI handles coordination, thus implying no rudder is necessary below 25 units AoA, while completely contradicting those statements by then saying that a combination of rudder input and aileron input is most effective.
At any rate, my landings are getting better but they’re so inconsistent. Same gross weights, same technique, one round is beautiful and the next round has me plopping down like a Hornet while on-speed, power on, and my stick at max aft deflection.
DT is also an absolute tack-driver with Mk82s if you fly the HUD cues well!
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Well all I can say is that rudder-for-roll, stick-for-alpha works pretty well in the slow speed fight, and actually feels better than the same in the Tomcat, but unlike the Tomcat the Phantom just feels like a completely different and much better plane above 450 knots!
I haven’t done any slow fights, but yeah rudder use in the pattern feels great compared to the Tomcat.
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Yeah I don’t recommend it (slow fights that is) - it works OK against the AI MiG-23 but that’s about it! 
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That’s a good find!
At the risk of relying on my very old Aero memory, a piece of the puzzle is this:
So, one of the reasons that you use rudder to roll, particularly at high AOA is that, in a sense, your wings are near(er) stall. Deflecting your aileron increases the camber of the wing (making the wing curvier at that point) but, depending on how high your AOA is, it may not be in its most effective regime.
Deflecting your rudder at this point, on the other hand, essentially “swings” your outboard wing forward, increasing lift on that wing disproportionately by increasing Q and also by presenting more leading edge to the relative wind.
Also, according to the HB manual, the ARI doesn’t even operate with the Slats Flaps Switch not in the Out and Down position or the airspeed above 230KIAS.
which would account for a difference between, say, turning in the pattern on speed and pulling into the vertical in a Flat Scissors on speed.
In perusing the internet, I also found this.
It is the internet of course, so take it for what it is. I also didn’t see a particular Phantom model specified. But this excerpt, wherever it came from, sounds not unreasonable, especially for the hard winged Phantoms…from the sound of it.
Lastly, I noted that the Phantom does not roll quite the same as some other jets. In executing a turn, the upward aileron (which is quite far inboard and which will have its own effect) and the downwind spoiler deflect. This also changes the aerodynamics of how the jet operates, compared to a more conventionally controlled aircraft.
Of course, this all assumes that DCS is capable of simulating the effects of each of these components discretely, and not in a general “shape the curve” sense.
So, some allowance might need to be applied.
Usual disclaimers for 30 year out of date aeronautical knowledge.
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Thanks for that writeup, that all makes a lot more sense, and also I misunderstood how the spoilers worked on the Phantom so that’s another piece of the puzzle that you’ve just clicked into place for me 
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Adverse Yaw / high AoA in hard wing F-4s ( F-4BN )
Missing line = “Excessive rudder inputs will induce excessive Yaw”
F-4KM
The aircraft had a rather disturbing handling vice – adverse yaw – and the stalling advice alerted the pilot to the risks. At very slow speed and at a high angle of attack, if a pilot took the aircraft beyond the normal limits it could ‘depart’ unless handled carefully. In layman’s terms, that meant that it would stop flying in a straight line and do something completely unpredictable. Pilots could often be drawn into this flight regime, particularly if reacting to a threat, as the speed could wash off quite quickly. Even so, the Phantom gave fair warning. At just beyond the normal AOA setting of 19 units, the aircraft would start to buffet quite noticeably and at this stage the pilot would ‘use the boots’. Take it even further and it entered ‘wing rock’. At this stage the aircraft would rotate around its longitudinal axis, giving the effect of the wings moving up and down in sequence, hence the term ‘wing rock’. Push it even further or try to use the ailerons and the aircraft entered the last and most dramatic phase, ‘nose slice’. At this point, the nose literally sliced in the opposite direction to the demanded turn and the aircraft could enter a spin. Spin recovery was briefed on every combat sortie and it was quite possible, using an appropriate control input and by popping the drag chute, to break the spin. More than one pilot returned without a drag chute after an aggressive combat engagement, leading to questions and an inevitable dual check with the squadron Qualified Flying Instructor. Unfortunately, if the spin ever developed into a flat spin there was no known recovery other than by using the ejection seats. A video showing the fate of the test crew who established that fact was shown at many air combat phase briefings as a warning to the unwary. Despite these known characteristics and the danger of entering a spin, many pilots used high AOA for short periods in order to gain turning advantage during air combat manoeuvring.
Gledhill, David. The Phantom in Focus
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Great stuff.
Roll Aug off for ACM, huh?
Now that is interesting!
It also occurred to me in the general discussion that many pilots (certainly this one) having been hammered with the concept that “AOA is all” for much of their life, have a tendency to equate a 450 knot aircraft at 19 units and a 150 knot aircraft at 19 units.
Oftentimes, you will even hear it in the discussion of an airplane “at high AOA”, without mention of the speed.
What I think sometimes gets lost is that, just because the wing is at high AOA, no one told the Vertical Stab! For the stab, and more importantly the rudder, there is very much a difference between a slow high AOA aircraft and a fast high AOA aircraft in terms of authority, stability, etc.
Which will also account for some of the controllability differences between, for instance, a high AOA rudder reversal and an approach turn.
Just more musing.
Thanks @MigBuster. That’s very helpful stuff!
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no one has done a video trying the dispenser pods … so I thought i would give it a go, I know there no sound …(still learning OBS)
these pods are a beast …
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My neophyte take on the handling of the Phantom’s: it has character.
Came across a summation of the design method that may or may not be correct but collects a lot of stuff I’ve read/heard about her over the years:
- McDonnell placed the engines low to make it easy to just drop them out the bottom during replacement.
- The elevons needed to be placed above that, to keep them out of the engine exhaust.
- At high AoA the main wing wake would interfere with the elevons and make them less effective.
- With the large anhedral (down sweep) the outboard part of the elevons are below the wing wake at high AoA → better control
- Anhedral makes an aircraft less stable in roll, the solution is to compensate by main wing dihedral, about 3° should do it
- The fuselage and wing box was already designed, rather than redo that, the engineers gave the outboard panels (would fold up for carrier parking) 12°
- The humpback canopy came after the first test flights, to improve visibility
Sounds like they just ‘fixed it’ as they went along, using a crowbar and hammer metodology; “hmm, ok, we’ll just bend these down…oh, now we gotta bend those up”.
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Understatement! My god! Awesome
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Something I’ve worried about with the Phantom release (prior to it actually), given the depth and accuracy I knew HB would put in to it:
Ok, not really worried but…
I foresaw many people ending up disappointed stemming from the time required to control the Phantom in a coordinated way (I’m not there yet). And the switchology.
Compared to the fly-by-wire, point-and-shoot, computerized, fighters that followed: It is more about flying the machine (so you can actually hit something) and less about operating the software in the systems.
Now, this crowd (Mudspike) is mostly NOT in that group but I’ve seen a bit of angst (I know, stop reading online comments) from people that like ‘jets’ yet probably had little exposure to those of this transitional time period; the Phantom and all those designed in the 1950’s are more like WWII fighters, with big, honkin, jet engines [and no torque 
].
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Started to work on bombing
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Anyone else got Jester to eject in terror? I tried to climb with a little power, almost stalled, and off he went, saying bye bye…
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The following is from And I Lived to Tell the Tales: The Life of a Fighter Pilot by Ed Cobleigh, currently free with Kindle Unlimited. He has another book War For the Hell of It: A Fighter Pilot’s View of Vietnam that’s also on KU that is directly his Vietnam experiences. I recommend both of them, he definitely does not shy away from politics service and national in either book, but I find that an interesting addition to the details of combat. I believe he has a similar discussion about the slats fixing the problem largely in War for the Hell of It but it’s been a few years since I read that one.
Not so in the F-4. At high AOA and low airspeed, the Phantom exhibited severe adverse yaw. What’s that? The aerodynamics are technical and beyond the scope of this book. What it means is when you roll the aircraft to the right with the stick the nose slices left. Or vice-versa. In most aircraft, the name for this phenomenon is “Spin Entry.” You could catch it, center the stick, and fly out of the incipient spin if you acted quickly enough. But if you were looking back over your shoulder, or having a bad day, you could easily spin the jet.
A spin in the F-4 was not steady-state and relatively comfortable as in the Tweety-Bird or Jet Provost. The Phantom’s nose oscillated up and down by 30-45 degrees. The wings rocked plus or minus 45 degrees. The rate of rotation of the nose would speed up and slow down during each turn of the spin. Not a fun E-Coupon ride. It seemed to us that the “Golden Arm” test pilots of the Edwards AFB Flight Test Center and of McDonnell Aircraft would change the recommended spin recovery procedures on a yearly basis. When in a spin, if you couldn’t remember that year’s technique there was one action which always worked. Put out the drag chute. The drag chute was used to slow the aircraft down on the runway after landing, saving the wheel brakes. In a spin, the chute would snap the nose down, breaking the rotation. For a few seconds, the massive F-4 would be hanging vertically from the drag chute like the world’s largest and ugliest Christmas tree ornament. Then the airspeed would rapidly climb from zero and the chute would tear away in the wind stream. Back at the base, you had to explain to the maintenance troops why they needed to spring for a new drag chute. The operations people, the Squadron Commander, or the Operations Officer, would never criticize the use of the chute to recover from a spin. Better to lose a chute than an aircraft.
There was one control technique which always worked to prevent spin entry. At high AOA, you had to avoid the use of any aileron at all. By keeping the stick centered and rolling the aircraft with the rudder pedals spins seldom reared their twirly heads. That took some practice to learn. In the 1970’s the Phantom was retro-fitted with slats on the wings’ leading edges. These smoothed the air flow at high AOA and virtually eliminated adverse yaw. On a slatted F-4 you could actually roll the aircraft with the stick at slow airspeed and high AOA, just like a normal airplane. Why this modification wasn’t included in 1950s when the aircraft was first built is beyond me.
On the subject of bombing modes:
Per Gabby Drake in his interview radar dive toss was apparently completely useless, and everyone used direct in place of it. Once they could use the Pave Spike to get accurate ranges it was apparently much more useful. There are two places in the interview where he talks about it, but the later one is the easy one to find, I’ll add the initial one when I have a chance to listen to the whole thing again.
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