I noticed yesterday when I tried to continue my Hornet mini-campaign playthrough that DUD was displayed on my HUD (or was it DDI) and CCIP was crossed out and I couldn’t drop my MK-84s (it was a mission where you need to take out that camp while being harassed by MIG-29s). I have to say I was pleasently surprised when despite being unable to drop my bombs I ordered my wingman to engage mission objective and he decimated that compound all by himself. I finally have passed that mission. I took different tactic this time though - instead of trying to engage the MIGs I just ingressed tree top level @ 500+ kts, popped up near WP3, ordered WM to attack, got back in the bush and egressed the same way I came in. Both me and my wingman unscathed! And I even trapped at the first try
I’ve been having similar issues, especially if the aircraft is loaded at the start of the mission and you change weapons, your old weapons stay in the stores page and really seem to throw the aircraft.
DUD cue means different things for different weapons. In the case of a GP bomb like the Mk-80 series and their guided derivatives this means that you’re altitude and descent rate are such that if you dropped the bomb now, you would be unable to escape the frag pattern with a standard escape maneuver (4G pull to the horizon). In such a case that would mean you have a >0 chance of blowing yourself up, and because the Navy thinks getting you and the jet back home safely is a more important concept then killing the target, the F/A-18 will automatically safe the fusing of the weapon in such a scenario (I.E it will be a DUD).
Now, the DUD cue should be dynamic. A Mk-82 Hi Drag has different frag parameters than a slick -82, which is smaller than an -83 or 84. My understanding is it’s a canned value at the moment, and doesn’t change per bomb, and is something they are working on.
Interesting…I wonder if this means they are going to go a similar direction as the Harrier in terms of alignment options and using the data cable when on the ship.
I think they could release with the older FLIR, but I think they want it to be the test bed for the new renderer, so it will wait on that. I think its in work currently, so not as bad as it could sound.
A little good-news update to pass along regarding the targeting pod for the Hornet. As many of you are aware, USMC Hornets fly with the AN/AAQ-28 Litening targeting pod when deployed from airfields. This is the same TGP used for our A-10C. As such, we now plan to first introduce the Litening pod to the Hornet prior to the AN/ASQ-228 ATFLIR pod. This will allow a more complete selection of targeting pod options (can also be used for other countries like Spain of course), but also allow us to introduce a targeting pod into the project sooner than we had originally expected.
Excellent! Why the change/addition, though? Also, will we be able to employ it on the cheek station or will we be restricted to the centerline and inboard pylons?
They’re more or less equivalent judging from a relatively recent assessment by the USMC, irl the litening is not carrier capable, maybe it is over-Gd more easily or hates salt water or something…
I did some reading yesterday, ATFLIR is supposed to have more magnification to suit the higher altitudes of the Hornet.
I ended up looking at all the pods - ATFLIR, Litening and Sniper. Litening is apparently a bit easy to work with, and more reliable, but doesn’t have the range.
One of the pods (I’ll try to find the article again) had issue with using sort of ram air like power source which would be susceptible to salt water intake on a carrier. I think it was the Litening. Again, I’ll find the article again and edit this post as needed. The others were powered from the carrying plane, so no issue.
That’d be LITENING as it has an inlet (see pictures above). Seems kind of moot though considering that the LITENING is used by Harriers and they operate from amphib carriers.
For our purposes, the ATFLIR will probably work better in the strike role, while LITENING will be better for CAS.
It seems a lot of you had fun with the “Valley Run” mission, but it’s not much of a challenge. Let’s try something a bit more skill-based? Attached is a “River Run” challenge mission that requires you to make it through all the gates in less than 345 seconds. Unlike the Valley Run, you can’t just firewall the throttles, you’ll have to manage airspeed to stay as fast as possible, while slow enough to make some of the turns.