Heatblur F-14 and Forrestal Update

Geez, you are expecting a little much from the pilots! How can you expect them to pay that much attention to the plebs walking around?! :wink:

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It’s even better at night when the deck is rolling, talk about disorienting.

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Oh man, that deck appearing at the end there - terrifying/cool. :mudspike:

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I rate :jenneke: / :jenneke:

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I can’t remember what book it was that described the terror of taxiing around the deck. Might have been that Jay Stout book (Hornets Over Kuwait) or Ironclaw
but they were talking about how the forward part of the jet would be overhanging the dark ocean below as they were making the turn and being terrified they’d go plunging off the side. Nightmare fuel.

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And all I know is that multiplayer with a Hornet and F-14s on a carrier deck with pilots moving their jets around and cat shots and traps is gonna be the coolest thing we’ve seen since
well
pretty much ever.

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I’m pretty sure that was Ironclaw- I remember the same passage.

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It might have been him that also described the tension of night tanking as well
 That was a great book, gonna have to dig it out prior to the Hornet release


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I remember him talking about how hard it was to hook up to a KC-135 with a drogue on the end of the boom- I wonder if we’ll ever get more accurate simulation of that (I’m ok with us NOT, for the record).

According to a childhood friend of mine who’s a boom on -135’s, the Prowler crews were their most polite customers.

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Is there any sim that has “rag doll” physics for any objects within? Seems like a probe and drogue would be a good fit for that. No doubt easier said than done.

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The DCS helo sling load has some very nice elasticity calcs going on. Two+ body fluid calculations are expensive to get done in time though.

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I’ve so far only tanked off Omega and the ARS pod but I’ve heard the 135 isn’t fun. I’m not sure how you’d model that though in the sim. I suppose you could decrease the likelihood of a successful plug and increase the probability of it smacking and failing your AOA probe.

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They could completely screw everyone and model it so unless you get the Hose on the -135 right (what’s it called? the knuckle?), fuel won’t flow. Hell, I think I’d almost prefer the current solution of sticking the probe up the flying boom.

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Iron Maiden

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The iron maiden’s the drogue. My understanding was there was a separate quirk to how the -135’s hose was set up that you had to get the hose in a specific shape before it would begin transferring.

The left engine has to be in afterburner or we’ll fall out of the basket because the tanker will be going so fast and our TF-30 engines are a little underpowered for big-wing tanking. Modulate the right throttle to control closure and to stay in the basket. When you ‘hit it’ you’ll need to drop down and to the left slightly to turn the hose leading to the basket to your 1 o’clock position on the canopy. If you don’t make it look like the ‘knuckle’ on your right index finger when it’s bent, we won’t get any fuel.

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Obviously they also need to implement the terrible autopilot on the -135. The thing porpoises up and down a couple of hundred feet when it’s level autopilot is engaged. Every -135 I’ve refueled on does it, some are worse than others. And ya it’s about as terrifying as you might think. You are trying to hook up and all of a sudden you reach the top of the porpoise, and the -135 suddenly descends down into you.
Combined with the terrible lighting on the -135 and it makes night tanking on them rather exciting.

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It’s a natural defense mechanism of a wild KC-135. Even the tamed once sometimes display it.

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The part of me that is incapable of having fun would like to point out that Tomcats shouldn’t be this shiny, in fact a combination of the TPS paint scheme and the dirtiness inherent in operations would conspire to make them quite dull looking.

The rest of me would point out good gawd so shiny.

I rate 9.999/10, Kaylee approved.

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OMG! LOVELY! Thanks for sharing

Goshdarnit it’s amazing