Climb schedule makes a big difference. I’m wondering on different techniques folks will use to reach max alt…
USAF would like its toy in one piece. 
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What if it’s fused to a single mass, in one crater…?
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30,675 ft or so (circa 9350m) and back in 4:59…I assume that later engine shutdown is just me pulling the throttle back and the ‘afterburner’ engine being ‘shut down’, as I definitely ran out of juice on the uphill!
I took off without A/B, flew level until accelerated to M0.55 or so, engaged 2 stages A/B, got up to M0.6 and did a 3G pull up to 80-something degrees pitch with 3 stages A/B, climbed until flameout.
Returned with full airbrakes, gear out and shuttle deceleration-style jinks to keep speed between 300 and 400 kmh all the way to threshold.
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First, and only (Scouts Honor) attempt…
“Ok, on three, go…THREE!”
Made it FL485+
In my defense, had there been a cable/Rabbit-Catcher (at either end) I’d have done a lot less damage. Been a few months since I ran the Viper - sucker didn’t want to slow down!
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I was just thinking - there seems to be two different optimum profiles here, depending on the goal:
Profile 1: Go as high as you can, run out of fuel and perform a dead stick landing as fast as possible - speed being the winning factor:
- If the main winning variable is time and out of two equal landing times the higher max altitude wins, then I think you end up having full A/B on from the start of the runway until flameout and find the best full AB climbing profile and the fastest possible descent profile (probably with some kind of high-G speed bleed at RW threshold).
Profile 2: Go as high as you can, run out of fuel and perform a dead stick landing as fast as possible - altitude being the winning factor:
- If the main variable is altitude and time is secondary i.e. out of two equal highest altitudes the faster one to land wins, then you end up trying to find the most efficient climb profile for 1000 lbs of fuel and the fastest descent profile possible (same as Profile 1). In the Viggen, the full AB consumes 7 times the fuel as full military (specific fuel consumption 8.253kg/sec vs 1.167kg/sec ) so there’s likely to be a level acceleration phase or phases where military power is better.
These are slightly disjointed thoughts and I realise I’m not comparing apples with apples as I am stubbornly insisting on flying the Viggen…but I hope my point comes across.
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I’ve been thinking on how to score this challenge. Weight of altitude vs time points.
I’m not math inclined, but using standard normal distribution and z-score would probably where I attack this challenge. Creating excel formula and populating to make scoring easier.
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So trying to figure out a way to score, I’ve created excel calculator by using standard deviations with standard normal distribution and z score. I’ve given %50 to time penalty over altitude. U = 450 for alt and 4:30 for time.
Using my best = 97.1
@BeachAV8R = 65.7 (and then disqualified for no deadstick)
@Bloodreina = 63.0
@Bearhedge = 19.8 (and wrong plane)
score_calculator.zip (6.7 KB)
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That score is unacceptable. Do I get another try?
Of course. As many as you want.
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Excellent - I get to learn from you, then!
I skimmed through a few articles to try and find how one goes about optimizing a time-to-altitude profile, but I think it is a bit beyond my maths / physics ability - especially with the added complexity of trying to do it with very limited fuel.
I did find the most economical Mach values for each km of altitude up to 10 km altitude from the manual and thought I could try and see if I could maintain those as high as possible…but those are for cruise, so unsure whether they are relevant or not.
I read some interesting stuff about Specific Excess Power too, which I think must be relevant for the climb profile but I don’t know how to work it all out yet.
The Viggen’s specs are also a bit different to the F-16: take off weight at 454 kg fuel is 11,113 kg vs. F-16’s 9390 kg, Viggen’s thrust is 115.6 kN vs. F-16’s 129kN.
Both points are added, but value of time points are %50 less.
I’ve created a mean (average) of FL450 and any standard deviation (+ about 8k) to the right gives you points. To the left reducines points. If you reach 3 standard deviations = max points for altitude. Same concept for time factor. Mean is 4 min and 30 seconds. Z value is 1 minute. Anything below mean by standard deviations gives you max points. But that score is reduced by %50 and then added to altitude score.
So if you have FL450 and 4 min and 30 seconds = total score is 75 points (50 points for altitude and 25 for time).
Hopefully explanation was clear as mud.
do this from Caucasus, too, but (IIRC) all the airfields there are lower elevation than Creech
Elevation difference is 2618 between those fields. I guess logical choice is forks at Cacucas add that value to their score. Not sure what to do (deduct) about time.
1kTo555k_offangle_cauc.trk (2.3 MB)
Revealing almost all of my techniques here. I can probably go a little higher.
FL555 (+26 = FL581 = 100.0 points)
Total time: 5 min 41 seconds.
Track on current stable version.
You haven’t removed the pylons so it’s not fully sleek streek. You can download my mission in the first post. Everything there is set.
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I think that’s the magical technique. Fuel burn at low atmosphere is so much higher.
That’s probably a next challenge.
Very nice! Congrats and thanks for participating! 
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First of all, a very fun challenge! A good way to have some quick fun in DCS 
I wanted to note that in DCS, pylon presence (on both the hornet and the viper) does not matter for performance. You can remove them for viewing pleasure, but for all calculations it is counted as if they are always there. ED said they did so because they consider this to be a combat sim and only focussed on the capabilities in combat configuration.
I do not have the mathematical prowess @Sine_Nomine has, (I still remember his fantastic and much appreciated assistance with explaining and calculating FLEX on the A320!) but I did devise a bit of a wet-finger tactic to complete this challenge. My idea was to immediately climb at circa 10 degrees of pitch to produce an appreciable level of climb to get away from the thickest air while building speed to a number close below mach to avoid trans- and supersonic levels of drag. I would then raise the nose to maintain a high subsonic number in the climb but still try to maintain a pitch level so that the wings produce an appreciable vertical component of lift, guessed to be around the 55-60 degrees of pitch level. I’d climb until I would stall. Then, I would put the nose down vertically and immediately pop out the brakes. Since I still expected to accelerate to an appreciable IAS, the brakes, which perform as a function of speed, could kill the most mechanical energy as possible. approaching the ground I would zoom-extend back to the base, allowing the brakes to kill more kinetic energy in the nice and thick air before touching down. Let’s see how that goes!
Climb out with the FPM on the 10 degree mark, accelerating to just over mach 0.8. I’m slightly over 5000ft when I put the nose up.
Put the nose up to 55-60 degrees. I under-estimated the rate of acceleration in this ultra-light viper and end up touching M1.02. Still going strong, though.
I stalled and somewhat lost control at 51509 feet. I quickly regain the control and put the nose down. I took a second for the hydrazine to kick in, though. And with all the tumbling I did while the jet was completely off-line, the INS went completely FUBAR
The nose-down part of the leg. Despite the brakes out, I broke the mach when going down.
The zooming back home part. The thick air slows me down nice and quickly.
Luckily, tacview doesn’t show you this. But I did another underestimation, this time for the gear extension time. It just barely fully deployed before I touched the runway. Remember that when touching the ground, give another speedbrake extension command in order to extend them fully! (the jet does this to prevent ground striking the brakes)
Fully stopped at 4:20
Plunging in 515 for altitude in Excel, and a total flight time of 4 minutes and 6 seconds (debrief noted my T/O time as 0:14) I get a score of 111,09
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Thanks for the kind words, Cygon!
I think your tactic has merit and that you had good results! My gut feeling is that 210 KCAS is a bit on the far high-end of the L/D spectrum, but it’s hard to judge for me at those altitudes, maybe you’re closer than I think! I’d be curious what sort of results you would get if you would do more attempts. But it has to be entertainable for you as well. Otherwise, I’m out of luck
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" Sryan Contest Winner"
I love the tag. For that score you’re the winner. Congrats. Nice job.
I can make it higher, but it will take longer. I’ve tried many different climb profiles…lol.
Thanks for playing.
Some folks on ED forums played this challenge. One guy says he got 120 points.
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