The 33 is getting some love!

This was my experience last night as well. Straight and level it was easy to get on the hose. In a turn it was difficult to get on, but once I was on it was ok. Well … until I was getting tired and then I was starting to lose it everywhere :slight_smile:

I will take a look at the video I recorded but on that last mission, if I looked at the F-10 map it was only once :-). I was lucky because my flight lead was navigating in the En-Route mode freeing me up to go into the BVR mode and try to keep an eye on the picture my radar was drawing for me. Unfortunately I do not know the symbology but I was able to make some educated guesses. That and with @near_blind providing escort and keeping the fighters busy meant that I didn’t have to panic quiet so much (as usual) :slight_smile:

Great info being shared here guys, especially about the FOD fences, wheel brake start, and refueling.

Most likely this will be filed in the dumb question folder, but for me it was hit or miss with the tailhook. In particular, I’m wondering why it wouldn’t deploy at airspeeds seemingly fine for flaps/undercarriage. Do you wait for a specific airspeed to drop the hook, or toggle and it will deploy when it’s good and ready? I did manage a trap after one missed approach.

Also, what are you guys using for landing configuration and airspeed? The Su seems happiest with flaps and speedbrake deployed at between 240 and 260, but this is all seat of the pants. What’s the correct aircraft configuration and even better, what does the proper pattern for the boat look like? This thing is so much taller/wider than the Hornet.

1 Like

It seems to me (trial and error) that the tail hook can only change state when the wheels are down. Not sure if that is a bug or intended design but there it is. So if you have it down and raise the wheels, it seems to stay down. When I lowered my wheels, I was able to pull the hook up and then raise the gear.

Also, there was some talk about how the tail hook seems to work, or doesn’t seem to work. I watched a few passes by @near_blind and @boomerang10 last night and noticed this:

  • it seems that if you ‘taxi to the wire’ (ie: touchdown point is before the wires) then the tail hook does not snag the wires. The code seems to take the touchdown point as the determining factor for deciding if a wire is grabbed or not. If you land short, even though your roll-out smooth and over the wires, they will not snag. Though I have a limited sample size for this I did see both near_blind and boomerang have some nice, smooth touchdowns just in front of the wire-box, with a nice smooth roll-out over the wires, that did not result in an expected arrested landing;
  • exception: if you bounce short and then into the wire-box (ie: second touchdown point in the wire box), you can snag a wire :slight_smile: ;
1 Like

My take on smokinhole’s mission.

Still have to train a bit, I lost much altitude at the first landing approach. I need to get used to that Russian ILS circle in circle thingie. :wink:

@Fridge - it seems that I was able to deploy the hook just fine before I dropped my gear.

Holy crap, I just saw this on youtube.

I still have lot to learn …

2 Likes

The hook can’t receive hydraulic power when the gear isn’t down. It even goes so far that if you’re raising the hook after bolting, and then start pulling in the gear, the hook will lose power and start to drop back down. This is in accordance with the manual, so it seems to be correct behaviour.

4 Likes

OK, thanks for that clarification. I see the doc DCS FC3 Flight Manual EN.pdf from 2015, but couldn’t find info on the tailhook. Maybe ED will publish a carrier ops doc once the dust settles. The Su-33 sure is nice in VR!

here’s the new manual! Uploaded it there, to big for the mudspike servers unfortunatly. 147 pages of goodness, but not to much info on procedures like carrier landings unfortunatly.

2 Likes

This isn’t optimal, but it’s also doesn’t strike me as bad. A Proper landing should have the tailhook touch down between the second and third wires. Touching down well short of the one wire like we were last night is frankly unsafe.

There are reasons it kept happening: the FLOLS is basically discernible past 300 kilometers, and while I could be ignorant of Russian CV ops and/or misinterpreting the display, the ILS seems to be setting an awfully shallow wire. Hopefully with the new model some of this will be sorted out, I have half a mind to experiment with the FLOLS equipped CVN-77 mod though.

The jet itself is also interesting to land: it’s like the avionics of an F-4 in a jet with the FCS of a hornet and the aerodynamics of an F-14 with hot air balloons attached. My approach was inevitably borked whenever I got low. It’s easy enough to add power back, but anything above 240 knots and the aircraft just floats and there’s no reliable way to kill that trend except bunting the nose over a little, which is a massive no-no behind the boat.
I’m curious how this will stack up to the F-14, which had similar issues that lead to the development of lift killing spoilers by the prototype phase.

2 Likes

Thanks. That looks like he was 500 kph / 200 mtrs at the break, then the the downwind leg a little bit longer than USN, ~ just passed 45 degrees, but had a bolter. On his second attempt he was 350/500 turning onto base at the same point, and 300 / 150 beginning final. He held that (more or less) until established on GS and 280 kph (151 kn) to the deck. Flaps/hook/no speedbrake.

Thanks @smokinhole - that helps, as in confirms what I thought I was seeing.

I use the extra (new with PFM I think) autothrust setting together with the refueling probe autopilot mode but to be honest it probably makes me lazy with throttle control and I trying to wean off of it. I also tend to do most carrier approaches with it on, and it would be better to if I used the AOA for speed, just to get my pitch right manually. I am landing pretty much ok now (with my ‘go a tad long’ aimpoint) and thinking it might be time to try some night / weather landings (assuming the ship goes straight into the wind).

I’m not sure if it was deliberate or just happenstance, but the Su-33 PFM release timing has really amplified my F/A-18 fever. What with AV-8B and F-14 as well, I do hope we get some updated ships this year.

Yep, didn’t want to imply you were staring at it, more that it would have been smart if I had remembered just to do a basic reccy of it the once before we took off. Due to being in VR all the time (I’ve not done the Su-33 without it yet, just as sort of sadistic experiment) then picking up ground targets is sometimes hard. VR helps with landings, refueling, but pixel dots it’s like wearing a scarf over my face. To offset that I can use the F10 as a sort of ‘satellite photo recon briefing tool’ before setting out on a mission, and that would have helped a lot to get my bearings.

He did ok until those manpads mansplained to him not to fly slow at 1500m with no countermeasures. :slight_smile: I had no mission plan worked out in my head, which made it all ugly.

In NOC (landing) mode the calculated airspeed for a safe landing at your weight (< 55,000 lb ish) is shown in the top left. of the HUD (above your airspeed). It does typically be between 240-280.

For procedures, we were chatting to @near_blind last night about this and to follow the USN/NATO way it seems like to get dirty with gear/flaps/hook on the upwind turn at about 4km, which then gives time to lose some speed and settle into AoA. The FLOLS / meatball would be really good to have (I’m guessing about < 2 km to make the call) but it’s not there as yet.

2 Likes

More specifically I’m using a real quick and dirty translation of what I remember from the daylight overhead.

Pattern entry paralleling the carrier at 500 km/h and 280 meters. Dirty the jet up on the transition to downwind while descending to 200 meters and slowing to on-speed. Establish on speed during the downwind, and then begin the turn onto final once I cross an imaginary line extending perpendicular to the stern of the carrier. From there it’s all stick and throttle work to try and make things happen.

4 Likes

One thing I have found to be helpful is the big white dot painted on the deck in the middle of the wires. By slicing it with the bottom of the HUD after the ILS brings me within 100 meters of the fantail catches the 3-wire MOST of the time.

4 Likes

Anyone found any decent SP missions for the new SU-33 D? I’m having addiction withdrawal symptoms. :slight_smile:

I read that a lot of existing campaigns and mission sets will get AI pilot issues, in that even though AI doesn’t use the new PFM, it does cause issues with take off weight etc?

Any plans for new content in this area @Baltic_Dragon? :slight_smile:

1 Like

So you’re saying to hold off on the existing single and training missions for now?

I’d read on the ED forum that a lot of the existing missions will need to be tweaked. Plan on finding out tonight (if no-one is on Mudspike teamspeak PST time later tonight for more MP - I feel bad keeping people up late at night who don’t live on the left coast):slight_smile:) and will report back what I find.

I’m planning on doing the same.

We settled on the following procedure on the deck:

  1. Check on comms for ability to spawn;
  2. Spawn;
  3. Fold wings and taxi to the island;
  4. Reload and re-arm as per the mission you want to fly;
  5. Call taxi to the long takeoff spot;
  6. Grill in, brakes on, up to AB and flight the WEP switch;
  7. Hold on, then clean up the aircraft on climbout;

Have fun!

4 Likes

Thanks Fridge. Question on the sequence for using Wheel Brake Start please. Do you hold toe brakes, hit LSHFT+W, run up engines, then release brakes? Or some other variation? Thanks.

That’s what I do … but I tend to be a little lighter on fuel than I have to be (instead of struggling off the ramp and washing my gear before I climb :slight_smile: ). I have seen people say to add WEP after burner but I am not sure if that changes anything.

1 Like