Mission 5 aar is sooooo harrrrddddd
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OK, so struggling with this one too. From time to time, I have had to run a carrier trap just to get some self-esteem back. This is hard!
I did watch oakdesign’s video, thankyou for that one. I can also obtain and fly formation with the tanker for maybe 30 seconds but tend to start bouncing around a bit, so a few questions for the masters, please:
I have been able to maintain a short Contact and I am wondering if my stick is too poor for this fine precision exercise? It’s a Logitech Extreme 3D Pro, but I have a good Virpil throttle.
The aircraft in the training TE is finely trimmed, so if I pitch up and let go of the stick, should it not eventually revert back to flying level again?
Another thing I found, once I get into the jetstream blowdryer behind the tanker, I struggle a lot with ending up both too low and offset to the boom. How on earth does eg. oakdesign manage to avoid that, is that by floating down from the left wing?
Cheers,
jayBHi there, i hope that i will be able to help you out.
The main issue is that most of us didn’t go trough the training those guys have to endure. They have been trained to fly formation and already have good formation skills when they get to the AAR refueling part. I remember one time i was flying with a trainee on my wing and I watched him trying to fly formation of me. He was holding steady for a few seconds then he was moving up and down and he was foghorn hard to hold a good position. At some point i asked him to turn his HUD Off. He was immediately steady.
Main reason behind this was that like most of us we fly the numbers. Try and fly in reference to the picture you see. Formation flying is visual, I know it sounds obvious but if you repeat it to yourself you will realize that everything you need to fly formation is outside the cockpit. Is the plane I try to fly formation of climbing ? If he is climbing then it means i need to climb and add a bit of power. Am I overtaking him ? If yes then I need to reduce speed, but slowly, proportional to the amount of correction I need to make.
Input, observe, input and do it again. Take your time and relax. Once you are used to the picture you want to hold you can now watch your hud for reference. Again, fly of the picture you want to hold and reference the HUD for gross values. When you feel like you had too much, take spacing and breathe. Then get a bit closer until you are comfortable.
It takes time and practice and also you need to understand the inputs you are giving.
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Well resumed by Canuck .
Jayb ,if I may dare a little off-topic suggestion : Try to fly a bit of helicopter sims (or IRL, if you are lucky enough !!!).
I see you all laughing, but you really shouldn’t : This give you the best training to evaluate distances , in all dimensions, as well as closure rate .
Do it in parallel with your AAR training in the Viper and you will quickly observe a huge improvement of your formation skills .Very good for dogfights too , and for very short landings .It will become a 2nd nature .
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Thanks Canuck, lolo much appreciated.
I have definitely fared better the less HUD info is on display, I will try and turn off the entire thing. I also found yesterday that it is better for me to correct one thing at a time, so if I am offset on azimuth and also too low, solve one first then the other. I prefer to solve the altitude and then crab in horizontally. Now it sounds like I am good at this, I am not, but my early attempts were really bad - this new idea has led to me having more control.
I took on oakdesigns rule of thumb about only adjusting +/- 200 lbs of fuel flow, that seemed to work fine for the config in the training TE. One issue I found is that if I take just a little too much throttle off, soon enough I end up behind in that darn jetwash again getting bounced around and losing my approach even more.
For me especially obtaining the proper altitude is hard because even 0.5 degree pitch means bouncing many feet up or down close up to the tanker. So that was why I was wondering if my stick is simply too bad for this. I could play with curves in the pitch direction in the config, I suppose (feature of U1 patch).
Also, to stabilise the altitude would it be heresy (or just pointless) to fix the altitude with the autopilot? I noticed that turns off when the aerial fuel door is open, but up till that moment perhaps it could be helpful. Any thoughts on using the AP ?
Lolo, as extra curriculum I might just dust off the old Arma3 to get some chopper going
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Imho, I don’t think that playing with the curves will help you. BMS has allready curves iirc, so putting curves on top of curves without a well thought of reason doesn’t seem like a good idea to me.
I think the AP won’t help you either.
I think the only thing that will help is practice.
When I decided that I wanted to learn aerial refueling I did the training mission every day. I really sucked bad. Many tanker crews died.
After about 2 weeks of daily practice it got better and I could connect to the boom most of the time. Only in the straight legs and I didn’t stay connected very long, but it’s was a beginning.
So i kept practicing.
I still suck at refueling, but it’s getting better. My formation flying improved a lot, and a few weeks ago I even connected and refueled in the turn.
So just relax, wiggle your toes and keep practicing!
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AP doesn’t work for formation flying. You’ll find out pretty soon.
Ninja’d.
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Any thoughts on using the AP ?
Personnally , not particularly fond of this … Why ?
I think the AP won’t help you either.
AP doesn’t work for formation flying. You’ll find out pretty soon.
Because , if you turn the AP ''on" , it will mask all the corrections of throttle/trim you could have made(your plane could make a big bump suddenly when turning off the AP , plus it could make you lose some precious seconds if you have to react quickly for any reason(e.g incoming missile , wingman suddenly going crazy or whatever…)
obtaining the proper altitude is hard because even 0.5 degree pitch means bouncing many feet up or down close up to the tanker.
True . That’s why , as being said by the other pilots (in a different way) : Be (very)smooth , be (very)gentle , relax ! .
I also found yesterday that it is better for me to correct one thing at a time
And you are doing right , to start with this training . With some practice , you will soon begin to anticipate and you’ll do 2 things at once without noticing it .
That’s why I talked to you about chopper driving : the same principles applies there , but are even more critical .
If you open , even a bit ,your throttle , the speed will increase, soon or later , leading eventually to a slight gain of altitude . So , when close to the tanker , it’s better to play with very slight speed adjustments(assuming you are lined up with the tanker) : the plane will smoothly go up ; As you said , direct pitch correction can be to too violent if you aren’t used to play the game.
An alternative way to pitch efficiently close to the tanker can be to use the trim up or down (but be careful of the correction of speed!)
A simple rule : I want to go up = More throttle= be prepared to trim down a bit to correct the move.
I wanna go down = Less throttle = be prepared to trim up a bit to correct. Banking to the left or right ? You might lose some speed , so be prepared to put a tiny bit more throttle and to trim up or down to correct (depends of the qty of energy you lost)…
Once you’ll be used to this , you will be able to invert the maneuver to do things more quicly : I wanna go up ? = I pitch up while instantly correcting the loss of speed with more throttle(anticipation) .
The aircraft in the training TE is finely trimmed, so if I pitch up and let go of the stick, should it not eventually revert back to flying level again?
Nope : pitching up(without correcting with the throttles) = You will break your speed = the plane will want eventually to go down = you are good for a bit of “Yo-Yo” flying experience: it could be fun if you weren’t supposed to connect to the boom …
As said in the other post and as you noticed, don’t look your HUD , all the process should be done visually : your eyes will tell you all that you need (closure rate , aspect of the tanker , altitude of the tanker relative to yours) .
Gl !
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My 2 cents:
Personally my problem is with the longitudinal axis (fore-aft). Just so damn hard to get the right throttle setting. Either i overshoot or need to catch up. Having a good throttle controller definitively helps. You can’t do it with a sticky one.Second, extending air brakes can help during training!
Because it makes throttle input less prone to overshooting.
Especially in the clean configuration in TE5.Fact is i made my first successful AAR two days ago with a freshly greased TWCS throttle and extended air brakes.
Now working on reducing the air braking. :?
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Throttle control is difficult because it takes the engine a few seconds to react. So I try to keep the corrections very small, and as soon as the plane starts to react, I try to put the throttle back to where it started.
A very useful tip I learned from Oakdesign is to look at the Fuel Flow Indicator to judge your throttle settings.
Goes like this: When flying formation with the Tanker before Contact at around 300kts, check your Fuel Flow Indicator. Depending on your loadout/weight your fuel flow will be around 4400 ish. If you increase the throttle your fuel flow will rise and you will close up to the tanker. If you put your throttle back to the original fuel flow number, your plane should settle at 300kts.
Watching your fuel flow gives you a more immediate response to your throttle settings, as fuel flow rises way quicker than engine rpm and speed. And it gives you a reference point for your throttle position whether you are accelerating or decelerating towards the tanker.
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I never look at perfect fuel flow setting or try to find the “right throttle setting,” because there is none. Once I got that spurious idea out of my head tanking was so much easier. It just requires constant micro back and forth of the throttle and sometimes often micro inputs on stick. Just settle in and slowly adjust. Push stick forward then back in small bursts of thrust until you hook up. Watch the lights and adjust accordingly. It is a knack and once you get it, it is not so hard. No air brakes either.
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My 2 cents:
Personally my problem is with the longitudinal axis (fore-aft). Just so damn hard to get the right throttle setting. Either i overshoot or need to catch up. Having a good throttle controller definitively helps. You can’t do it with a sticky one.Now working on reducing the air braking. :?
Forget about finding that sweet throttle setting that lets you hook up and you keep it there for the entire duration. As soon as fuel flows, your plane gets heavier, requiring just a tiny bit more throttle, the tanker speed may vary by a few knots and whatnot.
you’ll need to make constant (although tiny) throttle adjustments the entire time while being hooked up to the tanker. When I still used the HOTAS Cougar I got so frustrated after many failed attempts that I started see-sawing the throttle just for the heck of it, and lo and behold suddenly it was much easier to control my speed w/r to the tanker.
Whle the amount of “see-sawing” on the Warthog I use now is much smaller, still constant (hehe :)) adjustments are required, both with stick and throttle simultaneously. Once you get the hang of it it’ll feel like riding a bike and you’ll wonder how you ever had so much trouble hitting pre-contact (depending on your beer level, of course :))
Most importantly, relax.
All the best, Uwe
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Alright, I have just come off with a full tank!! Yay! Was it pretty? No. Did I get gas? Yes!
Phew, where do I start. As Logic mentions, the speed to catch the tanker: That is a double-edged sword which I had to figure out. I spent far too much time behind the tanker getting bounced around by the jetwash. On one hand speed needs to be high enough to fight thru the jetwash, so say 310, but as soon as I get close enough the jetwash is gone and the speed is now much too high to stabilize behind the boom. I tried applying brakes briefly, but that would send me down to 295 or so, back into the jetwash again. In stead, I took a page from oakdesigns book where he actually kills the throttle to idle, this turned out to be enough to go from 310 to 301 in those few feet of overtake. Of course, the trick then becomes to bring the throttle right back up from idle to the sweet spot of 300-301 again. Here, fuel flow is useful as a reference, but I found myself glancing too much on that, briefly losing sight of the tanker. I was cursing myself for not turning up engine sound louder at that stage. In stead felt the throttle position at 310 and got a feel for “a little less than that”.
As for my throttle it is ok quality, but even though I have set the idle cutoff at right before bottom placement, I find it strange that the idle (fuel flow of ~900) is in the middle of the throw, so I only have half an “arc” of movement for the actual speed management above idle. Is that a setting somewhere, because I noticed in the F-18 the full range of motion affects the rpm?
hoover, your point about minute throttle movement is well taken, what I noticed was that the corrections I had to do while connected were mostly stick. But minute ones to constantly have the yellow line centered. At one point did I have to go forward a bit so a slight tap on the throttle was enough. Perhaps that changes with loadout? I flew the clean jet in the AAR TE (mission 5) and it was very stable once under the tanker and hooked up. As for what Icarus mentions, the back and forth of the throttle I need to get a better feel for. I tend to move the throttle forward and then back by too much losing speed as a result.
Another thing I found useful was to use a throttle button for fuel door, so I did not have to look away from the tanker at any point.
So I will study this some more, try the heavy jet too. It was very encouraging for me to read StevieG’s post about training regularly. In fact, this last week I have had somewhat that mindset almost like homework and it has helped me. When I get even better at this, I will try some of lolo’s suggestions with hitting two moving targets at once, throttle+stick at the same time, throttle to compensate for altitude lost due to stick, that is graduate school material but I hope I will get there. I have also enrolled in the Falcon Lounge starter school, to maintain my own discipline about this.
Thanks again for all input, see you in the skies!
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throttle+stick at the same time
Beware ! Not always really at the same time( I was always talking about anticipation) !!! Gradually !And very close to a tanker: forget it !! , as everyone said we need to be gentle . All the contrary of the true “Throttle +stick” !
I am realizing that throttle + stick is hard to explain (at least in BMS , I’m only a sim fighter pilot) ….
Try a Su-33 in BMS and do a AAR (the tanker is here only a good visual reference ) or fly formation : set the AI at low speed… then fly with high AOA from a constant but higher speed(higher speed gap between planes=higher AOA for your exercice, so more corrections with your throttle) , and (try to)maintain alt . Then, nose down (i mean “flat” , sorry for my confused english) , while trying to maintain your alt the best (the longest) you can .Rejoin the AI then repeat . Aim for this result, the Sukhoi is powerful enough for this practice and is 100% forgiving, whatever you do you know you won’t stall . Try this exercise and you are done in all cases, for example maintaining steady and close formation.
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Nicely done, jayb! :mrgreen:
That first time on the boom is hugely satisfying. And you’ll continue to derive satisfaction as you get better.
“In fact, this last week I have had somewhat that mindset almost like homework and it has helped me.” … that is a great mindset to have! Determination and discipline are getting you there… and will continue to do so
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As for the jetwash, maybe you’re approaching the tanker too high? It’s fine to fly level while waiting for your refuelling spot, but behind the tanker when going for pre-contact you should stay slightly below (put the gun cross on the end of the boom or thereabouts).
Cheers, Uwe
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I spent many hours with AAR. What helped me most, at least in the beginning, was to turn off the hud. This forced me to develop a feel for speed, altitude and direction. I sounds counter-intuitive but it worked, at least for me.
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I spent many hours with AAR. What helped me most, at least in the beginning, was to turn off the hud. This forced me to develop a feel for speed, altitude and direction. I sounds counter-intuitive but it worked, at least for me.
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+1
Also, start by approaching off the tanker’s wing, in formation. When you are confortable there, then move to the boom pre-contact.
Easier to learn formation on the wing rather than behind -
Yes, thanks - formation, formation, formation That is now my curriculum for the next couple of training sessions - off the wing and with no or minimal HUD. That - and a trick for fine-tuning my vertical position that I thought about today while out running (which may or may not work, let’s see).
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My tip would be to use the snap pit, not 3D with TrackIr, when refuelling. It gives you a steady frame of reference vs the tanker and helps you build the image you so need to get into the right position. All the other tips are valid too: relax, gentle on the controls and practice.
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That’s a good point, i have noticed in videos that some turn off trackir up close with the tanker