Storage tank drop question.
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Why would that matter? You’re saying “keep the fuel tanks, the airplane will go that fast with them.” Doesn’t matter, more drag, more fuel burn, less fuel margin.
Yes it matters, if you read Radium’s answer, which Blu3 did. Radium exposes a rare tactic that justifies keeping weapons (which?), and Blu3 argues that in this tactic, fuel tanks are not the limiters. So, yes, if it’s about bombs, which we’re not sure, it matters.
If this is just about flying with less drag, the speed difference with and without tanks, the need for fuel and the limits imposed by the rest of loadout will likely be in favor of keeping the tanks, unless you have a good example of the opposite (and actually not just one, to be honest).
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No point in keeping fuel tanks which are empty if maximum performance is required.
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Haha… If all you want is us to agree, nothing beats a truism in a trusim.
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Why would that matter? You’re saying “keep the fuel tanks, the airplane will go that fast with them.” Doesn’t matter, more drag, more fuel burn, less fuel margin.
Those last three lines are the key bit - in general, the fuel gained by keeping the tanks tends to outweigh the potential fuel savings by ditching the tanks.
Exceptions obviously exist, Operation Opera for example.
Spooky, distinguishing between the “concept” and the “idea” is not meaningful in English - perhaps this is something that has been lost in translation?
available to the public eye
At least in theory, this is what should limit all such discussions on this forum, from a rules perspective.
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Spooky, distinguishing between the “concept” and the “idea” is not meaningful in English - perhaps this is something that has been lost in translation?
It does !
A concept is a structured idea.
Cheers,
Radium
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fuel gained by keeping the tanks tends to outweigh the potential fuel savings by ditching the tanks.
The fuel tanks are empty. What is gained?
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The fuel tanks are empty. What is gained?
No idea if this is true, but my logic says that empty fuel tank can be reused. Either at AAR during flight (can you refuel your fuel tanks midair???) or back at home base. It’s a piece of equipment that you don’t need to replace with new one.
As I said, I have no idea if this is the way I look at it, just my two cents.
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My thoughts about jettison the fuel tanks.
If you are flying in peace time operations and you simulate an exercise obviously you don’t leave your tanks unless you have a potential flameout approach and generally when the emergency checklist dictates to leave them.
In war if you have 1000 tanks back to your home base and you don’t bother about extra time during ICT in order to load new tanks then you jettison the tanks as you wish. But if one of those two conditions (1. don’t have enough tanks or 2. you need to be back in the air with new weapons as soon as possible) are met then you may leave your tanks only for your survival (merge with hostile or fuel emergency) or for an extreme tactic(very high risk missions) that it should be briefed on the ground.
I think that in campaigns the number of tanks are limited but I am not sure about that.
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My thoughts about jettison the fuel tanks.
If you are flying in peace time operations and you simulate an exercise obviously you don’t leave your tanks unless you have a potential flameout approach and generally when the emergency checklist dictates to leave them.
In war if you have 1000 tanks back to your home base and you don’t bother about extra time during ICT in order to load new tanks then you jettison the tanks as you wish. But if one of those two conditions (1. don’t have enough tanks or 2. you need to be back in the air with new weapons as soon as possible) are met then you may leave your tanks only for your survival (merge with hostile or fuel emergency) or for an extreme tactic(very high risk missions) that it should be briefed on the ground.
I think that in campaigns the number of tanks are limited but I am not sure about that.
They are. Also, in BMS you can always do fancy things. It all depends how fancy you want to go. I sometimes happened to fly with people jettisoning because they thought they always jettisoned their tanks IRL. It was an opportunity to tell them this wasn’t the case.
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I guess the big question is, if you return to bas with stores are they ALL returned to inventory? If not, this whole exercise is moot…
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This is because you do not understand the concept nor the idea but because you focus on facts and the knowledge you have which is based on what you can read and that is available to the public eye. He was not talking about the F-16 as he said he is not sure the F-16 can do this.
It can, and has been done by the IAF.
The F-16 uses special logic when jettisoning fuel tanks to reduce collision chances -
No idea if this is true, but my logic says that empty fuel tank can be reused. Either at AAR during flight (can you refuel your fuel tanks midair???) or back at home base. It’s a piece of equipment that you don’t need to replace with new one.
Yes, it is possible to refuel the fuel tanks midair, provided they are depressurised.
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Of course fuel tanks are reused, both BMS and reality. 99% of the time this is what’s done in both. But jettisoning tanks does provide maximum performance for when that is the priority. It would be a shame to lose a war and your homeland over a couple $10,000 fuel tanks.
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In BMS, we should simply reduce by an amount of points or a factor the Pilot Score mission if he do not bring his WT back home. And if he overstress the jet (speed/G load) if he do not follow ATC instructions … etc …
In other words, giving a motivation to do things right and it rewards to pilot’s who cars about RL considerations. -
I want to drop my fuel storage tanks but not my bombs.
I go to the SMS page and highlight the fuel tank, an press the drop button on the left part of the cockpit.
But nothing happens, if I press it again, I drop my fuel tank as well as my bombs (which I didn’t want to do)
So how do you drop your fuel tanks and keep your bombs during a mission flight.
Jack, I’m curious what jet you’re flying, what is the mission/target, and what’s your ordinance? All are important in answering the question of whether or not to drop tanks.