If I hate my EDTracker
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Again, I’ve never had a seat in a real Viper pit, and won’t come anywhere even close until I get mine built…so…no telling where I’ll look or how. And I still don’t believe you can physically look dead six in a Viper…
Reset of trim to neutral on a single button press has sorted me out more than once in a few RL trainers. Very handy.
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Well, guess we should alert the USAF, get them to remove the instructions on how to do just that from the AFTTP 3-3v5 then.
Perfectly neutral trim isnt essential. What would make instantaneous trim reset useful? Those are the two reasons I can think of to want a button - perfect neutral, or fast neutral.
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Guess we should…all I know is that I can’t get my neck around that far, so for purposes of my own sim it’s pointless.
Primary reason for being able to zero trim fast is if you become disoriented in zero-zero conditions…at least it’s been the primary reason I’ve used it. You you are totally white-out and you’ve screwed up your trim the heavy stick will only further add to the disorientation. Lots of times during my trainer sessions I find that the console operators will like to mess with you once they learn you can fly…throwing you into a solid cloud layer or pitch dark while in an unusual attitude or during a dynamic maneuver is one of their more “go-to” tricks…that’s when I will generally opt to zero trim if I find I can’t get my stick under control.
And it could be that being able to do this this is more useful with a center stick which actually displaces and gets heavy rather than something like the Viper’s kinethetic side stick. Dunno…but I do still use zero-trim with BMS/FAF. Usually rolling out to final - I like to start from zero to capture trim for landing, as I find it far easier/faster to capture and maintain on-speed that way. Navy habit…maybe. But it works for me.
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Hmm. I dont trim for final. I tend to prefer the nose low trim that requires back pressure to hold the desired speed. Same goes for tanking or fingertip.
I dont see how getting thrown suddenly into an unusual attitude with zero vis requires an instant zeroing of the trim. With a stick that gets forces on it, sure. Not so much with a stick that has a constant reaction force equal and opposite to the applied force.
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I’ve made it part of my pre-take off checks to reset the tims (pinky - pickle on my Dunc_DX cougar setup) ever since that nasty accident at Albacete that was apparently caused by an accidental trim setting.
All the best, Uwe
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Hmm. I dont trim for final. I tend to prefer the nose low trim that requires back pressure to hold the desired speed. Same goes for tanking or fingertip.
I dont see how getting thrown suddenly into an unusual attitude with zero vis requires an instant zeroing of the trim. With a stick that gets forces on it, sure. Not so much with a stick that has a constant reaction force equal and opposite to the applied force.
I always trim for/to on-speed…it makes on-speed far easier to maintain; set attitude, maintain attitude, fly throttle - which is how it’s taught in RL. But that’s likely my “Navy” habit - all you Viper-primary drivers always land fast, and are usually fast over the round-down during your CV approaches from the screenshots/vids I’ve seen. Problem is that I’ve learned how to do this so well in BMS/FAF that’s it’s about totally ruined my technique in the trainers…so I’ve grounded myself with regards to BMS for a bit.
I don’t know that trim zeroing is “required”, but it’s sure saved my butt a number of times during RL trainer sessions…though I have managed to over-trim my FCC3 equipped Cougar and noted how you have to hold a force on it to counter that (if you don’t adjust for a power or configuration change)…in which case I simply double tap my NWS switch to null trim, and start over. I agree - it’s probably more of an impact with a center stick, but I find it useful in the Viper as well, particularly coming off the 90.
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I’ve made it part of my pre-take off checks to reset the tims (pinky - pickle on my Dunc_DX cougar setup) ever since that nasty accident at Albacete that was apparently caused by an accidental trim setting.
All the best, Uwe
Another nice use of the shifted function! I try not to use weapons release switches for anything but releasing weapons…and I’ve built some delay (0.5 sec) into my CMS switch to help prevent accidental activations.
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See theres a viper difference, in that its normally flown at 11 degrees AoA for the approach, and in those conditions you fly attitude with the stick and speed with the throttle. At 13 degrees you can set the throttle and fly airspeed with stick. Same thing, you will find that promulgated in USAF F-16 docs…
Trimming for the desired speed doesnt really work so well at 11 degrees AoA, but you can trim for the desired glideslope, which is a little nose up from neutral. I just like the nose down effect, because it keeps the stick constantly under pressure
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I totally ignore airspeed once I’m on-speed…unless I get a stall tone, in which case I’m not on-speed. I set attitude, trim to center the indexer, and then fly using the throttle and nose - nose in the direction of he arrow/throttle in the direction of the light - to keep the indexer green. I trim to minimize the amount of stick I’m using to do that, so mainly I’m on the throttle during approach. I trim for attitude not speed, and control sink with throttle…that’s how you get aboard the CV but it works ashore (and for any jet or heavier aircraft) too. You can squeak on some throttle just prior to touchdown to arrest sink and then cut to idle to “Navy-flare” ashore - that works with the Viper too, once you get the timing of it.
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If there’s reason to believe it works better than an EDTracker I could try it. Maybe I want some sort of hypothetical industrial strength tracker.
You can use the EDTracker hardware with FTNoIR or OpenTrack. I use mine with latter and only use the EDTracker software to rest the gyro bias, which has to be done each time I plug it in (actually I have a button on my USB hub that disables the port, so I rarely need to physically unplug it).