General Category > Unofficial F/A-18 Acceleration Pack board

Sim 'gouge'

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SpazSinbad:
Thanks for sharing your wonderful experience cap'n. You will be able to remember that for a long time I'll wager.  ;D

Orion:
Nice going Capt!

Sludge:
CAPT...

Was wondering how that was gonna go... sounds like it was a very intense experience. So can you give me some feedback or ideas in comparison to the Sludge, especially in regards to handling, stick/throttle response. I read the part you had in the post about how a little throttle would make a big glideslope correction; was the Sludge "in the ballpark" of what you experienced with the Super?

I thought it was funny you were down on yourself for not getting an OK 3, even though you are a first timer. I guess if you dont expect better of yourself, you're not gonna be a good aviator (even FSX aviator), right?

Anyway, give me your thoughts as I'm still working on the next release which I think you will really like. I'll probly get you and a few others (MIKEB54, JJ, simon, JR) amongst others to be test pilots for it. But, especially you and Mike who have seen real Hornet simulator time... your inputs will be invaluable.

Later
Sludge

GOONIE:
Sludge,

Yeah I was kind of hard on myself, but I seriously didn't think I was going to bolter so much, especially with the site picture I had At the Ramp (on speed, centered ball). Like I said, the bolters were a combination of my throttle inputs, and I am sure the real Super Hornet Sim models the hook and wires differently, to make a trap harder or more realistic versus the way it is modeled in FSX. Does anyone know if that is possible in FSX, to reduce the windows or area your hook has to hit in order to trap? I think it would make sense to tighten these ranges up to make it harder, but I have no idea how to do this, or what values to even use, just an idea.

Regarding the handling qualities of the real sim versus the Sludge Hornet, there are several. First, I must say I mainly fly the Sludge hornet, but do own the VRS Super Hornet and occasionally fly it. Now I hate saying this, but I tried flying my FSX sim last night and used both the Sludge and the VRS to see if I could correlate my experience in the real sim, and was surprised by how close the VRS comes to the sim I flew the other day, not perfectly, but I definitely noticed similar behavior and response to my inputs. That being said, I was flying a Super Hornet sim with the latest fly by wire, and I know the VRS guys have tried to replicate this fly by wire behavior as much as possible in FSX. Now regarding the Sludge Hornet, which is an Alpha / pseudo Charlie legacy hornet, I don't know how it is supposed to handle or fly based on a real simulator. I think MikeB54's inputs are more appropriate since he flew that version of the hornet.

For what it is worth here are my comparisons. I feel the Sludge hornet’s bank and pitch are very close to the sim, although the super hornet sim felt more "squirrely" behind the boat and during my FCLP, especially when turning from the 180 to the 90, and then into the groove. Basically any time I made large changes in aircraft state, it required a deft hand. But once a bank or pitch was selected, the fly by wire and trim held it there nicely. I feel the Sludge is very stable and maybe because I fly it more and my muscle memory is better, I feel I can fly a more precise pattern and anticipate power changes and bank inputs at the various points in the carrier pattern. In the sim I found myself wandering around when getting to “the start” which I don’t do when in the Sludge Hornet. Let me caveat this by saying I have a small amount of data points to compare in the real sim (4 FCLP and 2 Carrier race track patterns), compared with hundreds using the Sludge. Needless to say, in the Sim I never actually felt stable or smooth when getting to the start, but once in the groove the stick response/input is similar to the Sludge, where constant, small stick inputs are required to stay on centerline and on speed. Proper trim is critical.

Regarding the throttle, once in the groove, constant movement is necessary, but the range you are moving the throttle is very small, my estimate is about an inch or two. My friend (hornet pilot), told me he locks his elbow against his hip and “walks the throttles” (moving one side at a time) at very small intervals, basically a cm at a time to stay on glideslope. He demonstrated one pattern around the boat, to what looked like an OK3. I watched his hands and they are moving constantly, but a lot smaller range then in the videos I’ve seen. As I mentioned in my earlier post, if you move the throttle more than this when AR or ITW, you can easily bolter in the Super Hornet. I find on the Sludge Hornet I am moving the throttles more to get the ball to do what I want, it could just be me or my hardware (Warthog HOTAS). I am going to experiment more with it this week and would be really happy to try out your latest version of the Hornet when it is ready for testing. Also  my friend said throttle inputs are easier to judge in the jet, since you can feel (seat of the pants) when you’ve added too much and or too little. He also said the meatball, at least in the sim we were flying, was harder to see than in real world ops. He said the sim is better suited for procedural learning, and that it can give you a sense for flying to the carrier, but so many extra cues and not to mention resolution help make it easier in the real jet. One thing he said is pretty accurate is the night time approach, understandably  8).

Well hope that was helpful, a lot of it is subjective, but I tried to capture as much as I could before the memory fades. Let me know if you have any quesitons

-CAPT

SUBS17:
You think the VRS SH is good now wait for the Pro version which will have an even better Flight model. I am amazed that you managed to land on a carrier in an actual simulator for a real SH after just trainning on FSX and other sims. That reminds me of a Falcon 4 player a few years back did something similar in a real F-16 sim he got in and started it up without a check list and flew it. Its one thing to fly any other sim but its something very good in acheiving a landing on an actual SH sim on a carrier. I bet there were a few surprised people watching you pull that off.

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