gradyhappyg
Charter Member
Just got this on sale very nice job Virtavia. 1 question though shift 4 is supposed to bring up the auto pilot 2d panel and all I am getting is an empty black square. Anyone else getting this?
Virtavia A-4 Skyhawk available
- Thread starter flaviossa
- Start date
SpazSinbad
Members +
Inadvertant Skyhawk Shutdown
Heheh. The mouse would be my squeaky voice if I did what a student in a TA4J did - 'power? (throttle?) got stuck in the detent' - I think he says. The PLAT camera video says it all. (I'm on dialup for a few hours so uploading this small video clip may take a while.) It seems that the engine must be running but at idle perhaps for a second (because the student reduced power to idle?) and then the long spoolup time for go around catches out the student but he does save the aircraft in the ground/water effect as the engine accelerates to full power. A lesson learnt in NOT reducing power to idle at any time in the pattern and especially on the deck - in flight!
Perhaps having the throttle friction set appropriately really helped to prevent the throttle inadvertantly 'going around the horn' (which in 'old Sail Sailor' Parlance is the hazardous around Cape Horn voyage). The TA-4 was most prone to this sloppy throttle/friction/inadvertant shutdown problem as I recall, with warnings in NATOPS. One of the first students in the A4G shut the engine down inadvertantly during a full stop runway landing - this is noted in a humourous VF-805 (first iteration was the initial training squadron subsequently changed to VC-724 for later training groups) line book page. He was stranded on the runway with no way to exit, talk to anyone because the A4G had no batteries, way to restart the engine on the ground and importantly had no park brake! He just had to sit there until rescued by maintainers with suitable chocks and tow equipment to get the aircraft back to the line. I'll either be able to upload the video here? or post it on SkyDrive. Will come back here with the link or whatever. 2 Page PDF about this incident now attached.
QUOTE FROM SKYHAWK TA-4J NATOPS: "CAUTION
While advancing the throttle from IDLE toward military power, any outward pressure may cause an inadvertant throttle hangup in the forward idle detent." This is likely what happened to the TA-4J student - but ask yourselves - why was the throttle at or near idle? Perhaps he thought he was going to arrest? (with hook up).
Whatever.
SAME VIDEO NOW ON YOUTUBE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdV6zSjnJ5U
Forgot to mention that the real A-4 had this "dogleg" kind of stop. You had to force the throttle outward against a spring and then backward to shut off the engine which prevented inadvertent shutdowns. The ignitor switch was actually out there on the outside of the throttle track, so for an airstart (possibly even a regular start...I can't remember) you would "bang" the throttle against the microswitch and bring it around the dogleg in the track. In the training command it was referred to as bringing the throttle "around the horn"...the horn being that little stop.
No mouse clicks involved...thank God!
Deacon
Heheh. The mouse would be my squeaky voice if I did what a student in a TA4J did - 'power? (throttle?) got stuck in the detent' - I think he says. The PLAT camera video says it all. (I'm on dialup for a few hours so uploading this small video clip may take a while.) It seems that the engine must be running but at idle perhaps for a second (because the student reduced power to idle?) and then the long spoolup time for go around catches out the student but he does save the aircraft in the ground/water effect as the engine accelerates to full power. A lesson learnt in NOT reducing power to idle at any time in the pattern and especially on the deck - in flight!
Perhaps having the throttle friction set appropriately really helped to prevent the throttle inadvertantly 'going around the horn' (which in 'old Sail Sailor' Parlance is the hazardous around Cape Horn voyage). The TA-4 was most prone to this sloppy throttle/friction/inadvertant shutdown problem as I recall, with warnings in NATOPS. One of the first students in the A4G shut the engine down inadvertantly during a full stop runway landing - this is noted in a humourous VF-805 (first iteration was the initial training squadron subsequently changed to VC-724 for later training groups) line book page. He was stranded on the runway with no way to exit, talk to anyone because the A4G had no batteries, way to restart the engine on the ground and importantly had no park brake! He just had to sit there until rescued by maintainers with suitable chocks and tow equipment to get the aircraft back to the line. I'll either be able to upload the video here? or post it on SkyDrive. Will come back here with the link or whatever. 2 Page PDF about this incident now attached.
QUOTE FROM SKYHAWK TA-4J NATOPS: "CAUTION
While advancing the throttle from IDLE toward military power, any outward pressure may cause an inadvertant throttle hangup in the forward idle detent." This is likely what happened to the TA-4J student - but ask yourselves - why was the throttle at or near idle? Perhaps he thought he was going to arrest? (with hook up).
Whatever.SAME VIDEO NOW ON YOUTUBE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdV6zSjnJ5U
Navy Chief
Senior Member
GREAT stuff, Spazsinbad!! Seems like I recall the Corsair II having. Similar "detent", but I'm probably mistaken......old age. NC
SpazSinbad
Members +
'SkidMarks' (Skiddies?)
I must admit that is the weirdest thing I have seen but - hey - I forgot 'You have to land here son - this is where the food is' means something with the next 'unusual' A-4 deck landing video. I'm still on dialup so may take a minute or two....
VIDEO now on Youtube also: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrtvoAfbW3Q
Graphic from USN APPROACH Magazine, March-April 2010 : http://www.public.navy.mil/navsafecen/Documents/media/approach/Mar-Apr10-Approach.pdf
I must admit that is the weirdest thing I have seen but - hey - I forgot 'You have to land here son - this is where the food is' means something with the next 'unusual' A-4 deck landing video. I'm still on dialup so may take a minute or two....
VIDEO now on Youtube also: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrtvoAfbW3Q
Graphic from USN APPROACH Magazine, March-April 2010 : http://www.public.navy.mil/navsafecen/Documents/media/approach/Mar-Apr10-Approach.pdf
It goes into the detent and says "Cut" not "Shut" but the engine just winds down a bit then back up to idle ad infinitum. I was using the Clean model, I will try the other models and see if they work the same. Since I seem to be the only one having this peculiarity, I will assume it is something with my setup and continue to investigate. Luckily it is not something that keeps me from flying.
Thanks,
Dave
Does the throttle tooltip read zero when you shut it off? Does the throttle jump back to idle after you turn it off? If I press F1 in any aircraft, the tooltip will often briefly read zero then jump to a couple of percent...my throttle overrides the keypress.
Another thing I discovered which maddened me when troubleshooting my throttle, is that if you have the throttle sensitivity setting in the FSX options menu set to anything but full, you may not get full throttle throw in FSX.
Just some suggestions.
Deacon
hschuit
SOH-CM-2024
Throttle not able to reach the full zero and 100% is a known FSX bug. It can be fixed by editing your Controls\Standard.xml file. The default (wrong) ZAxis - AxScale value is 127, it needs to be 129. This ZAxis entry appears two times in the file, fix them all.
Yes the tooltip reads zero and the throttle does not move when I hit the F1 key. I am using FSUIPC and the throttle stays dead still when looking at the calibration numbers -16384 with no jitters at all.
Dave
SpazSinbad
Members +
Another Short Old Movie about Proper Wave Off
Part of a long movie - shows requirement for proper wave off technique with an example of an A-4 inflight arrest PLUS 'Fly The MEATball'! 17Mb .MP4 - 2min 08sec duration.
Part of a long movie - shows requirement for proper wave off technique with an example of an A-4 inflight arrest PLUS 'Fly The MEATball'! 17Mb .MP4 - 2min 08sec duration.
Just tried the new files. I have found so far that:
1. The AOA indexer is still upside down. There was a fix back several pages and you will need to redo whatever it was to get it to work properly. Also, the optimum AOA on the gauge is down around the 6 o'clock position instead of the 3 o'clock position where it is conventionally set. On-speed seems reasonable-ish though for the weight.
2. The ADI is still kind of wacky. If you are nose up and roll inverted, the ADI will show you nose down. This one in particular surprises me a little. I wouldn't think that it would be hard to fix.
3. The plane climbs better the one time I tried. You can get it into the low 40's which I think was about right. The Mach meter is still broken though and so you will need to sort of feel out the proper climb speed...not a huge problem as the sensitivity to climb mach seems to be pretty generous. This was with empty wing tanks, which may have given me better climb performance than the last time I flew it though, so I'd need to do more testing.
4. The rudder/sideslip is better, but still a bit too much. You just don't use the rudder in normal flight that much in a jet. It's most noticable at the boat, where a little wing dip for lineup just doesn't do much for you in the sim.
Personally, unless you are of a mind to practice things like wingovers or flat scissors, I'd just turn auto rudder on in the realism settings. It really improves the feel of the sim compared to the jet and is in no way less accurate for most kinds of flying...so no one should feel like they have the training wheels on.
Overall, I had hoped for a bit more from this patch. I definitely think the flight model has improved somewhat and I thank Mal for his hard work on it. The systems glitches; some obvious, some unfortunate I think were not adressed at all by Virtavia, which is a shame...especially since some had already been fixed by the community like the AOA indexer.
Still, it's the nicest looking Skyhawk out there, flies well in general, and is still a lot of fun to zoom around in. The carrier landings are especially fun and, indexer issues aside are good enough to take me back to the days of flying around in my clean white helmet. :cost1:
Deacon
1. The AOA indexer is still upside down. There was a fix back several pages and you will need to redo whatever it was to get it to work properly. Also, the optimum AOA on the gauge is down around the 6 o'clock position instead of the 3 o'clock position where it is conventionally set. On-speed seems reasonable-ish though for the weight.
2. The ADI is still kind of wacky. If you are nose up and roll inverted, the ADI will show you nose down. This one in particular surprises me a little. I wouldn't think that it would be hard to fix.
3. The plane climbs better the one time I tried. You can get it into the low 40's which I think was about right. The Mach meter is still broken though and so you will need to sort of feel out the proper climb speed...not a huge problem as the sensitivity to climb mach seems to be pretty generous. This was with empty wing tanks, which may have given me better climb performance than the last time I flew it though, so I'd need to do more testing.
4. The rudder/sideslip is better, but still a bit too much. You just don't use the rudder in normal flight that much in a jet. It's most noticable at the boat, where a little wing dip for lineup just doesn't do much for you in the sim.
Personally, unless you are of a mind to practice things like wingovers or flat scissors, I'd just turn auto rudder on in the realism settings. It really improves the feel of the sim compared to the jet and is in no way less accurate for most kinds of flying...so no one should feel like they have the training wheels on.
Overall, I had hoped for a bit more from this patch. I definitely think the flight model has improved somewhat and I thank Mal for his hard work on it. The systems glitches; some obvious, some unfortunate I think were not adressed at all by Virtavia, which is a shame...especially since some had already been fixed by the community like the AOA indexer.
Still, it's the nicest looking Skyhawk out there, flies well in general, and is still a lot of fun to zoom around in. The carrier landings are especially fun and, indexer issues aside are good enough to take me back to the days of flying around in my clean white helmet. :cost1:
Deacon
Ian Warren
Charter Member
One great video , the one I really liked in your PB album was the Sykhawks operations on the HMAS Melbourne , only aircraft carrier i've seen with my real eyeballs in 1980 just before they put her out to pasture across the bay in Sydney , I run around to get a view as the tugs were juggling it around from the Opera house , the best view point
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my 0-1 clean aircraft.cfg says:
// A-4E/F Skyhawk Flight Dynamics by mal
// 1 Nov 2012 ver.2.3 : final release version
is this still an older version of the FDE?
Dave
That looks indeed like version 1.0. Version 1.1 is up at PC Aviator USA since Wednesday last (the 15th), so you should be able to just download it again if you bought it from that shop (the file says v1_1).
The heading of the aircraft.cfg (v1.1) should read like this:
// A-4E/F Skyhawk Flight Dynamics Ver 1.0 by mal - CLEAN Aircraft
// 4-22-2012
// 5-17-2012 ver.1.1
// 5-20-2012 ver.1.2
// 5-29-2012 ver.1.3
// 6-05-2012 ver.1.4
// 6-08-2012 ver.1.5 Near Completed Flight Model
// 6-16-2012 ver.1.6 New Models added to Cfg.
// 6-18-2012 ver.1.7
// 6-21-2012 ver.1.8 G models added
// 6-27-2012 ver.1.9 Cleaned up descriptions & misc. items
// 6-29-2012 ver.1.9 Clean Aircraft CFG.
// 7-31-2012 ver.2.0 FD Completed
// 9-11-2012 ver.2.1 Flight testing completed - remembering 9-11
// 21 Oct 2012 ver.2.2 : new lts sect, fuel dump & exh fx, AP bank, wingfld/tailhk, thumb UI.
// 11-29-2012 ver.2.3 Updated lateral stability, COG, yaw moi. h-tail incidence, launch bar lug
// 12-04-2012 ver.2.4 adjusted h-tail incidence, decreased flap lift & pitch, lowered fuel gain, reduced elevator effectiveness, reduced pitch stability, decreased oswald efficiency, modified (404) stall characteristics, lowered vert. inertia, lowered elevator control factor.
// 12-06-2012 ver.2.5 increased yaw stab2
// 12-07-2012 ver.2.6 decreased aileron & rudder effectiveness, increased yaw stab 1 & 2
// 1-06-2013 ver.2.6 out for testing
// 1-08-2013 ver.2.6 test results positive
// 1-22-2013 ver.2.6 ver.2.6 fine tuned - 2.6 release candidate
// 1-30-2013 ver.2.6 decreased yaw stability, increased aileron response, increased elevator response
// 3-2-2013 ver.2.6 FDE updated
delta_lima
Charter Member 2015
Hello,
Did this ever get released? I'm looking everywhere here on the SOH library ... Indeed any of the USMC ones you did would be most welcome. Links are dead, alas...
Just got the model - really love it Virtavia - great job. Yes, a few niggles here and there - but overall, glad I got it - on sale, no less!!
cheers,
DL
FSX rudder sensitivity is generally much too sensitive so below are the settings I use to fly the A-4. It should be noted that these files were tested by several very knowledgable sim flyers as well as a couple of real world A-4 pilots. These files were given a thumbs up by all concerned but it should be noted that flight profiles can always be tweaked more. In fact, as soon as I finished these, I started re-working what had just finished. I don't expect I will ever release those as I moved on to other projects and never finished them. If I ever do I will make them available to anyone who wants them
In the mean-time if you are unhappy with the rudder sensitivity try my recommended settings. I fly with a Saitek X-45.
Thanks again to all those who helped in the testing. It was much appreciated!
Aileron and Elevator sliders set to 50% (I don't use Null)
Spoiler set to 100% (no null)
Rudder set anywhere from 0 to 50% slider, Null 100% (full right slider)
Throttle 100% slider full right- zero null
Elevator Trim axis slider at 50%
Realism; user preference... I set mine to full realism.
In the mean-time if you are unhappy with the rudder sensitivity try my recommended settings. I fly with a Saitek X-45.
Thanks again to all those who helped in the testing. It was much appreciated!
Aileron and Elevator sliders set to 50% (I don't use Null)
Spoiler set to 100% (no null)
Rudder set anywhere from 0 to 50% slider, Null 100% (full right slider)
Throttle 100% slider full right- zero null
Elevator Trim axis slider at 50%
Realism; user preference... I set mine to full realism.