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Complex engen management


Doogerie

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With complex engine management, you have to control the radiator setting (beyond the regular "auto/open and closed"), as well as supercharger settings, fuel mixture, and prop pitch.

Not all planes have supercharger settings or prop pitch, but they all (almost all) have different radiator settings. Mixture is mainly needed for the Russian and some Japanese planes.

If you don't use the engine settings, you won't get the best performance out of the plane.

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Trim is set by ascribing key presses to the appropriate controls in the Controls page of the game - or it can be done in the HOTAS section if you have sliders or rotary axes to spare. You'll need to remember that not all the aircraft have trim on all the axes of flight. The I-153 & the I-16 have none - the 109s have only elevator - the Spits and Hurris have elevator & rudder - the later US planes have elevator, rudder and aileron. They are all different and you'll get to know which has what as you get to fly them.

What they do is alter the airflow over the principal surfaces of the plane. Taking the rudder as an example, they enable you to fly along a straight nose-to-tail line. If the rudder is not trimmed, either by direct rudder movements or by the use of trim tabs, you will find your plane 'skids' as you proceed on your course. 'Crabbing' is another term used to describe this kind of progress, as your plane still goes forwards but at an angle to the nose-tail axis, a bit like a crab's progress along the beach. This will slow you down, especially in a combat situation, and spoil your aim when you finally latch on to a target.

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Trimming just means you don't have to hold constant pressure on the stick(or rudder), you can fly "hands off" without holding back the stick in a climb.

Fly fast without pushing forward on the stick.

Rudder trim has a lot to do with throttle setting and speed. You can watch this with the slip/skid gauge(the curved glass tube with the ball inside)

Flying straight, the ball is in the middle. If it isn't, you're not flying straight.

Another thing about trim.

Your elevator trim works just like a cruise control and is the most important aid to precise flight control.

The guy bobbing around in formation is the guy who's always fighting the stick because he hasn't trimmed the plane.

Elevator trim sets the SPEED your aircraft will fly at. If you get the plane flying level at 350K and adjust the trim so you can let go of the stick it will always want to fly at (or close to) 350K.

Cut the throttle and it will go into a dive... and stabilize at around 350K.

Add full throttle and it will climb ..... at around 350K.

These are fighters and not designed for stable flight, they have huge engines trying to twist the plane in all kinds of directions at once so they don't react to trim as nicely as your passenger planes of today.

Very handy when landing.

Most beginners just chop the throttle, point the nose at the runway and get there at 450K. Not pretty.

Get off the end of the runway at 700m or so, cut the throttle and hold the nose up, slow the plane down to your approach speed. 50K or so above stall with gear and flaps deployed and use elevator trim for hands off flight.

Now you adjust your sink rate to the strip with throttle. If it looks like you'll be short DO NOT pull back on the stick, this will make you sink faster and fall even shorter. Just add some throttle.

When you almost touch down then you pull back the stick to hold the plane off the runway(flare) and let the speed bleed off.

When the plane is ready it will stop flying and drop the last foot onto the runway without the embarrassing crow hopping.

I find in the game it's a good idea to add some throttle just before you flare, these planes are heavy and it makes the landing smoother.

When you get some experience you'll know how far you have to be off the runway so you can glide in with your engine at idle.

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I find in the game it's a good idea to add some throttle just before you flare, these planes are heavy and it makes the landing smoother.

The Perfesser is correct, you are going to have to fly these aircraft all the way to the ground.

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  • 1. DDz Quorum

There is some really good information coming together here, it would be nice to see it encapsulated into a more formal guide (along the lines of the Switcher install guide I did as a web page) and as we have the technology, and space awaiting, it would be a shame to not do it.

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  • 1. DDz Quorum

Hmm.

There are macro recording programs (AutoIt springs immediately to mind) that you can use to record macros or key press sequences, and have them played back using a hot key combination.

AutoIt would need to run in the background waiting to intercept key presses, but should have minimal system impact.

Only ever used it for SysAdmin purposes but I think it would be viable for this, working pretty much the way SaiteK/CH control managers do.

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  • 1. DDz Quorum

I confess...

I bought my CH Quadrant for trim, plus it does prop pitch (and feather too when it hits the detent) I did map flaps to one but don't use it, which leaves one lever unused...

Never understood why 6 levers = a quadrant..thought it would be 4!

Combined with a CH Pro throttle,

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