Next HB aircraft module (corrected list)

F-14D

This a repeat of another poll (https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=261776) where the A-6 had been forgotten in the list of contenders.

 

 

So far HB has made public their next module will be a (1) complex (2) twin engine jet. Aircraft that fits this bill I can think of are:

 

1. Blackburn Buccaneer
   
2. English Electric Lightning
   
3. Gloser Javelin (not sure it is a complex aircraft)
   
4. Panavia Tornado
   
5. SEPECAT Jaguar (not sure it is a complex aircraft)
   
6. Grumman A-6
   
7. General Dynamics F-111
   
8. Lockheed F-117 (nobody ever mentions this one)
   
9. Sukhoi Su-24 (not sure it is a complex aircraft)
   
10. Mikoyan Gurevich MiG-27 (not sure it is a complex aircraft)
    

 

 

This list excludes (1) planes that are too new to be adapted to DCS or that have been announced by other developers as part of their development plans, (2) medium and heavy bombers, (3) reconnaissance aircraft, (4) trainers and (5) planes that never made it to mass production.

Lol the Jaguar was more complex with a far higher pilot workload in comparison to the Tornado. Only had to look at the typical Jag pilots they were generally older with more flight hours in the log. Not sure how this would cope in today's MP environment however unless limited to cold war.

In terms of what would be favourite's i'm confident it would be the Tornado and F-111. However Tornado still active (re Luftwaffe and Saudi - not that means anything these days re Truegrit). The F-111 would be immense, that thing could shift and supreme down low and fast as well as carry an insane amount of weapons.

AH-64 is complex and has twin engine jet....turbines. ;)

The Australian F111c's were given the option to use the French Super530s. I assume being courted by arms manufacturers. At the end of it, they went with Sidewinders. I cant find anyone to ask about the Pig, what the long distance option they used.

The F111 was built to carry the Phoenix, but im not sure if the Radar suite and WSO/RIO seat was equipped beyond the F111b. All the Aardvarks had state of the art radar, it was one of the strengths. But i dont know about the munitions.

 

As for getting ass kicked in multiplayer.. dont forget this is equivalent to the Warthog. Actually, Twice the Warthog. Its a bomber. It just does Jet stuff. It will sustain a 3g turn at mach. That just below black out. AND its faster than anything in the game. thats pretty awesome, and certainly quickly into the notch.

 

Most importantly though.. this is a 100,000 lb. plane. with reduced fuel, 2 2.8 mach engines, and 100,000 lb wings out.. i bet this thing would turn like the tomcat. if you stepped on the flaps. Similar style of turn.

 

Thats how good the F111 is.. we compare it to fighters.

Yikes! Sorry for the necro! Only now did i see this reply.

1. No AWG9 on the A's.

2. The f-14 and the F-111 are aerodynamically more different then the F-14 and the F-15, despite the variable geometry. Everything about them is different. The foil used on the wings is different. The wing pivot points are completely different both in relation to each other and in relation to the center of lift and gravity. The body-fuselage blending and geometry. Inlet geometry. The only thing similar maybe the TF30's on the early versions, but even those were different later on.

So no, the 111 will not turn like a 14. Some of the people that seam to have flown both the F-4 and the F-111, claim that the latter is actually worse turner then the former.

So the A6 is confirmed?

Hopefully they bring the A-6.

Every other module would be an disappointment for Heatblur Simulations aka. Grumman Simulations.

PLEASE PLEASE drop the A-6 or confirm it at least official that we have something to look forward to.

Anticipation is the greatest joy.

Please drop the A-6, followed by the EA-6 (four client Coop-module) and then followed by ... of course ... the F-14D.

Please confirm it soon.

Stay healthy & fly safe

Hopefully they bring the A-6.

Every other module would be an disappointment for Heatblur Simulations aka. Grumman Simulations.

 

 

PLEASE PLEASE drop the A-6 or confirm it at least official that we have something to look forward to.

Anticipation is the greatest joy.

 

 

Please drop the A-6, followed by the EA-6 (four client Coop-module) and then followed by ... of course ... the F-14D.

 

 

Please confirm it soon.

 

 

Stay healthy & fly safe

Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk

Hopefully they bring the A-6.

Every other module would be an disappointment for Heatblur Simulations aka. Grumman Simulations.

 

 

PLEASE PLEASE drop the A-6 or confirm it at least official that we have something to look forward to.

Anticipation is the greatest joy.

 

 

Please drop the A-6, followed by the EA-6 (four client Coop-module) and then followed by ... of course ... the F-14D.

 

 

Please confirm it soon.

 

 

Stay healthy & fly safe

A-6... very nice! The Tornado is important as well ;)

This is from my WHY YOU NEED THE F111 IN DCS post.

 

The F111 Aardvark. "The PIG". Strategic or Strike Bomber? Interdictor or Interceptor? Fighter or Recon? ..or all of those?

I would absolutely love an F-111 myself, but let's be realistic about its capabilities. It would be a pure strike bomber, not a super plane which can do anything.

It has an Internal Canon

Completely Modular, the bomb bay could carry all sorts of goodies.

The early variants could carry a gun on its weapons bay. In that case the weapons bay would be filled with amunition. This capability was removed on later variants, when it got the capability to carry Sidewinders. The gun was never used in combat.

The B Variant carried Phoenix missiles.

The B variant was the Navy variant the Navy didn't want, and never entered service. We are certainly not going to get the B. The Navy got the F-14 instead, and so did we :D

Its wings are Sweeping, but they Carry Pylons that swivel, so the munition always points forward.

Only the inner most pylons could swivel. Which meant the 4 outer pylons were never used in combat, as it prevented the wings from swiveling.

Im trying to confirm the use of Helmet Displays and over the shoulder A2A deployment.

It certainly wouldn't be equipped with a helmet sight, as it only carried early Sidewinders without support for a helmet sight. This was not a fighter, it was a bomber.

It had a modular INTERNAL CANNON. 2,100 rounds worth of 20mm ammunition.

As mentioned, it was mounted on the weapons bay, and only on early variants of the F-111.

It has TWICE the Bomb-Load of an A10-Warthog

It could carry *48 bombs..

While it had a huge carrying capacity, the 48 bomb load is a bit of a fantasy as that would mean using the non-swiveling pylons, which meant only slow speeds as the wings would be prevented from swiveling. Not a useful combat configuration.

Its FAST. Mach 2.5 with Moving Swept Wings, and range

Its faster than the F15 and the F16. Its faster than the F4 Phantom. With a range twice that of the Phantom. 4,200 miles.

It certainly was fast, not the least down low where it was made to fly. I've heard stories of F-111s reaching mach 1.4 right down over the ground! And while some question what is the use of such long range on the tiny DCS maps, remember the F-111 was in its element down low, where fuel consumption is much higher. Most fighters run out of fuel after just a few minutes of AB use at sea level. The F-111... could at least last a few minutes more. You can never have too much fuel going fast at low level.

It HAD A HOOK. Thats right, it Can Land on an Aircraft Carrier

Only the B could land on a carrier. Pretty sure the F-111s which entered service had the normal hook most USAF fighters have (just look at e.g. F-15 or F-16, they have it too). It's not strong enough for carrier landings, but can in emergencies be used on runways with cable gear. This system slows the plane at a much less aggressive rate than the carrier wires.

It could Maintain a 3G turn at Super Sonic Speeds

3G at super sonic speeds is not much turn rate though :) It doesn't take much at all to reach 3G at those speeds.

The F-111 had great capabilities, but not nearly as great as you seem to believe. It was a great strike bomber, but it was no fighter, even if it had a very limited self defence capability. But in its role its best defence was its speed, as nothing could catch it low level.

But I think it would be a really awesome plane to fly in its strike role! Imagine all the low level fun possible going really fast to strike a target deep into enemy territory. And for its time it had great strike capability and some interesting weapons which were the most capable for its time. E.g. during the Gulf War I think it was the one of the few planes capable of self designating laser bombs (a few F-15Es had gotten Lantirn pods which allowed them to do it too).

And I just love the systems of this generation of planes. Advanced capabilities, but early electronics which had limitations and were cumbersome to use. Makes for an interesting experience to learn how to use them effectively :-)

A-6... very nice! The Tornado is important as well ;)

Yes Tornado important as well. By looking in your signature seeing an important one too: The legendary Starfighter.

Also very important.

But I hope Heatblur will go on first with the A-6. The way they sculpted the Grumman instumants are truely awesome. They should go on with this style of instuments, because they did is so brilliant. A-6 will be a Homerun ih Heatblur do it. The Panavia interior and instruments which will be also in the Tornado are not done by any 3rd Party yet. There is no binding to Heatblur. It could be done by any developer. The other way, the A-6 done by an different developer could be a flop. You have a high standard of sculpted Grumman instruments. In case the art and graphics look different to the Tomcat it could make the A-6 feel wrong.

Grumman Aircrafts shoud be done all by Heatblur now. To make them look as the came all out of one "factory".

Hopefully the Tornado come by an different rd Party developer right next to Heatburs A-6.

Another reason is Heatblur is dropping an a-6 AI. It's on the Hand that they could do it as a complete module.

Last Reason is the Release of the Super Carrier and the upcoming Forrestal.

Theres a Hype for naval carrier based aircrafts.

How awesom it would be to land in multiplayer with a freund next to you with an INtruder on the Forrestal ... at night

A-6 would fit there in perfectly.

A-6 is a MUST.

PLEASE ANNOUNCE THE A-6 SOON :pilotfly::pilotfly::pilotfly:

Heatblur has already said there will not be an F-14D due to so much of it's documentation being classified.

 

Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk

Then remove it from the Bucket-List for the E-2B Hawkeye.

But thats future music... first they should go on with the A-6 followed by the the EA-6

:wub: Love Heatblur Simulations aka. Grumman Simulations :wub:

I would absolutely love an F-111 myself, but let's be realistic about its capabilities. It would be a pure strike bomber, not a super plane which can do anything.

As a followup on the F-111, an interesting article from a former F-111 pilot at https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/4595/flying-the-iconic-swing-wing-f-111-aardvark-at-the-height-of-the-cold-war

Some interesting quotes:

The Vark's big strength was that it was fast as hell. I routinely cruised at .95 mach in military power (full throttle with no afterburner augmentation) while on the deck. The F model was nearly super cruise-capable. I saw 1.1 mach on the deck in a D model, and I knew guys who had the F model up to 1.4 mach on the deck! It held enough gas to do it for a while, too. Not many planes could keep up.

The F-111 worked in Vietnam because it flew really low and was really fast. It could fly down to 200 feet AGL (above ground level) using terrain following radar in all but the heaviest rain. As long as the TFR could see the difference between the weather and the ground, it could fly safely. The Vietnamese would barely hear it coming as it was pushing the mach and was really low, hence the nickname. That tactic, low and fast, became THE doctrine

About max weapon load:

The amount of bombs the F-111 could carry was definitely a strength. I have a picture of the F-111C dropping 48 Mk-82s. I think he had to be in full burner to barely get to 10,000 feet. They used fixed pylons on the outboard stations to carry six 500-pounders on each pylon. You can't sweep the wings unless you punch the pylons off. Totally impractical, but also really cool!

About air-to-air:

Sadly, the F-111 was lousy at air-to-air. It had way too high a wing loading, poor visibility, and huge energy bleed-off when turning. It was almost impossible to get above 5 g's in it, and when you did you had just lost about 200-plus knots in the break turn.

About gun and sidewinders:

They took the gun out. General Creech, a TAC commander during the F-111 development, was quoted saying he wasn't going to have a $20 million dollar airplane strafing $20,000 trucks. We could only carry the AIM-9P Sidewinder with no radar cueing, and that was the mid ‘80s before it became routine to have the Aim-9 loaded up at all. The AIM-9P is only going to hit if launched from the rear against someone running hot, and we had no maneuverability to get to the rear of the bad guy. At least the smoke trail coming off my wing after launching the thing might make the other guy flinch, so I could get low and run like a scalded ape.

About navigation with the immature avionics:

The A model had an all-analog cockpit. The Weapon System Officer (WSO) had to twist dials to change the latitude and longitude to the next coordinate. The pilot would turn to the next heading and hack a watch (or use a running time) while the WSO would change the inertial navigation system (INS) coordinates and then make sure the computed heading/time agreed with the dead reckoning time. All F-111 pilots lived by their stopwatch. You could not fly without it, as the INS died young.

Sounds like a really interesting plane to me :-) And I don't think it has ever been simulated with any accuracy.