Wake turbulence during dogfight

Just curious if this is normal behaviour. During a dogfight with an AI Mig-29 I've noticed at times if I'm close in and I intersect with the Migs wake it'll cause me to roll 90 degrees left or right. Pretty much a 90 degree snap roll. Accurate or WIP? Thanks

 

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To be perfectly accurate, it should stall the left engine, trigger a flat spin, and then you hit the canopy… But it's too sad, for Maverick the incident still sticks in his throat...

I haven't experienced it that violently. I usually get thrown around a little bit, but it has a lot to do with the angle. Don't fly behind the bandit, come at an angle

I haven't experienced it that violently. I usually get thrown around a little bit, but it has a lot to do with the angle. Don't fly behind the bandit, come at an angle

Yeah in my experience its after a bandit reverses its turn and there's a split second of its wake being in front of me. I'm certainty not waiting until I'm 180 degrees rear aspect to shoot, his wingman would be all over me. I'll see if I can get a track this week.

 

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Interesting to see wake turbulence in dogfight. Not much of a dogfighter but I would look out for it.

I want to assume the wake turbulence does affect AI aircraft too when behind me.

hitting wake turb...

 

In real dogfights its a little different depending on the where and how you intercept the wake.

 

If you hit the wake off a close head to head pass it can vary from just a loud thump (the first time I encountered this I thought I had a mid-air...lol..) and a quick bump of turbulence (in the case of high closing speed opposing pass) to a slightly prolonged bump of turbulence and less loud audible feedback when the angles off decrease during a slower pass.

 

When you are directly behind and trying to match flight vectors (for either a gunshot or close formation flying) it can feel like a momentary loss of control - kinda like in a car when you hit a patch of ice - you can move the wheel but the car doesn't really respond until you get off the ice patch. In addition to that there can also be aircraft upset - an uncommanded roll of varying intensity depending on who's wake (larger heavy aircraft - like tankers = bigger more violent wake). The wake does dissipate the farther you get from the source.

 

That's my experience anyway...

 

CB

This wake seems also to be active now with AAR,

 

F18 behind the K135MPRS wing tip, has me tilted.

This wake seems also to be active now with AAR,

 

F18 behind the K135MPRS wing tip, has me tilted.

I had the same problem. Fly lower and come under the tanker's wing. You should only get a little bit of the effect like that.

If you're being violently thrown around, you're too high.

I had the same problem. Fly lower and come under the tanker's wing. You should only get a little bit of the effect like that.

If you're being violently thrown around, you're too high.

Just tilted, looks a bit weird when one notices.

Moving to the outside, one starts to speed up a knot or so - suction? So I just rather stay somewhat banked in the usual place.

The effect might be a tad exaggerated, I've never seen RL pics of jets doing AAR steady but banked, RL planes seem level but that would be - very - hard to see, and what would I know.

Edited July 2, 2019 by majapahit

If it is during a high G turn, could it be a stall of one wing over the other causing that ?

If it is during a high G turn, could it be a stall of one wing over the other causing that ?

Not likely, at the point where it happens I'm often letting off on the G for a tracking shot. It only started happening after wake turbulence was implemented. Also Hornet FCS seems to keep that sort of thing in check no?

 

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I dunno, I just had a few near misses landing online with some folks that didn't bother using SRS to announce takoffs just as I was landing, nearly crashed, so yeah I'd say it can happen in dogfights.

Considering how new wake turbulence is, I would definitely assume it's still wip. That being said I haven't encountered any instances that have been too egregious. I'm no expert on the physics of the matter though so there might be discrepancies that I'm just unaware of.

 

 

 

Pretty cool though, makes dogfights a little more interesting.

Not likely, at the point where it happens I'm often letting off on the G for a tracking shot. It only started happening after wake turbulence was implemented. Also Hornet FCS seems to keep that sort of thing in check no?

 

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Well if one wind suddenly get enough low pressure and turbulences to stall only one wing, I don't think the FCS would have time to react, a little like the V22 Osprey when one of is prop was biting the prop wash, but apparently this isn't what you experienced if you weren't turning when it happened.

In real dogfights its a little different depending on the where and how you intercept the wake.

 

If you hit the wake off a close head to head pass it can vary from just a loud thump (the first time I encountered this I thought I had a mid-air...lol..) and a quick bump of turbulence (in the case of high closing speed opposing pass) to a slightly prolonged bump of turbulence and less loud audible feedback when the angles off decrease during a slower pass.

 

When you are directly behind and trying to match flight vectors (for either a gunshot or close formation flying) it can feel like a momentary loss of control - kinda like in a car when you hit a patch of ice - you can move the wheel but the car doesn't really respond until you get off the ice patch. In addition to that there can also be aircraft upset - an uncommanded roll of varying intensity depending on who's wake (larger heavy aircraft - like tankers = bigger more violent wake). The wake does dissipate the farther you get from the source.

 

That's my experience anyway...

 

CB

 

Thanks for this! Love it when real pilots post about their experience!

CB has it

 

I will add that if you position wrong behind the tanker it does feel like a constant roll force as you enter the tankers wingtip vortices.

 

In ACT I did have a burner blowout due to wake but I was modulating the throttle at the time so that was just unlucky. So far its all felt pretty good to me and a nice representation, way better than I ever expected we would get.

Edited July 3, 2019 by WindyTX

[...] So far its all felt pretty good to me and a nice representation, way better than I ever expected we would get.

 

Wow, that is encouraging to hear! Also for the DCS software engineer(s) who worked on it I guess :)

 

These are the things where an armchair pilot like me is deeply grateful for feedback from RL pilots! I will never be able to correlate my DCS experience to any real flying (of which I have very little anyway). I can rather easily find out if a button or switch is correctly represented in DCS by looking at pictures of the real thing. I can read in the NATOPS how things should work and compare that to our jet. But I will never be able to tell if the stick force (or rather „deflection“ for us) needed to lift the nose gear off the runway seems to be right ... or if the effects of the tanker‘s wake are even close to how it feels like in reality.

 

So thank you WindyTX and CB as well.

Edited July 3, 2019 by Hog_No32

Sometimes the quick bump as you pass through someone else’s wake can do damage... we had a chap on ex cope thunder ‘93 lose the top foot of his fin after he passed through someone else’s wake. The investigation believed the instant vortices generated from the intakes at high alpha battered the fin so hard it took the top bit off.

 

Through fast jet training we taught that you must not drop back and low in the final stages of a formation landing or the vortices will flip you over and you won’t have enough control authority to stop it.

 

In ACT, I’ve seen stalls and surges (with fuel coming out of intakes!) as a result of flying through jet wash or wake turbulence.

 

It’s real and it’s powerful.......and the higher the wing loading, the bigger the vortices..

Edited July 3, 2019 by Dangerman

CB has it

 

I will add that if you position wrong behind the tanker it does feel like a constant roll force as you enter the tankers wingtip vortices.

 

In ACT I did have a burner blowout due to wake but I was modulating the throttle at the time so that was just unlucky. So far its all felt pretty good to me and a nice representation, way better than I ever expected we would get.

 

 

Windy, did you have a restriction in the F3 as we did in GR1 that if we needed burner on the tanker, use only the one on opposite side to your probe?.... although I’m sure you had more thrunge and never needed burner on the tanker!!

Even in a Cessna 172 you’ll encounter your own wake while doing 360s.

Windy, did you have a restriction in the F3 as we did in GR1 that if we needed burner on the tanker, use only the one on opposite side to your probe?.... although I’m sure you had more thrunge and never needed burner on the tanker!!

Ha I wish yep the other one from the one you used was normal tho not sure I remember it being mandated.lol. Always needed it in the gulf and while I guess it was a bit more thrust it was never enough eh .

 

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Windy, did you have a restriction in the F3 as we did in GR1 that if we needed burner on the tanker, use only the one on opposite side to your probe?.... although I’m sure you had more thrunge and never needed burner on the tanker!!

 

Holy smokes, you needed reheat (in your lingo:smilewink: ) to stay on the tanker in the fin? I mean I have heard that the RB199 wasn’t the most powerful engine on earth...but really? Or was that just with an extremely draggy loadout (and what would that have been) or at rather high altitude?

Edited July 3, 2019 by Hog_No32

Over Kuwait in the summer 2 big fuel tanks phimat pod TRD and 8 missiles basically the max load possible on the Aircraft filling up all the way to the brim. Yep reheat on one was required, even more fun on the kc135 using the boom drogue adapter had both in burner for a second

 

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I was fortunate enough during a ride to get to do some guns BFM as we had a wingman with another GIB at the same time. As knuckle-draggers, we give ops guys a hard time sometimes when they do something boneheaded, but there’s other times when you get to appreciate how good they are with a lot of shit going on. We were offensive in a guns jink, I’m doing my best not the throw up, and there was twice where he called the wake before we ever hit it and rolled wings level to travel through it. Both times it basically felt like you were riding a bike off a small bike ramp. For sure noticeable, no question. Not sure what that would have felt like if we were still trying to put a nose on him. The guy I was with had a few thousand hours, but still impressed me that even in the middle of tossing the jet around trying to kill the bad guy, he saw it, knew it was coming, had time to roll the jet and still tell me it was coming before we hit it.

Over Kuwait in the summer 2 big fuel tanks phimat pod TRD and 8 missiles basically the max load possible on the Aircraft filling up all the way to the brim. Yep reheat on one was required, even more fun on the kc135 using the boom drogue adapter had both in burner for a second

 

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I seem to remember the burner was scheduled by nozzle position so it went something like this for me:

 

Dropping back in dry thrust to the end of the hose

Realising you need burner

Select reheat on the left

Nozzle opens

Thrust reduces on left slightly due more Aj

Panic as dropping back even quicker due less thrust

Advance left throttle a bit more

Enter cloud

Wobble about a bit

Burner ignites

.......at a higher throttle setting than originally intended

Huge increase in thrust due more burner selected

Panic

Fore aft PIO on power ensues

Stabilised!

Breathe

 

All happened in a fraction of a frantic second!