Force X35 in to forward flight?

[Pummel 10]

Can you?

For a better description, when you do a virtical take off, the rear engine is facing directly downwards to help you lift off. As far as I can tell, the only way to now fly off in to the sunset, is to angle your plane forward like a chopper... and then have it gradually pick up speed until it gets fast enough that the rear engine returns to it's normal position, and then you really start picking up speed.

What I always wanted to do though, was to just manually tilt the engine back so I can fly away like a Transformer! I notice that you can trick the plane in to doing this by engaging the landing autopilot. It instantly puts the engine up, and then you can just disengage the autopilot, but that's a bit messy.

[TechnoTerrorist303 10]

It needs the ability to vector the nozzle on the f-35. Being able to do that properly in the Harrier would be awesome too. VIFF = awesome aerial advantage.

[Pummel 10]

Ahh so it's not possible? Pity. Maybe they could do it in a patch.

[Big Dawg KS 6]

Huh? I don't get it.

I don't think that the F35 (it's no longer X35) would be able to produce enough lift to stay airborne if you suddenly returned the nozzle to forward flight position without gaining some speed first.

Btw, in ArmA 2, if you turn off auto-hover on the F35 while in a hover, you will be able to move forward without tilting the aircraft. When you get up to speed the nozzle will automatically return to the normal position. Also, with auto-hover off, the nozzle will adjust depending on your speed (when you fly slow enough). So, it works just as it should.

Edited July 25, 2010 by Big Dawg KS

[Pummel 10]

It's just a bit conservative. You can hover up pretty high, and then you only need to tip forward for a moment to reach say 50 kph, so if you could then just manually tilt the engine up, you might drop a bit, but with the full forward thrust you would have enough speed to get lift within just 2 or 3 seconds.

Like I said you can actually do this already by using the autopilot, but it would be nicer if you could do it manually, as I'm sure you could in real life.

I doubt you would want to do it from takeoff, unless you liked being a crazy pilot, but sometimes I like to come to a hover from forward flight, and you can end up hovering at like a thousand feet up. So engaging forward thrust at that point would be great. Even if you dived down 200 feet before you could pull up and fly level, you still wouldn't be anywhere near the ground. It would be so much fun to be able to fly it like that.

Edited July 25, 2010 by Pummel

[JuggernautOfWar 1]

This same concept applies to in-game helicopter flight. We should be able to tilt the rotor head, not the entire helicopter to move around. The way this (and every) game portrays helicopter flight is ridiculous.

[Big Dawg KS 6]

Like I said you can actually do this already by using the autopilot, but it would be nicer if you could do it manually, as I'm sure you could in real life.

I highly doubt there is such manual control IRL. I'd imagine it takes some computer intervention to get such a complex aircraft to stay in the air, why would they let some guy risk destroying their very expensive aircraft by trying to do it manually?

Edited July 25, 2010 by Big Dawg KS

[TechnoTerrorist303 10]

In the f-35b when performing the transition from vertical to forward flight there are so many things going on that I highly doubt the pilot has any meaningful control over the process, the harrier is a different thing alltogether so having a proper vector control for that would be pretty cool :)

[Big Dawg KS 6]

This same concept applies to in-game helicopter flight. We should be able to tilt the rotor head, not the entire helicopter to move around. The way this (and every) game portrays helicopter flight is ridiculous.

Are you talking about rotor dive? It was in OFP, so there may be a chance you can still configure helicopters to use it (though none of the BIS ones do). The problem is I suspect that they don't use it because the animation controllers don't work correctly, or it's very difficult to animate it properly. Anyway, for the most part helicopter movement in ArmA is pretty realistic. Most helicopters that have rotor dive can only do it slightly, and it's really only going to allow you to make really slight movements (good for precision hovering I suppose), but for the most part when you want to go forward, you have to tilt the entire airframe.

[TechnoTerrorist303 10]

This same concept applies to in-game helicopter flight. We should be able to tilt the rotor head, not the entire helicopter to move around. The way this (and every) game portrays helicopter flight is ridiculous.

The problem with trying to simulate helicopter flight controls totally realistically is that you soon run out of controllers connected to the PC.

Rotor head, pitch of blades etc...

[RomeoSierra 10]

The problem with trying to simulate helicopter flight controls totally realistically is that you soon run out of controllers connected to the PC.

Yeah & flying a heli takes a lot of skill, training, etc. You have to use the cylic, the collective & the pedals all in concert. So if you push the cylic (joystick) forward you have to increase the collective (throttle, to stop you dropping like a stone) & in turn then have to push on one the pedals more (rudder, to stop the airframe spinning as you increase torque.

I LOVE realism but you have to draw the line somewhere. Otherwise people would have to go to flight school just to play a game!

[Pummel 10]

I highly doubt there is such manual control IRL. I'd imagine it takes some computer intervention to get such a complex aircraft to stay in the air, why would they let some guy risk destroying their very expensive aircraft by trying to do it manually?

Because it's not 'some guy', it's a pilot they train incredibly intensively. They could already destroy the plane any number of ways, but they don't because they are skilled.

The Harrier pilots can certainly do it, and it was only through experimentation that they tried thrust vectoring in actual combat to out manoeuvre enemies. They have full manual control over the plane. The F35 may be more modern and computer based but it could well still allow you to do it. It's not even that risky a prospect if you are careful. It's far more dangerous to do low level flying which is what pilots are doing almost constantly these days.

Edited July 25, 2010 by Pummel

[RomeoSierra 10]

The Harrier pilots can certainly do it, and it was only through experimentation that they tried thrust vectoring in actual combat to out manoeuvre enemies. They have full manual control over the plane. The F35 may be more modern and computer based but it could well still allow you to do it. It's not even that risky a prospect if you are careful. It's far more dangerous to do low level flying which is what pilots are doing almost constantly these days.

I imagine it would be computer assisted. The pilot may have manual control but if he makes a mistake, for example vectoring in such a way as to send the airframe into a spin or stall, the computer would 'auto-correct' to stop the fatal manoeuvre.

[Big Dawg KS 6]

Because it's not 'some guy', it's a pilot they train incredibly intensively

I'm pretty sure they wouldn't be trained in things like that. Like I said, it's likely highly automated, and since vertical takeoff is already considered "risky" I doubt they'd ever let the pilot fly "manually" like that.

[Pummel 10]

Maybe, but that's just speculation. I could speculate that they would be trained to use the aircraft to it's full potential. I've seen footage of Apache and FA18 pilots doing very dangerous silly stuff. I wouldn't even be surprised if it was encouraged to some extent.

[ryguy 10]

In flight, thrust vectoring is automatic. The F22 as well as the F35 do it. It's only manual on landing.

[TechnoTerrorist303 10]

The f22 doesn't exactly vector to the same extent as the f35 as the F-35 does it to change into a vertical flight mode, f22 has it for added manouverability. There are some big differences between the vertical modes of the F-35 and the Harrier. When a Harrier goes vertical, the nozzles on the side just vector downwards which can be done with a lever that is controllable by the pilot, the F-35 opens flaps on the top and bottom and vectors the main jet exhaust downwards, all of which needs to be done in a synchronized manner to achieve vertical flight without added death. This would need to be coordinated by a computer I would think to avoid stalling what is probably an already aerodynamically unstable aircraft (as modern fighters tend to be).

[Pummel 10]

Oh well, shame, because it would have been fun.

Maybe a modder can do it.

[wolfbite 8]

The fact is that The multi million dollar aircraft has a computer that is not going to let you stall it and destroy it. You have to attain minimum forward speed before it will rotate the engine to forward flight. The F-35'ad and harriers thrust vectoring are allmost entirely different so cannot be compared.

[Pummel 10]

The fact is that The multi million dollar aircraft has a computer that is not going to let you stall it and destroy it. You have to attain minimum forward speed before it will rotate the engine to forward flight. The F-35'ad and harriers thrust vectoring are allmost entirely different so cannot be compared.

Well the Harrier is multi million too, and nobody actually compared their thrust vectoring.