Hard to trim

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sparrows
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Joined: 29 Jul 2008, 16:24
Location: Germany

Hard to trim

Post by sparrows »

Hello,
I
Did my first ride, and the Hawk was well to manage except trimming it.
One tick up, you move up like sailplane hitting a big thermal.
One tick down, your going a dive.
At least i avoided to look at the vario but had my eyes on the horizon.

The spit is more reliable there, you can get a setting where she is very stable.

Any experiances or advices?

Peter

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Killratio
A2A Spitfire Crew Chief
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Re: Hard to trim

Post by Killratio »

Peter,

With the P-40 it is all about fuel load. There are wide differences in handling when certain tanks are full or empty. The "reserve" or "fuselage" tank is particularly problematic.
This is a feature of some of these high performance aircraft and is a symptom of the ever increasing need for fuel/range.

Later Spitfires with the rear tank were practically uncontrollable with that tank full..so much so that even though the tank was factory fitted on the "low back" Mk IXs, it was actually FORBIDDEN to use it!! Most had teh fuelcocks wired off!


Search this forum re fuel load and you should pick up some good rules of thumb/tips.

Darryl
<Sent from my 1988 Sony Walkman with Dolby Noise Reduction and 24" earphone cord extension>


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sparrows
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Joined: 29 Jul 2008, 16:24
Location: Germany

Re: Hard to trim

Post by sparrows »

Thank you.


I´ll give it a try and test some fuel settings.
That shows this fantastic A2A aircrafts aren´t created to light the fire and run. Love it.

Peter

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DHenriques_
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Joined: 27 Mar 2009, 08:31
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Re: Hard to trim

Post by DHenriques_ »

sparrows wrote:Hello,
I
Did my first ride, and the Hawk was well to manage except trimming it.
One tick up, you move up like sailplane hitting a big thermal.
One tick down, your going a dive.
At least i avoided to look at the vario but had my eyes on the horizon.

The spit is more reliable there, you can get a setting where she is very stable.

Any experiances or advices?

Peter
One thing about trim, and it's especially prevalent in trimming a fighter like the P40;

The technique you use in trimming the airplane is extremely important so that you're not working against yourself. There is a sequence involved and it's very important you follow it. That sequence is as follows;
1. Nose........PIN the nose where you want it.
2. Power........adjust the power where you want it.
3. Trim.........trim the pressure off the stick.

It's notable concerning #3 that using a desktop simulator controller you can't "feel" the aircraft like you can in actual flight in a real airplane. (Force feedback is NOT the answer to this). So after you have pinned the nose and are holding it steady with the controller, then adjusted the power where you want it, use your trim CAREFULLY and SLOWLY in extremely small and subtle steps to "find" a "sweet spot" where it's easy to maintain the nose position you desire.
It's also notable that in an actual prop fighter, you are trimming all the time with every power, airspeed, and attitude change, especially as fuel is burned and changes the cg.
Hope all this helps a bit.

joe bob
Senior Airman
Posts: 167
Joined: 25 Oct 2010, 15:28

Re: Hard to trim

Post by joe bob »

I have always used the joystick trim as a coarse trim adjustment and the Num Pad 1 and 7 for fine tuning with aircraft that are sensitive to trim. That combined with slight power adjustments has worked for me and the P-40. Still that Fuselage tank is the first to feed though.
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rc flyer
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Re: Hard to trim

Post by rc flyer »

Dudley Henriques wrote:
sparrows wrote:Hello,
I
Did my first ride, and the Hawk was well to manage except trimming it.
One tick up, you move up like sailplane hitting a big thermal.
One tick down, your going a dive.
At least i avoided to look at the vario but had my eyes on the horizon.

The spit is more reliable there, you can get a setting where she is very stable.

Any experiances or advices?

Peter
One thing about trim, and it's especially prevalent in trimming a fighter like the P40;

The technique you use in trimming the airplane is extremely important so that you're not working against yourself. There is a sequence involved and it's very important you follow it. That sequence is as follows;
1. Nose........PIN the nose where you want it.
2. Power........adjust the power where you want it.
3. Trim.........trim the pressure off the stick.

It's notable concerning #3 that using a desktop simulator controller you can't "feel" the aircraft like you can in actual flight in a real airplane. (Force feedback is NOT the answer to this). So after you have pinned the nose and are holding it steady with the controller, then adjusted the power where you want it, use your trim CAREFULLY and SLOWLY in extremely small and subtle steps to "find" a "sweet spot" where it's easy to maintain the nose position you desire.
It's also notable that in an actual prop fighter, you are trimming all the time with every power, airspeed, and attitude change, especially as fuel is burned and changes the cg.
Hope all this helps a bit.
Dudley, have you tried http://code.google.com/p/fscode/wiki/RealTrim? Basically lets you do steps 1 and 2 above. You designate a button to hold after step 1 and and as you move the stick back to neutral it adjusts the trim so that when you release the button at neutral stick your all "trimmed up".

Steve

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DHenriques_
A2A Chief Pilot
Posts: 5711
Joined: 27 Mar 2009, 08:31
Location: East Coast United States

Re: Hard to trim

Post by DHenriques_ »

rc flyer wrote:
Dudley Henriques wrote:
sparrows wrote:Hello,
I
Did my first ride, and the Hawk was well to manage except trimming it.
One tick up, you move up like sailplane hitting a big thermal.
One tick down, your going a dive.
At least i avoided to look at the vario but had my eyes on the horizon.

The spit is more reliable there, you can get a setting where she is very stable.

Any experiances or advices?

Peter
One thing about trim, and it's especially prevalent in trimming a fighter like the P40;

The technique you use in trimming the airplane is extremely important so that you're not working against yourself. There is a sequence involved and it's very important you follow it. That sequence is as follows;
1. Nose........PIN the nose where you want it.
2. Power........adjust the power where you want it.
3. Trim.........trim the pressure off the stick.

It's notable concerning #3 that using a desktop simulator controller you can't "feel" the aircraft like you can in actual flight in a real airplane. (Force feedback is NOT the answer to this). So after you have pinned the nose and are holding it steady with the controller, then adjusted the power where you want it, use your trim CAREFULLY and SLOWLY in extremely small and subtle steps to "find" a "sweet spot" where it's easy to maintain the nose position you desire.
It's also notable that in an actual prop fighter, you are trimming all the time with every power, airspeed, and attitude change, especially as fuel is burned and changes the cg.
Hope all this helps a bit.
Dudley, have you tried http://code.google.com/p/fscode/wiki/RealTrim? Basically lets you do steps 1 and 2 above. You designate a button to hold after step 1 and and as you move the stick back to neutral it adjusts the trim so that when you release the button at neutral stick your all "trimmed up".

Steve
This looks like a good program and should work for some. I have nothing but respect for folks like this who devote time and effort with freeware programs designed to make everyone's simulator experience a better one.
For me personally; I took a long look at the trim situation a long time ago and made a decision on how I'd handle it for my own personal use. Fortunately for me, a lot of the airplanes I've flown during my career used electric trim, especially the jets. What I've done was to assign my trim function to a 4 way stick hat for a thumb position that replicates the pine tree switches I'm used to. The pitch trim is a vertical axis function and aileron trim if available is a lateral axis function.
This allows me the normal procedure for pitch, power, trim, which works beautifully for me.

This small freeware program might work beautifully for others however and I see no reason not to recommend it.
Dudley Henriques

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