DCS F/A-18C Hornet Air to Ground Radar & LITENING Targeting Pod Tutorial!

[@Spudknocker]

I know its a bit late now but I did want to bring you guys something to show off the new air to ground radar and TPOD updates in the latest open beta update! This video shows how to use the air to ground radar in conjunction with the TPOD to find and acquire targets quickly and efficiently!

[@DJones476]

Hey, Spud, awesome vid, Man. I'm seriously looking forward to the expand and freeze modes.

[@Taipan303]

Thanks for this, did they give any indication when it would move over to stable?

[@sometoastxd]

There is another reason to use the A/G radar, it's the best method to detect targets in all weather conditions when flying historically accurate missions prior to 2001. TGPs are a very modern piece of equipment and hornets flew for a long time without them.

[@MattVarnish1103]

Maybe ground targets arent the best targets, but since it can pick up ships on the water... its good for Harpooning!

[@schweizerluchs7146]

I like it the most for Visual IDing😁

[@picoletor]

cool that you are using an ALA-15 spanish C.15!

[@colderwar]

Excellent video - as always :))) you really have a knack for explaining things while also adding some interesting side information along the way...

[@Spudknocker]

Thank you man!

[@Bane_Diesel]

Too bad I fell in love with the tomcat man the hornet has all the cool shit... looks like I will have to buck up and relearn how to fly the hornet.

[@DJones476]

@Orangebike666: You can always cheat on the kitty with the bug...

[@homelander7506]

Tomcats hard mode compared to the Hornet which is easy as shit.

[@hellcat611]

I knew Ol' Spuddy would do us a solid with a review.

[@Spudknocker]

Haha here I am!

[@Sinbad683]

Yep I gotta relearn how to fly the Hornet. I'm currently campaigning my way through with the Tomcat

[@clevercat5844]

Good stuff here, thanks Spudknocker!

[@FalcoGer]

I can see that being useful in tasmo engagements where the targets will be on the move. And if you launch from 100 miles away you will not always have great waypoints and randomly slewing your targeting pod around to look over the sea will only get you an s300 in the face before you know what happened.

[@TacticalError]

Hi spud, you can also turn the JHMCS off by tapping the "RECCE Event Mark Switch" on the stick! It will not fully disable tho, so it will still slew a sidewinder, but it hides the symbology.

[@razorseal]

That's cool to know!

[@stingerrgb2754]

Funny that all comments got a heart, except this one...

[@joshuastone2820]

Gotta say I love the on the fly back story

[@burtpilon1735]

Do you have to hold the trigger down when turning on the laser ? Or just one click to turn on and off. Thx man for your tutorials they are helping me tremendously 👍🏻

[@kerbo312]

Hold

[@tim-3705]

Trgt on located on the right of the flir display does not show up for my, and clicking the arming button causes it to switch back immediately. Help 😢

[@kurothas2181]

Why not with autolase? Its a much appreciate addition to the Pod, you could show this as well next time! It works with GBU´s and E-MAV´s very well

[@Spudknocker]

True I think I get caught not Trusting It haha

[@razorseal]

What's this about? the letting it lase itself?

[@DJones476]

@@razorseal "Ahhh...that's classified, uhm... You're on a need-to-know basis... We pray to God no one needs to _know_!"

[@vJaBoG32Laud]

On a sidenote: Lasing early is not bad form. It just elevates the risk of the bomb falling short because of it putting in too much steering too early and thereby bleeding its forward velocity.

[@Pekins]

cool video, but wished you explain how you are zooming in and out, and how do you laser something.

[@razorseal]

Thanks for that. Question 1 - How do you activate laser before it goes off automatically? I thought it was the "trigger" but that didn't work. Also I tried mapping first detent, and that didn't work. Question 2 - Why is it "bad form" to lase early? I would think it'd help align the bomb better from higher altitude. Thanks!

[@Spudknocker]

You need to have the TRIG boxed in the upper right soft Key

[@EricSeelig]

I read somewhere that the reason it's bad form to lase early is that the guidance system on the LGBs is not that sophisticated. Once the bomb picks up the laser spot and starts guiding, it can only use full deflection of the strakes one way or the other to keep the nose pointed at the target. So rather than falling in a ballistic parabola, it tries to fall in a straight line. If you lase too early, the bomb may lack the energy to get to the target and wind up falling short. In the Warthog you can set the autolase time, and the usual recommendation is ~8 seconds.

[@iltgdellosportivo2066]

Ground radar is very used in real life. U dont have a map and don't know where enemy tanks could be. It isn used to find an island or a city like u did but to find ships and jeeps bvr. Set the gain to the minimum place some tanks in the editor and try to find them only with the radar. Very satisfying trust me

[@Spudknocker]

You are incorrect sir

[@sloppydog4831]

"C-130s are evil" - Wagner, Matt -2020

[@Spudknocker]

They are very evil!

[@47SCIPIO]

Can confirm. If you've ever had to ride in one you know. They're the devil

[@Matthew.1994]

okay finding targets near a city is kinda ez with the radar but what if the target is in the middle of nowhere and you dont ahve waypoints. when there is no large radar spots like a city. how do you find those?

[@TacticalSandals]

how did you get your gameplay so buttery smooth? I have been having micro stutters every 10-20 seconds ever since the lighting update which was 2.5.6.2 (not sure why it made that a hyperlink..)

[@Spudknocker]

Hey man have you tried deleting your Meta shaders and FXO folders in your Saved Games folder?

[@TacticalSandals]

@@Spudknocker Sadly yes, its always the first thing I do after any major updates. (not so much the mini hotfixs)

[@TealJosh]

The hyperlink happened because the version number looks like an IP address. The lighting update is unfortunately more graphics intensive so you might have to take the L and lower the graphics settings. Big performance hits come from terrain object shadows, SSAA, SSLR and anistopic filtering. Also make sure that you don't have any outdated nvidia graphics settings enabled for the game. That update broke some the anti aliasing stuff from nvidia's control panel side of things

[@TacticalSandals]

@@TealJosh naw I figured it out, adding the autoexec.cfg with the hotplug disabled command line fixed the issue. I think the update a while back got rid of that file that I had added and just never noticed. Putting it back in the config folder got rid of all the stutters. 2080 super,32gb of ram and DCS is installed on a nvme ssd so dont think it has anything to do with the actual hardware.

[@TealJosh]

@@TacticalSandals damn I should check that myself. EDIT: Yup, it was removed for me as well.

[@SakibLH44]

how do you get the free float camera angle for all of the intros? it's so badass

[@yieovgwqxaz7912]

The f16 ground radar seems more high resolution?? Weird since f18 should be more a/g capable

[@klk1900]

The A-G radar is used a lot more now. In Syria GPS guided weapons are useless. They have a net jamming system that will jam gps guided weapons. Jdam/cruise missles etc

[@Rhinozherous]

Very clear and direct, thank you very much!

[@JayDKB]

I just click thumbs up before I even watch the video, I already know its going to be a banger video

[@OzDeaDMeaT]

Great video mate, thnx

[@danijelkraljev]

Great job Spud,but would you still stay on open beta or go to stable version after latest update,thx

[@Spudknocker]

I’m always open beta

[@danijelkraljev]

@@Spudknocker Ok,Iwas wondering sholud I go on stable and what is adva. /disatvantage?

[@flyingfatcats517]

New to DCS, thanks for the video! Big question: I see on this video and others that your head moves around and you can zoom in nicely. What are you all using, TrackIR, VR or? Whatever it is, I need it!

[@chadvader974]

How the heck do you zoom your targeting pod so far in. Mine 1) when i press zoom it doesnt smoothly zoom in like yours, it jumps frame by frame and 2) my level of zoom is no where near yours at that range :(

[@pxolqopt3597]

It sounds like you're using the atflir and not the litening

[@RealVENOMous]

Hey Spud, I tried that on my created mission, found my TGT on the AG radar and my FLIR never sync'd to the target as yours did. I literally put my TGT on my WP3 and the FLIR was no where close

[@charlylesuedois4129]

Thanks very interesting !

[@deejayGOLDEE]

without targeting pods, possible to lock groundtarget? ( with markpoints)

[@flyingpedal]

Very good video ! Its only Beta version ?

[@Despiser25]

You should put a cap on your video length. 15 minutes max. Like this one ;) An hour video usually takes me two or three hours to watch ;)

[@abyssalreclass]

Honestly I imagine the air to ground radar will be better for finding ships to attack right now

[@ALPHARICCO875]

Super, thanks

[@47SCIPIO]

I've noticed the last few days or so whenever I get airborne and turn on the TPOD it automatically designates a random point on the ground by itself a d I'm then unable to slew the TPOD at all no matter what I do. I have to turn the tpod off then back on again to designate a new target or area. Anyone have any suggestions?

[@TheMrGamma195]

Use the sensor select right again if it's stuck in point track you can cycle through it or you could use the cage uncage button most of the time it should be in snowplow mode on first activation

[@mykneeme]

Thanks @@TheMrGamma195 you’ve helped me out with this tip.

[@johnathandoe9346]

I can'l get my laser to fire, even while holding the trigger down.

[@Spudknocker]

Is the laser armed and do you have TRIG boxed?

[@johnathandoe9346]

@@Spudknocker my LTD/R switch don't stay armed . I'll flick it on and it'll flick back to safe.

[@schweizerluchs7146]

@@johnathandoe9346 it does that since the last update if you autolase it. You have to cycle it every time!

[@CalinDee]

@@johnathandoe9346 If you mean it instantly flicks back to safe mode, then you havent selected AG mode. As Schweizer Luchs has said, if autolasing it will automatically reset to safe a few seconds after impact. You will need to re-arm prior to any follow-up drops.

[@utley]

GMT isnt implemented yet, is it?

[@thebiggestoneyouveverhad]

T-pod still has no auto lasing function huh?

[@JSpidey]

It does.

[@seaniam81]

Ya it does now. If you don't use the trig function on the FLIR and have the laser armed it'll fire the auto laser. Just remember to rearm the laser after use.

[@necatisahin6585]

F-18 BLOCK-3 produced, if you tell her too

[@Vorenus1974]

wish they just tell you what button to push

[@dontaddmehobo]

everything is hard as fuck but your videos help the most. grim reaper has too much fluff and too much british accent. love your vids, good mix of patient explaining but getting to the point.

[@eq1373]

this is by far the most frustrating thing to try to do in the Hornet

[@erikpotter767]

Cool vid, and I know it's DCS is just a game. But, remember in the real aircraft you don't, just get to press the f10 map to see were the bad guys are. You don't get the luxury of hitting pause eather. 😆 LOL

[@Happy-tp4jd]

no the reason ag radar isn't used is that its trash, could pick up a camel that's moving

[@mikeduffy67]

TMA .... Too Many Acronyms :)

[@Obi1-KenBone-Me]

Theres nothing to talk about the surf mode.Its completely useless right now

[@dat_spartan_gamer7322]

hello

[@papabear6382]

i can't see any useful or convenient application of A/G for me it seems it's complicates everything to much. F10 map is way more convenient. unless i fail to see applications of A/G radar being better than f10 map i think A/G radar is completely pointless and don't needed.

[@phillipharrison8463]

Are you talking about using a fully visible F10 map to find targets? Because if so why play a sim then? Moving tank column, ships at sea. I know in the real F16, not sure about F18 you can cancel out stationery objects and terrain to only show stuff that is moving

[@papabear6382]

@@phillipharrison8463 no i'm not talking about fully visible map. if there is already known position of any targets A/G radar is pointless.

[@TealJosh]

@@papabear6382 it's not pointless for sea targets. I'm not sure how realistic ED is going to make the A/G radar, but it should be able do some quite clever things with forests.

[@DJones476]

@@TealJosh They can only make it as realistic as the law allows. A lot of the AN/APG-73 radar's features are still classified. I remember when the Link-16, IFF, and NCTR were all still _highly_ classified.

[@thert.hon.thelordnicholson7261]

@@papabear6382 it's actually super useful, at least in Falcon BMS - easy to spot a group of vehicles on the AG radar and then slave your TPOD to that point. For the initial acquisition of a group of targets it is very efficient. I guess it adds to your situational awareness too, which can't be bad.

[@floppa1-166]

‘Wagnermobile’