Formation Take Off SOP's

[+baffmeister 1,205]

Tinkering with EzLead's staggered take off mod and noticed the wing man has to cross behind the lead aircraft to get into formation so was wondering, is there a military protocol that specifies which side of the runway the lead aircraft should be on during formation take offs? All I could find on the internet was the lead aircraft should be on the left hand side for left hand turn outs and on the right hand side for right hand turn outs. Great mod and the icing on the cake for Desert Target Zone!

[+russouk2004 6,958]

As far as I know it depends on wind direction so the wingie doesnt ingest his leads exhaust etc.

if wind from right of runway then lead a\c will be on left side and vice versa.

Edited February 10, 2012 by russouk2004

[+Dels 649]

As far as I know it depends on wind direction so the wingie doesnt ingest his leads exhaust etc.

if wind from right of runway then lead a\c will be on left side and vice versa.

It's actually because of the wingtip vorticies/wake. Lead will be on the downwind side if there's any more than 10kts of crosswind. If there's less than 10kts, lead generally lines up on the far side of the runway from where they taxi on.

 

Dels

[+baffmeister 1,205]

Thanks guys, will try to make it work with lead on the far side of the runway by choosing the appropriate take off direction. [one way runways]

[+baffmeister 1,205]

Unexpected problem! When using a runway 18 departure the player aircraft will point in the correct direction but the AI aircraft continue to point north, but from the correct positions. Must be some hard coding going on. For Desert TZ I'm just going to set them up with the runway 36 departure and the wing man on the left.