Chaff and flare dispenser help?

[SebastianP]

I've been sorting through my downloaded mods and trying to combine the lot of them into one giant mod folder, which is so far working out pretty nicely. Among the aircraft in some of the larger mods I'd downloaded I found a few that weren't available separately, at least not anymore, such as the C-5 and C-17, both of which I thought were nice additions. Looking at their data.ini files though, I found that both of them had some really generic chaff launchers set up, with 200 chaff per aircraft, which is not at all accurate as far as I've been able to determine. Those C-5s that had countermeasures at all, had four flare launchers mounted under the nose, and the C-17 has four groups of three flare launchers under the forward fuselage and on the sponsons.

 

I've been able to get the C-5 launchers more or less in place, by trial and error, but I've run into a serious snag trying to do the same with the C-17. The first set works just fine, but when I add a third and fourth dispenser, the game suddenly doesn't find any of them. This is... less than ideal, in my opinion...

 

Here's what I've worked out for the C-17:

 

[ChaffStation1]
SystemType=DECOY_DISPENSER
EjectPosition=-2.2,12.0,-3.1
EjectVelocity=-1.0,-0.5,-2.0
NumChaff=30
NumFlare=60

[ChaffStation2]
SystemType=DECOY_DISPENSER
EjectPosition=2.2,12.0,-3.1
EjectVelocity=1.0,-0.5,-2.0
NumChaff=30
NumFlare=60

[ChaffStationA]
SystemType=DECOY_DISPENSER
EjectPosition=-2.5,5.0,-0.5
EjectVelocity=-3.0,-0.5,-2.0
NumChaff=30
NumFlare=60

[ChaffStationB]
SystemType=DECOY_DISPENSER
EjectPosition=2.5,5.0,-0.5
EjectVelocity=3.0,-0.5,-2.0
NumChaff=30
NumFlare=60

 

With the top two entries only, the system works, and flares eject more or less where I want them. Add the other two, and suddenly there's 0 flares and 0 chaff on the aircraft...

 

 

I had similar trouble with the BOL dispenser mods for the Gripen (I didn't try the others) - at present, three of the four BOL launchers work, but the fourth is thumbing its nose at me, and I don't know right now if the BOP/C launchers are correctly set up either.

 

Also, is there a way to make different size flares for different aircraft? The B-1B for example has *huge* flares (12 to a launcher that'll fit 30 chaff cartriges) with similarly huge effects when you look at RL photos. Are we completely stuck with one size fits all here?

 

(I'm currently using a copy of the SF2NA.exe to run the game - might this be the source of my problem, or am I looking in the wrong places? There are several aicraft in the mod folder with large numbers of flare launchers in their .ini files that I've yet to test, and it would be very strange if those had been uploaded if it couldn't be made to work...)

 

Cheers, and fly safely!

 

Edit: I'm an eedjit. The problem was I hadn't added the proper "system" lines in the fuselage section. Once I did that, all the dispensers started working. Bah.

Edited March 19, 2013 by SebastianP

[SebastianP]

My "corrected" C-17 Globemaster III:

 

 

The flare effect I have installed right now sucks rocks, and the aircraft really needs a nice new skin, but at least it's launching chaff and flares from approximately the right locations now.

 

Now, the aircraft themselves were found in Operation Darius, and don't appear to be available separately. The readme for Darius credits the aircraft to Veltro2k - is he still around somewhere, so I can ask for his permission to post my corrected .ini files?

 

Also, someone mentione waaay back that the ALE-50 towed decoy system had been implemented in the Super Hornet for SF2. Was this done with any other aircraft, like the B-1B (which has 8 of them) or the F-16C (4)?

[+Wrench]

pretty sure I did an upgrade pak for Globemaster .... it probably got removed during The Pruge. I guess I should re upload it

 

However a new model reaaaallllyyy!!! is required ... the lod needs optimization; more than 2 or 3 parked on base drops the frame rates to single digits.

 

You go ahead and post the ini, and I'll incorporate the changes before upping the sf2 C17 pak again

Edited March 19, 2013 by Wrench

[SebastianP]

OK!

 

Position info for the C-17 countermeasures systems:

 

[ChaffStation1]
SystemType=DECOY_DISPENSER
EjectPosition=-2.2,12.0,-3.1
EjectVelocity=-1.0,-0.5,-2.0
NumChaff=30
NumFlare=60

[ChaffStation2]
SystemType=DECOY_DISPENSER
EjectPosition=2.2,12.0,-3.1
EjectVelocity=1.0,-0.5,-2.0
NumChaff=30
NumFlare=60

[ChaffStation3]
SystemType=DECOY_DISPENSER
EjectPosition=-3.7,5.0,-1.5
EjectVelocity=-5.0,-0.5,0.0
NumChaff=30
NumFlare=60

[ChaffStation4]
SystemType=DECOY_DISPENSER
EjectPosition=3.7,5.0,-1.5
EjectVelocity=5.0,-0.5,0.0
NumChaff=30
NumFlare=60

 

Make sure to add proper SystemName entries under [Fuselage].

 

Dispenser entries for C-5 (Pacer Snow):

 

[ChaffStationLeft]
SystemType=DECOY_DISPENSER
EjectPosition=-1.2,33.0,-3.0
EjectVelocity=-1.0,-0.5,-2.0
NumChaff=30
NumFlare=30

[ChaffStationRight]
SystemType=DECOY_DISPENSER
EjectPosition=1.2,33.0,-3.0
EjectVelocity=1.0,-0.5,-2.0
NumChaff=30
NumFlare=30

 

No further changes needed for this one, unless you want to change the chaff/flare mix.

 

If the C-141B is out there somewhere, I'd love to get my hands on it.

 

A nice reference I've found for at least knowing where to *look* for the countermeasures systems on USAF aircraft:

 

http://www.0x4d.net/...to00-105e-9.htm

 

This is a USAF technical order for fire and rescue crews, which lists all the hazard areas and systems, including the chaff and flare systems if applicable. Very helpful. :)

 

Edit: I haven't noticed any slowdowns even when taking off from a base loaded with the beasties. Then again, I've got a Core i7-2600 with 16 GB RAM and a Geforce GTX 465... I haven't found *anything* that slows that down noticeably. :)

Edited March 19, 2013 by SebastianP

[Falcon1364]

Hey guys,

I used the upgrade for F-4E IIAF; however, I am unable to use chaff/ flare. I checked the DATA.INI, and I was not able to find any correspondence to Chaff/Flare section. Could you please help me to resolve this issue? Thanks a lot. 

Edited September 24, 2020 by Falcon1364

[+Crusader]

Not every variant has decoy dispensers.  Iranian F-4s were modified only in the 1990's or later.