Just an extension on saying you need the generators on for the data link to be showing: It's not just having the a generator switch flicked up with at least one engine powering it. Your throttle needs to be a bit closer to the metal bar for it to spool up enough. If your throttles are still floored, like when you're still prepping on the ground from a cold start, then you won't be seeing wingmen icons on your ABRIS, etc.
Nice tutorial sir. I've been playing BS for many years but never realized that the antennas for DL are on the tail. The fun fact is that losing the shark's tail make her "a Ghost" literally. Not only the DL, but also the game system itself won't recognize the airframe's existence😒
Interesting. I didn't realise that... so that's then somewhat like a Tomcat losing both engines and then recognised as dead in terms of AI trying to kill you etc.
Hello Volk. Thank you sharing your experience. I am working myself into the Ka50 atm and do have a question about the accuracy of DL targets. Although doing the NA INU alignment, my Shkval is not able to skew directly on the DL target, my wingman designates. Do you have any suggestion how to improve accuracy? I seem to be off mostly about 100-200m from target.
So there's likely always at least a small degree of accuracy unless they're hovering right beside you. Ensure the alignment's done perfectly, and use Fix Points to deal with significant drift. Also correct the barometric pressure on the baro gauge for your area - that makes a difference.
Just a bit of a correction, but the datalink MODE dial with the "WINGMAN, COMMANDER" do NOT decide who you are in the flight. #1 is always flight lead, and #2 through #4 are wingmen. The MODE selection determines how datalink messages are able to be transmitted. WINGMAN means anyone can transmit to anyone, while COMMANDER means only #1 can send and receive to and from everyone; but #2 through #4 can only send and receive to and from #1, not to each-other. EDIT: Officially, that is. I don't know if the functionality works that way in DCS. I've seen claims both ways; which is true?
I'd have to rewatch the vid for my exact wording. But what I was trying to say is #1-4 on the Who-Am-I (or Who-I-Am, depending on which version you read), determines your ID on the datalink for sending messages and your ABRIS icon number. It'll also prevent you seeing people with the same number, and flash if other numbers conflict. The commander-wingman knob according to the manual is supposed to do something like you describe, limiting who can send-receive, but from what I've tested in DCS, it doesn't. All it does is change whether you appear as having one or two double circles on the ABRIS maps of other Black Sharks on your Datalink. It probably matters for specially created missions or milsim groups - but for most join-whenever sessions, this makes no difference - you anyway tend to respond to the number more than the circles. Can't comment on how it's supposed to work IRL. If you found my above description differs from what you saw in the video & I'll pin errata.
@@volkvoort I watched the video, you explained it the same here as in the video. Good to know the behavior differs from what is typically quoted. I wonder which is correct; the manual information or the in-game behavior? Hard to tell if it's a bug/design change for gameplay or actually more accurate.
Hey Volk! Great video! And I'm not sure what throttle you've got, but if you have the ability to change a rotary axis to a non-axis switch, I was able to get that to work. I've got the Orion throttle, and from what I can tell you're only able to have one actual rotary axis assigned to the rotaries, but the others simulate is as if you're clicking it up or down once with each detected movement of the rotary, if that makes any sense. I was able to map my Panel Lights rotary to "ABRIS Axis Decrease" when turned to the left, and "ABRIC Axis Increase" when turned to the right. I could also use the depress feature of the rotary for "ABRIS Axis Push".
Thrustmaster TCWS. I'll need to upgrade sometime. I those ones bound. And the FSK pushbuttons to some of my Numpad keys. The ABRIS knob using keyboard is slower than the mouse if you're click & dragging in the right directions though, so would have been cool if it could be axis bound, so you can do the faster movements and then small corrections with ease.
@@volkvoort Ah yeah, the TCWS definitely doesn't have the same millions of buttons on the base. I've been looking at grabbing the collective handle for the Orion base, so I can get something a little more real while flying helicopters, but damn, everything is so expensive in this stupid hobby. I'm loving these videos! I've been getting back into helicopters recently (naturally, my virpil pedals died a few days ago, so now I'm waiting on parts...) and these have been great for learning the Ka-50, since a lot of the previous videos were remnants of stuff released back when the Black Shark originally released.
@@aaronwhite1786 yeah, some older vids are prior to patches, but some of the current ones feature new bugs like having rocket recoil, or the ABRIS not being able to fail atm. win some lose some I guess. Maybe there's a bug-fixing drive push for Black Shark 3.
@@volkvoort One thing I asked about on the ED Discord was if the Black Shark 3 release would bring new key-mapping abilities for everything, since one area that really lacks right now with the Black Shark is the availability to map things with the range of buttons modern HOTAS setups offer. The gear itself is a big one, since it's essentially a keypress, instead of an up/down toggle. Similarly I wanted to map the APU/ENG1/ENG2 to one of the 3-way switches on my throttle base, so I could do the entire startup process (well, on the engine panel at least...) without having to look down and toggle the switch with the mouse, but it's also just a button and not a 3-way switch. I've heard there are some workaround lua files, but I'm still hopeful the new new Black Shark 3 will revamp the controls for both modules. I'm looking forward to seeing it when it comes out, and hopefully there will be some servers with some fun red vs blue missions once we've got the Apache and Kiowa for the blue side.
@@aaronwhite1786 Gear was a big one... I almost imagine laser being on or not was also just a single toggle instead of two possible bindings, but that may just be the way I set it up rather than a system limitation.
from the main menu options > Gameplay tab > Avionics language. If you set that to English from the default/native, then Betty will speak in English and the ABRIS will have English text. HUD's still Cyrillic, but there's hardly anything on it.
Just an extension on saying you need the generators on for the data link to be showing: It's not just having the a generator switch flicked up with at least one engine powering it. Your throttle needs to be a bit closer to the metal bar for it to spool up enough. If your throttles are still floored, like when you're still prepping on the ground from a cold start, then you won't be seeing wingmen icons on your ABRIS, etc.
This is the kind of detailed wisdom that is rather rare on YT. Thank you.
Ahahahahah the David Attenborough impression was spot on!
Just sending a big thank you for your excellent tutorial vids. Big help!
Much obliged
The intro was really well done! it made me chuckle.
Thank you for taking the time to make this tutorial on the effective employment of the DCS Ka-50 module's Data Link and ABRIS for us.
Nice tutorial sir. I've been playing BS for many years but never realized that the antennas for DL are on the tail. The fun fact is that losing the shark's tail make her "a Ghost" literally. Not only the DL, but also the game system itself won't recognize the airframe's existence😒
Interesting. I didn't realise that... so that's then somewhat like a Tomcat losing both engines and then recognised as dead in terms of AI trying to kill you etc.
Hello Volk. Thank you sharing your experience. I am working myself into the Ka50 atm and do have a question about the accuracy of DL targets. Although doing the NA INU alignment, my Shkval is not able to skew directly on the DL target, my wingman designates. Do you have any suggestion how to improve accuracy? I seem to be off mostly about 100-200m from target.
So there's likely always at least a small degree of accuracy unless they're hovering right beside you. Ensure the alignment's done perfectly, and use Fix Points to deal with significant drift. Also correct the barometric pressure on the baro gauge for your area - that makes a difference.
Just a bit of a correction, but the datalink MODE dial with the "WINGMAN, COMMANDER" do NOT decide who you are in the flight.
#1 is always flight lead, and #2 through #4 are wingmen. The MODE selection determines how datalink messages are able to be transmitted.
WINGMAN means anyone can transmit to anyone, while COMMANDER means only #1 can send and receive to and from everyone; but #2 through #4 can only send and receive to and from #1, not to each-other.
EDIT: Officially, that is. I don't know if the functionality works that way in DCS. I've seen claims both ways; which is true?
I'd have to rewatch the vid for my exact wording. But what I was trying to say is #1-4 on the Who-Am-I (or Who-I-Am, depending on which version you read), determines your ID on the datalink for sending messages and your ABRIS icon number. It'll also prevent you seeing people with the same number, and flash if other numbers conflict.
The commander-wingman knob according to the manual is supposed to do something like you describe, limiting who can send-receive, but from what I've tested in DCS, it doesn't. All it does is change whether you appear as having one or two double circles on the ABRIS maps of other Black Sharks on your Datalink. It probably matters for specially created missions or milsim groups - but for most join-whenever sessions, this makes no difference - you anyway tend to respond to the number more than the circles.
Can't comment on how it's supposed to work IRL.
If you found my above description differs from what you saw in the video & I'll pin errata.
@@volkvoort I watched the video, you explained it the same here as in the video.
Good to know the behavior differs from what is typically quoted. I wonder which is correct; the manual information or the in-game behavior? Hard to tell if it's a bug/design change for gameplay or actually more accurate.
Yes, clickable is nice but I find the keyboard to be more realistic.
and it's waaay faster
Hey Volk! Great video! And I'm not sure what throttle you've got, but if you have the ability to change a rotary axis to a non-axis switch, I was able to get that to work. I've got the Orion throttle, and from what I can tell you're only able to have one actual rotary axis assigned to the rotaries, but the others simulate is as if you're clicking it up or down once with each detected movement of the rotary, if that makes any sense.
I was able to map my Panel Lights rotary to "ABRIS Axis Decrease" when turned to the left, and "ABRIC Axis Increase" when turned to the right. I could also use the depress feature of the rotary for "ABRIS Axis Push".
Thrustmaster TCWS. I'll need to upgrade sometime. I those ones bound. And the FSK pushbuttons to some of my Numpad keys. The ABRIS knob using keyboard is slower than the mouse if you're click & dragging in the right directions though, so would have been cool if it could be axis bound, so you can do the faster movements and then small corrections with ease.
@@volkvoort Ah yeah, the TCWS definitely doesn't have the same millions of buttons on the base. I've been looking at grabbing the collective handle for the Orion base, so I can get something a little more real while flying helicopters, but damn, everything is so expensive in this stupid hobby.
I'm loving these videos! I've been getting back into helicopters recently (naturally, my virpil pedals died a few days ago, so now I'm waiting on parts...) and these have been great for learning the Ka-50, since a lot of the previous videos were remnants of stuff released back when the Black Shark originally released.
@@aaronwhite1786 yeah, some older vids are prior to patches, but some of the current ones feature new bugs like having rocket recoil, or the ABRIS not being able to fail atm. win some lose some I guess. Maybe there's a bug-fixing drive push for Black Shark 3.
@@volkvoort One thing I asked about on the ED Discord was if the Black Shark 3 release would bring new key-mapping abilities for everything, since one area that really lacks right now with the Black Shark is the availability to map things with the range of buttons modern HOTAS setups offer.
The gear itself is a big one, since it's essentially a keypress, instead of an up/down toggle. Similarly I wanted to map the APU/ENG1/ENG2 to one of the 3-way switches on my throttle base, so I could do the entire startup process (well, on the engine panel at least...) without having to look down and toggle the switch with the mouse, but it's also just a button and not a 3-way switch.
I've heard there are some workaround lua files, but I'm still hopeful the new new Black Shark 3 will revamp the controls for both modules. I'm looking forward to seeing it when it comes out, and hopefully there will be some servers with some fun red vs blue missions once we've got the Apache and Kiowa for the blue side.
@@aaronwhite1786 Gear was a big one... I almost imagine laser being on or not was also just a single toggle instead of two possible bindings, but that may just be the way I set it up rather than a system limitation.
its weird i have my cockipit on english but that screen is still in russian
from the main menu options > Gameplay tab > Avionics language. If you set that to English from the default/native, then Betty will speak in English and the ABRIS will have English text. HUD's still Cyrillic, but there's hardly anything on it.
@@volkvoort thank you very much sir