F-14 Tomcat: History, Performance & Discussion

The consistency issues of the F-14 are more related to its airframe and sensors rather than its weapons.

  • The F-14’s have (afaik) one of if not the best FM’s for dogfighting in-game, BUT need near mechanical precision to be used to their max potential, and aggressively fall off if not flown ideally.
  • The F-14’s both have relatively poor acceleration which makes them severily punish their pilots for improper energy use (hence why it was commonly said that F-14’s should NOT be dogfighting when the F-14A was added for example)
  • The F-14’s have a tremendously min-maxed radar, with incredible range, power and scan volume/speed, but horrid notch angles and TERRIBLE TWS bar height (4 deg for regular scan, 6 for narrow scan iirc).
  • AWG-9 is not made to be operated by a single pilot, and as such all the short range aids (ie: ACM modes) are SUPER short ranged (9km) because the RIO is supposed to be doing all the radar work, letting the pilot focus on piloting the aircraft. This isnt modelled in WT, which could be rectified with this suggestion being implemented (cough cough shameless plug): Mouse designated radar lock for 2 seater jets
  • F-14A has the largest heat signature by FAR in-game, with the only thing competing against it being the literal sun. The heat signature is so massive R-60M’s can lock it in rear aspect at over 30km’s THROUGH CLOUDS (devs hit that bug report with “not a bug, kick rocks idiot” long ago) and has a horrid 60cm’s to try to deal with it.
  • F-14B caught a stray by having its BOL pods nerfed into the ground (unrealistically) when the gripen was murdering everything
  • Neither have HMCS/HMD’s (downside in uptiers)
  • They’re massive (super easy to hit)
  • They’re fragile (unrealistic, but oh well, seems to be gaijins opinion of 99% of american planes, and there aren’t exactly “primary sources” regarding the health points of wings, tails, etc… so thats never getting fixed…

imo the weapons are sorta the least of their worries. The AIM-54’s are still inconsistent/horrid vs anyone with half a braincell, but that’s never gonna get a fix cuz the 54A is accurate (or possibly even overperforming a bit afaik), and the 54C is never gonna have its guidance adjusted to be an actual threat vs fighters at ranges its supposed to be fired at cuz gaijin thinks they’re funny.

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wdym?

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Without clean turn charts, comparison to in-game performance is meaningless because stores drag and the affect they have on the FM is not accounted for. This is why stuff like Gripen doesn’t top out at mach 1.4 with air to air loadout.

16 → 24 degrees/s due to a -5000ft drop in height and 8 missiles seems excessive to me

Isn’t it 8 missiles?

1st photo is F-14A because You can see glove vanes.

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oops yep

given f-15 rates at about 20 degrees in the same config…

I’ve always found the FM odd. The slightest amount of damage turns the jet into a leaf and just gets forced into a flat spin.

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5000ft drop in height, and 3225lbs drop in weight, along with a (likely) superior aspect ratio and no missile drag…

Also, the 24deg/s is with 20min fuel, so more like 6239lbs drop in weight.

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to cause an 8 degree/s change in rate? going from 5.25G’s to 7.5G’s? i dont buy it, especially for an aircraft of it’s size where changes in carriage and weight have a smaller impact

23.65 degrees is basically 24 for my point.

Even you didn’t get damages, you can go flat spinning if you pushed rudder at low speed.

It is really annoying when I force 1v1 duel against enemy because in 1v1 duel situation, rudder is most important things for controlling.

The difference is ~16.2% increase in optimal TWR and 15.2% in static TWR, omitting drag from the missiles and as I stated, wing aspect ratio, which would play a significant part in the improved performance.

The 23.65 deg/s is with combat flaps, which iirc rarely got used because they liked to jam. The F-14 is also one of the very rare planes where the flaps actually improve its rate performance.

so clean your saying an f-14 outrates an f-15 easily?

And im comparing it to the 16 deg/s with combat flaps… the rate without is even worse and even less likely to become the 22.9 deg/s in game… 15deg/s at a higher speed btw

  1. idk the in-game tested STR’s for the F-15 for a similar config, so i cant comment on that
  2. You’re comiting the cardinal sin of rate comparison, which is looking at peak numbers on a spreadsheet and equating it to 1:1 in-game performance
  3. Reminder the F-14 commonly fought and won dogfights vs F-15’s and F-16’s. Its a tremendous aircraft in a dogfight due to its absolutely ABSURD effective wing loading (48 lb/sq ft (230 kg/m2) effective)

“Maneuver devices set to auto” is not combat flaps, its regarding auto wing sweep/flaps/slats, which does NOT inherently aim to maximize rate, as it typically means the system is attempting to maintain optimal average performance.

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Usually in 1 circle fights yes

As opposed to?

The F-14A was considered scary in the 1c, the F-14B and beyond was considered scary in both.

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