nighthawk2174

@FoxAlfaI am starting to believe what your seeing in that video may just be an artifact of English bias commands acting on the initial steering commands of the missile. When the missile is launched English bias will attempt to null out any aiming errs or unnecessary (for lack of a better word) additional G on the missile in both the Yaw and pitch axis. This can cause the missile to pitch up a bit more than in pure PN as the missile is nulling out aiming errors and when it is done nulling these out it would resume a more pure APN/PN course. And if the target is a parchute moving downwards this would add to the downward trajectory. Especially if the missile is APN as it would damp the maneuvering of the missile based on range rate and target acceleration. Which if both are "low" could result in the missile more gently pulling down into the target after the english bias pull up.

Yes this is specifically noted in several manuals. I have one for the F15 the unambiguously says it does.

I don't know watching the vid I don't see the second bend at all it looks far more like a smooth pull up into the target and not the second shape you drew.

Except the chaff itself looses velocity very quickly, i've seen numbers ranging from 1200-1600m/s. So it would also fall into the notch very quickly and also fall away from the aircraft very quickly.

Motor wise I do have doubts about the 120's burn time and thrust it produces but well there's nothing to prove ED's current modeling wrong for now. Same for the battery life, the 80 seconds comes from the vipers manual but it is for the 120B not the C. And considering the C got a new seeker and newer electronics I have a suspicion its battery life is longer than that of the B. But again there is nothing that we have access too to see if this suspicion is correct. The SD10 is probably fine as we should keep in mind its a larger missile than the sparrow. The only error is that its supposed to have a dual stage motor that burns at different times. The initial boost is supposed to burn out and the motor re-ignited latter on to get the missile up to a higher speed for terminal intercept. At least that's how Deka has described its operation.

IMO its more accurate this way especially for the 120's. There are numerous ways to reject chaff that these missiles have access too. Range gating, velocity gating, rejection if outside resolution cell, monopulse seekers can have possible but more limited rejection inside the res cell, rcs edge tracking, and possible other algorithms that can reject the chaff due to sudden RCS changes on the target. Chaff is just a limited CM, there's a reason western jets moved to towed decoys and a emphasis on stand off jamming. A document I have, and posted on another thread, was a test of a 50's era pulse tracking radar against chaff and it had a very low chance of break lock against an aircraft dropping chaff; often less than 1%, increasing towards 2% near the beam.

Yes! The Baltics would be a great map and i'm kind of shocked that it hasn't been made yet. It can fit everything from pre WWII to current events.

It is a direct increase in the drag force ontop of the already worse drag characteristics, plus this is in terms of frontal area which includes the grid fins. And remember this difference is cumulative the drag force is constantly acting on the missile during its flight and even small increases build up especially at longer ranges. Yes we are, in your view though how is the R77's guidance system the major limiting factor here. I don't know much about the R77's guidance system as there really isn't anything i've found especially in English.

No it probably does, however even with the loft the 77 we have in game will still have a bit less range than the 120B. I have gone into BMS and copied the current drag and motor characteristics onto its missiles (you can too). And the 120B has slightly more range, the 77 gets a bit faster but it is also a bigger missile that is only fractionally heavier than the amraam, and has worse drag characteristics, especially in the transonic region. Basically what GG said, its likely they will have similar aerodynamic properties. Its a larger bodied missile with a higher value drag coefficient curve across its speed range, especially in the transonic region, compared to the 120's. If the motor is not a dramatic improvement over that of the adder we have in game I just don't see it competing at all with the 120C7/120D. And considering that the 77-1 is only 15kg heavier (not all of that is going to be rocket fuel) I don't think it is that dramatic improvement. Maybe not even with the C5 if the motor is only a slight improvement over the original adder. It kind of depends on the missile.

Basically all of the bullet points are based off of stuff that is publicly available. There are textbooks out there about missile guidance and kinematics. And a lot of the things lacking in the old API from the new would result in the improvements I mentioned. The only thing that would fit something that SME's may know but can't say is if the 54C can go active on its own. Which is a shame as I would love a definitive answer as to wether or not it can so we can be sure that the 54C is properly simulated in this aspect.

Well based on my current understanding what we'll see is: -Smother loft, no more 600+kt energy bleeds at the top of the loft -APN, smoother guidance that is damped against target maneuvers at long range. -Possible increase in its maneuverability -Possible reduction in energy bleed in maneuvers -Possible increase in range performance? As motor on drag reductions are now taken into account Beyond this I would love to see the 54C be made so that it doesn't need a signal from the AWG9 to go active. Its my personal opinion that the 54C likely doesn't have this limitation (even HB agrees), digital electronics and INU on par with the amraam. However due to the lack of documentation on this is not going to change from how it is now.

The 77-1 still has the grid fins right? So its probably still very similar in performance to the adder we have in game. And considering the 120D has better range than even the C7 and a two way datalink (meaning it can get target position updates from the L16 network) its not exactly a question if it is better it just is and probably by a significant margin.

Could be the manual could have just rounded up

According too the -742-100 radar manual this behavior is accurate, "Spotlight is entered from any A/A radar mode except STT or STT RAID by pressing and holding the TDC for more than one second and then releasing the TDC...". Holding it will allow you to move the spotlight search around the scan volume.

@Chizhany plans on improving proximity fuzzes (especially in mp where their practically non-existent) for the improved missile API?

Well I mean in the timeframe of DCS it certaintly is and even now the 120D is probably still a worthy opponent to the meteor.

Probably its also monopulse as well the issue here is more with ED than HB. Chaff overall needs to be rebuilt but that's on ED's end ton HB's.

Agreed not to mention it'll fall out of resolution cell rather quite quickly as well.

Could be interesting if you could make the circle say green if the radar is silent, if that's possible ofc.

Well the fact that a specific ECM technique, cross eye jamming, had to be developed (mid 2000's?) to counter active monopulse seekers like the 120 (at least that's my understanding of it) I think speaks a lot about its ability to counter older jamming techniques. Nor are we sure about the exact effectiveness of this technique either.

The tactics may simply be for the highest PK possible but there's nothing there that says the missile is hopeless without it. If anything I wouldn't be surprised if keeping track of the target till impact (so long as you shot first and your missile will hit first) was for SA purposes so you didn't loose the target. Especially since from the vid it looks like their in a 2v4 situation.

I'm sorry but I think your underestimating the seeker and as mentioned above the manuals indicate no difference in PK after pitbull rather a big difference while its still passive (which I completely agree with). The datalink just allows while active too cover for possible rare events. There are other anti-notch teqniques, from the F18's radar manual its possible to flip off the MLC and also to just track the target if its return is separated in range from the MLC or if the target return competes with the ground clutter to just track it even in the presence of clutter. Not to me mention getting a notch on a missile is going to be extremely hard especially with the newer APN guidance algo. Not to mention the missile should be able to reacquire if notched (I don't think it does in DCS now not sure though) and considering the range at which the seeker is active staying in the notch the entire time that requisition is going on is not an easy feat. I'm sorry but what did I say that was false here? LOS rates is absolutely a possible avenue to build a loft profile that doesn't require ranging information. As can be seen there are missiles that loft without any range information in use.

TBF I can imagine a loft without range information stuff like the javelin shows its possible. I can't imagine you couldn't build something based off of LOS rates. Would it be as good, probably not but it may still be possible. Not to mention if host radar burns through it should go for a loft.

Ehh the performance the radar gets in range is already very impressive for its size and being a monopulse seeker with MPRF modes and modern digital electronics I think that my statement is more accurate.

Yes it doesn't work this way in DCS as of right now but it should work this way Yes it'll result in a higher PK but the missiles even without out datalink updates the missile is still going to be extremely resistant to both countermeasures and notching. Datalink updates are just the icing ontop for the rare circumstances where something weird happens or there are friendlies mixed in with hostiles.