Northstar98

As an addendum to this, the newest model depicts the pylon on the right wing for LITENING/Sniper targeting pods. This was first operational in 2003 [1], [2], [3] meaning our B-52H is most likely a late 2003 aircraft, considering we also have Harpoon (albeit wrong variant and wrong quantity). This also means it would fit fairly nicely with many of ED's teen-series modules like the F-16, F/A-18C and in the future the F-15C and is perfect for Iraq War missions. This means that weapons of the conventional enhancement modification program (circa 1994-) are applicable and given that we have Harpoon, we also have a Harpoon Mod aircraft. We have the HSAB, so the CEM program applies. The AGM-142A Raptor/Have Nap and its associated AN/MSW-55 data link pod was the first on the list for the CEM program, from circa 1994. [4], [5], [6] The JDAM (GBU-31(V)1/B and (V)3/B) reached IOC on B-52H circa Dec 1998 [7] and WCMD reached IOC on the B-52H in 2000 [8], the AGM-158A JASSM also reached IOC in 2003 [9] meaning it is accurate as well. Therefore, the following weapons are accurate: AGM-84D-1 Harpoon Block IC (×8) - note we have 12 AGM-84A. TO 1B-52H-34-2-2 states that only 4 can be carried on each HSAB (3 occupying the forward-most stations and 1 on the rear-centre station). AGM-142A Raptor/Have Nap (×3) and its associated AN/MSW-55 data link pod. AGM-158A JASSM (×12 externally) AN/AAQ-28(V)1/2 LITENING II CBU-52 (27 internally + 18 externally on HSAB) CBU-58 (27 internally + 18 externally on HSAB) CBU-71 (27 internally + 18 externally on HSAB) CBU-87/B CEM (unsure on quantity) CBU-89/B GATOR (unsure on quantity) CBU-97/B SFW (unsure on quantity) CBU-103/B WCMD (16/18? externally on HSAB) CBU-104/B WCMD? (16/18? externally on HSAB) CBU-105/B WCMD (16/18? externally on HSAB) GBU-10x/B Paveway II (at least 8 externally on HSAB) GBU-12x/B Paveway II (12 externally on HSAB) GBU-31(V)1/B JDAM (12 externally on HSAB) GBU-31(V)3/B JDAM (12 externally on HSAB) M117 (×27 internally + 18 externally on HSAB) https://www.raf-fairford.co.uk/operation-iraqi-freedom/ https://www.airandspaceforces.com/article/1103bombers/ https://www.joebaugher.com/usaf_bombers/b52_17.html https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/news/2003/04/mil-030415-rafael01.htm http://www.airvectors.net/avb52_3.html http://www.designation-systems.net/dusrm/m-142.html http://www.designation-systems.net/dusrm/app5/jdam.html https://www.designation-systems.net/dusrm/app5/wcmd.html https://investors.lockheedmartin.com/news-releases/news-release-details/lockheed-martins-jassm-certified-ready-operational-use-stealthy https://www.airandspaceforces.com/PDF/MagazineArchive/Magazine Documents/2003/May 2003/0503weapons.pdf

Hi everyone, In the changelog, the following is mentioned: However, post update the lights appear unchanged to how they appeared when the issue with them was first reported, in this now locked post: S-3B_ARS_lights2.trk

Hi everyone, The recent update has introduced some unexpected behaviour for the AI when performing a racetrack orbit. Unlike previously, where upon activation of the task the AI would fly directly to the next waypoint before making its 180° left turn, now, upon activation of the task, the AI immediately performs a 180° turn to the right, immediately followed by a 180° turn to the left. They will then fly to the next waypoint, make a correcting turn to the right and then commence the 180° left turn to begin the racetrack. Fortunately, subsequent "laps" of the racetrack are perfectly excuted - completely as expected and the AI no longer needs to make corrections upon finishing a turn, which is fantastic to see. However, the initial behaviour upon activation is undesirable, especially for practice missions with tankers and receivers that start from the air. There’s no reason for the initial right, followed by left turn, all it does is displace the aircraft laterally from the intended course line and it's only something the AI later corrects when reaching the first turn. Instead, what should happen is that the AI should proceed to the next waypoint as it did before, perform its 180° turn, fly the reciprocal course until it reaches the start point, do another 180° turn and so on, as it does for subsequent laps. Orbit_2.9.12.5336.trk

Make that 2018 for the Intruder

So long as the road network is accurate (and accurately depicted) I don't see why not - even if they aren't configured as airbases (like Kola for instance) - we already have invisible FARPs, it's fairly trivial to set them up. The only problem is the AI though as they need dedicated aerodromes.

Definitely very excited for this one and yes, we definitely could do with its own subforum. One thing I will say (and something I'll no doubt be repeating) is please include empty SAM and EWR sites - if they can be something akin to this, then that would be basically perfect, but even a generic layout of each type placed correctly would suffice (which was sort-of-ish done with Syria, but only with the SA-2, and only in some locations and even then the generic site wasn't that accurate). I've attached 2 .kmz files from SAM Site Overview.kmz by Sean O'Connor, showing the positions of SAM and EWR sites in the FRG and DDR (though this doesn't include British Bloodhound and Rapier sites, though as I understand it, the former was usually stationed somewhere on or adjacent to some of the RAF airbases). Many sites are still extant with their layouts clearly visible in present-day imagery, but even examples that aren't usually are in historical imagery (the main exception being Nike Hercules IFC sites). Just for some examples: DDR.kmz FRG.kmz

What about air defence assets? Currently, the latest long(-ish) range REDFOR SAM system is the S-300PS from the 1980s (basically the same vintage as the MiG-29 in development), for BLUFOR the latest is Patriot PAC-2 from the early 1990s. Could we expect to see an SA-17, SA-20 or SA-21? These are systems the F-35 was designed to defeat.

Sorry for the OT post, but would you consider doing the same for the S-3B? It's a bit different as we have 2 versions and technically speaking, only some weapons belong on one of the versions (and that version can only be used as a tanker), but for the rest of it all but one of the weapons already exist in DCS.

@DSplayer @Default774 Well this is confusing - if it were a C-5 all along, why the change of name from AIM-120C-5 to AIM-120C in the loadout list?

Hi everyone, The AZP S-60, S-68 (as used on the ZSU-57-2) and AK-725 have some issues with their muzzle flashes; sometimes they won't produce a visible flash and even when they do, the muzzle flash pales in comparison to what's seen in real-life footage. This, combined with the lack of gun smoke, results in firings that are far harder to spot visually than perhaps they should be. The S-68 and AK-725 are both derivatives of the S-60 and all fire common ammunition. It should be said that the AK-725's flash is different to that of the -60 or -68, due to the absence of a muzzle brake. S-60: S-68: AK-725: AZP_S-60_muzzleflash.trk S-68_muzzleflash.trk AK-725_muzzleflash.trk

Well, there is a level of absence of evidence isn't evidence of absence. I'm not saying you're wrong, but the SA-N-4 (essentially a navalised SA-8, but using the exact same missiles) does have limited capability against cruise missiles. If it's able to detect and acquire cruise missiles within the engagement zone of the missile, I can't see why it shouldn't be able to engage them, especially with low line-of-sight rates. If we can source some figures on expected detection distances against whatever RCS target, we should be able to determine when it might be able to detect a cruise missile. However, this'll probably depend on the operators, optical tracking is completely manual and as for the radar, acquisition is done via a fairly manual process. Not quite, because the majority long-range SAMs are all PVO systems, whereas the SA-8 is a PVO-SV system which falls under the ground forces (army), so it would've been protecting mobile systems like the SA-4, -6 and -11. The only "long-range" PVO-SV systems were/are the SA-11 and 12.

For the AGM-158 - that's the JASSM, which doesn't exist in any version in DCS (and the AGM-158C is the LRASM). Is that referring to the JSOW (where the B-1B does have access to the C, but not the A).

Now that the higher quality models have been released, I wanted to bump this. Excluding an ED AAQ-25 (though is externally identical to the AN/AAQ-14 ED are supposed to be developing for the F-16), the missing stores that DCS support are all already present in-game, for both variants. While some weapons technically only apply to the tanker version, ED could, as a stop-gap, either enable weapons that only came with the 2002 Maverick Plus upgrade (even though the regular S-3B is no later than 1998) or make a new unit by duplicating the S-3B tanker model, remove the air refuelling store and the permanently equipped drop tank and give the weapons to that. Then when buddy stores are properly supported (i.e. as a loadout option) the S-3B tanker can be deprecated and then both S-3Bs can receive the buddy store.

Yep, that's how it appears in the track - thanks for the reproduction

Hi everyone, A minor-ish bug with the newly added S-3B models (which look absolutely stunning ) - the lights on the Sargent-Fletcher A/A42R-1 air refuelling store on the S-3B Tanker show as a missing texture, making it very difficult to tell which light is illuminated unless you're already familiar with the configuration of the pod. S-3B_ARS_lights.trk

This bug appears to have re-emerged in the latest update (2.9.11.4686). As before: It doesn't appear in the mission editor. It doesn't appear on AI aircraft. It doesn't appear on player aircraft if equipped at mission start. It doesn't appear on player aircraft when rearmed via the ground crew menu. AI_F-4E_ALQ-131_rack.trk AI_F-4E_AVQ-23_rack.trk AI_F-4E_AVQ-23FT_rack.trk F-4E_ALQ-131_rack.trk F-4E_AVQ-23_ALQ-131_rack_rearm.trk F-4E_AVQ-23_rack.trk F-4E_AVQ-23FT_rack.trk

In DCS at least, yes - the fire-control radars (AN/MPQ-46 IHIPIR) have it as a unit dependency. See line 18 of this. IRL I'm not so sure, but I don't know enough about the HAWK to give a definitive answer.

Most EA modules already come close to a MVP state when initially released - this is a distinction without a difference. And ED have already arguably gone below even MVP state in the past, it doesn't need repeating (F-16). Modules don't get finished enough as it is and that's where scopes are very narrow (and even then stuff that fits said scope gets forgotten about). Speaking completely frankly - the last thing we need is the bar to be lowered any further.

And its obvious that the current system doesn't either. We've been through this multiple times - as long as there are different locations with different elevations the current system is nowhere near realistic. It overexaggerates the wind gradient over open ocean (and that's from documentation you yourself have cited), you even agree on this point. There isn't any backing or veering - it isn't even possible as the directions are locked. So it's not realistic there either. The best case scenario where this system is realistic, is if you only intend to operate within the vicinity of a single airport/in a confined area over land. Go outside of that area, and the realism goes off a cliff. Just for an example, at RAF Akrotiri (75 ft MSL) at the time of writing (13 December 2024, 1050Z) is reporting 9 knots at 260°, Damascus International (albeit with a METAR station located some distance away), at 2000 ft MSL, is reporting 12 knots at 340°. If I try and have an accurate speed for the former in DCS, the speeds at the latter are now 50% greater. As the direction is also locked, it's not only significantly greater, but it's also practically orthoganal to what it should be. While 340° is a crosswind at Damascus regardless, it's not difficult to imagine a situation where setting accurate winds for a particular aerodrome results in not only a crosswind where there shouldn't be/wasn't one IRL, but one where the wind is significantly stronger than it should be at another aerodrome. If I instead try and have accurate speeds at Damascus, now the speed at Akrotiri (and at sea level) is 6 knots as opposed to 9, so the IRL speed should be 50% greater than what I have. Because of the slower speed, I also have to make carriers go that bit faster to get my desired wind over deck - the waters on the Syria map are somewhat restricted, which can make route planning for them more annoying than it should've been, now that they're travelling greater distances in the same interval of time. Then, over the sea, the typical gradient between sea level and ~2000 ft should be 1.43 (i.e the speed at 2000 ft should be ~1.43× surface speeds) according to a document you yourself cited, but in DCS it's a little over 2, so it's already exaggerating by ~71% faster than it should be in that case. Whichever way I slice it I can't get them both realistic, any attempt I make will result in a zero sum, merely exchanging which location is accurate at the expense of others. And because they're rigidly locked together with a model that assumes a constant gradient regardless of terrain, making a compromise is far more difficult than it would've otherwise been were it possible to set them independently. Were it not for this shortsighted locking of the speeds and directions, I could set up a compromise that gets Akrotiri and Damascus more in line with reality and closer to sanity (so I'm not dealing with crosswinds that are 50% larger than they should be for instance). But it would make perfect sense to get around the current limitations of DCS' weather system, especially so on maps where there are suitably large elevation differences andf where you want to support both land based and carrier operations. Unless you want to do carrier operations or operations at sea, where it overexaggerates the gradient by a significant margin. Unless you want to set backing/veering, where it prevents you from doing so. Unless you want to try and best set the weather for multiple areas (particularly where there are sufficiently large elevation differences) - the locked set up makes it far more difficult than what you could otherwise achieve. Yes, the solution to all of the above is for DCS to have a better weather system, ideally one that allows you set up more localised weather. There was supposed to be a weather update beyond just graphics, but IIRC it's been years and years since there was any mention of it and even then, we've got no idea what it'll even consist of or even what the rough plan for it is, if indeed there is one.

Yep. Beamscanner reported this one over 6 years ago:

Yep looks like both issues are sorted now

My apologies - you are correct, further reading actually had these (at least the Sidewinder) as having tilted secondary mirrors, which implies conical scanning (though wiki also describes these as AM seekers, which implies spin-scan). According to this and this, the AIM-9E and FIM-43 have the same reticle frequency (though, not that it matters with conical scanning). The others though, sure (though some I don't know the numbers).

There are already spin-scan missiles in DCS - the AIM-9B, E (coming) and J (and possibly the P) are all spin-scan. For the Warsaw Pact there's also the R-3S, R-13M and M1. AFAIK the R-60 uses a spin-scan seeker too. EDIT: No, Dragon1-1 is correct - the document I used on this implies that conical came with the AIM-9L and R-60M, most sources actually describe the seeker construction as having a tilted secondary mirror, which would imply conical scanning. It would however be great to get Cold War MANPADs like the SA-7 and Redeye which are vulnerable to infrared jammers like L-116 and AN/ALQ-144 as those are more the intended threats these jammers were intended to be used against.

To stop them from strafing the target, make sure you set the weapon type to ARM (if available). I have a working mission attached below (AGM-45A_S-125M_test.miz) - this does indeed work. Here I have 4 aircraft, WEASEL21 and 23 equipped with Mk 36 guidance sections and 22 and 24 with Mk 37. Here all aircraft engage the site (though the Mk 36s consistently miss the Low Blow). Unfortunately AI behaviour is somewhat unexpected and inconsistent. I noticed that search then engage unit/group work against a Low Blow by itself (well + the Flat Face-B for acquisition) - see AGM-45A_SNR-125M_Mk36_SearchThenEngageG.trk (for group) and AGM-45A_SNR-125M_Mk36_SearchThenEngageU.trk (for unit). Add the launchers though and the same set up stops working, even with the AI set to not react and immortal. It also looks like AI behaviour with attack group/unit has changed - unless the radar is in a state where it can be engaged with Shrike the instant the attack group/unit task is called, the AI will forget about it and not engage it. AGM-45A_S-125M_test.miz AGM-45A_SNR-125M_Mk36_SearchThenEngageU.trk AGM-45A_SNR-125M_Mk36_SearchThenEngageG.trk

However, that behaviour changed in subsequent updates - allowing attack group/unit as well as search then engage to work (this is useful as, unlike the SEAD task, it gives you greater control - such as weapon quantity settings as well as control over what specific unit/group the AI should attack). I was able to reproduce the SEAD task working and the same for the Search Then Engage tasks. So I guess this report can now be treated as fully resolved. What I don't understand is why doesn't the AI attempt to make an engagement regardless? Especially when, if it does so, the SON-9 will start tracking and permit continuous Shrike guidance. But even with the SON-9 remaining in search (or even off the air) firing an ARM may still be desireable in order to achieve suppression (though obviously direct or LABS. By firing a weapon (even blind - and the Shrike certainly lets you launch it blind) operators may be compelled to keep their radar off the air (or in search). And in that case - why shouldn't the attack group/unit task work? On another note, I noticed that the AI will now perform loft attacks when the Shrike guidance section mode is set to loft, I'm not sure when that changed but I'm very grateful for it! @gillouf1 If you try the AI against the S-125, but set the Shrike guidance sections to loft instead of direct, you should find that they'll be more effective at destroying the P-19 as they will engage on the outer limits of the S-125's range.