Capn kamikaze

IRL no, it is not possible, but in a game anything is.

The effect is the same though, the missile is guiding all on its own, there is a difference between keeping somethings last position/direction in memory so you can predict where it is going to be, and actually tracking it while it makes a turn.

Where you see me break left, and start to dive away, about half way down that dive, before I turned back into the Flanker, is about where I turned it off.

I doubt it, I turn off my jammer when I get closer to the bandits.

I know there are issues with it not dropping locks quick enough, but what is in that track just isn't funny, the lock has clearly been lost, the radar can't possibly be pointed anywhere near me, and it isn't like it's a few hundred milliseconds delay, the lock should be long gone, and the missile THEN initiates a turn. For all the complaining about the chaff, why is it that no one is complaining about this sort of unrealistic behavior? I've just checked the track again, from the POV of the Su, and he doesn't even lock me up, so what is going on here?

This tacview track proves just how messed up the R-27ER modeling is, it is behaving like an actively guided missile. I know there is an issue with DCS where it remembers but it shouldn't, but this is ridiculous, if you view the track pointing from the F-15 to the Su-27 at about 11 minutes in, the Su has clearly turned away long before the R-27 makes its last turn before nearly hitting me. https://www.datafilehost.com/d/cb074804

The difference in diameter translates to frontal surface area, but the effect of that can easily be less than the skin friction drag coefficient of an aircraft or in this case a missile, and that is dependent on "wetted area", which having much more control surface area will contribute to. The missile is hardly going to be at zero alpha except for fleeting moments during the flight.....

IMO it simply comes down to this, of all the factors that are different between the AIM-120 series and the AIM-7 the main ones are the control fins, which in the case of the mid body fins, the AIM-7 has about four times the area as on the AIM-120, and the motor. Now back to the topic of the R-27R, that missile is a lot larger than the AIM-7, it is longer, wider, weighs more (so retains more momentum) and has a lot more control surface area than the AIM-7, smaller mid body fins, but larger rear body fins, but it also has the forward body fins that the AIM-7 doesn't, but it has the capacity to fit a much bigger motor, never mind the ER version. That capacity for a larger motor is what makes all the difference, and is why IRL the standard R-27R should have a longer reach than the AIM-7, and the ER should have a massively longer range, so if things were modelled correctly, and they are not, then the R-27R should be the best comparison to the AIM-7, not the ER as that is taking things way beyond a reasonable comparison. In my experience, R-27R's tend to be launched before I can comfortably launch AIM-7's and expect them to get to were they need to go, and ER's LONG before. Trying to pretend that the AIM-7 and R-27ER are comparable is nothing but an attempt to try to stack the deck.

Which would be a significant change, going from a round dome tip typical of an IR missile to a sharp point typical of a radar missile is a significant change, going from a sharp point tip to a slightly sharper point tip is not significant, remember this is all in comparison to the significance of the difference in the size of the control surfaces between the two missiles, we're looking at what contributes the main aerodynamic difference, and it is clearly the control surfaces.

I don't agree that the difference is significant compared to the difference between the control surfaces Which means that the burn profile for <C5 is not that different. Already mentioned better guidance during mid-course flight as being a factor.

The overall profile makes the most difference.

Note the last bit of that line.... changing the control surface size to make them similar to the AIM-120 would be a major airframe change.

I'm saying that it didn't, not that it couldn't, and because it did not it would natually have more drag from large control surfaces as opposed to what the AIM-120 has from its much smaller surfaces. If you were to put small control surfaces on the AIM-7 you would have a missile that is physically quite similar to the AIM-120. If you did do that, the AIM-7 would have a longer range than it did, but no such "clipped wing" AIM-7 ever existed. One reason you can't just change it so easily is that the AIM-7 is a midbody fin steered missile, and the AIM-120 is a rear fin steered missile, and because of the missiles steering fins being at the rear they will produce a control moment about the missiles COG, raising the nose, and dropping the tail. The AIM-7 on the other hand produces a control moment at the middle, about the rear of the missile (the fixed fins, which naturally want to stabilise the missile) and it has to raise the nose and the midbody, which means doing that will fight against the control input, hence the much bigger fins near the middle.

Which both are not significantly different, especially compared to the difference between the surface area of the fins, in purely aerodynamic terms with the exception of the midbody fins, the AIM-120 and AIM-7 are very similar. The length of each missile is the same, the body diameter difference is nearly the same, only 20mm between them, the size of the rear fins is very similar.

The C-5's bigger motor, and the improved guidance from the C-3 stage (more efficient flight path) would be the others.

BTW, the clipped control surfaces of the AIM-120C is also part of the reason why the C has a greater range than the B..... I guess that's "interesting" too.

I'm mentioning it as part of the reason why the AIM-120 has a range advantage over the AIM-7 while both missiles have very similar dimensions. Its not "interesting" as you would like to characterize it. There was never any version of the AIM-7 that had control surfaces as small as even the AIM-120A or B, if there was that would have helped, but..... there wasn't. The R-27 has a lot more control surface area than both the AIM-120 and AIM-7, but it has a lot bigger motor..... Come on, it's not that hard to follow.... I find it "interesting" that you would like to try to pretend I am contradicting myself, I note how you conveniently didn't mention I was comparing the AIM-7 to the AIM-120, and the major physical difference between them being the drag inducing parts, while their volume is fairly similar, it's almost as if you're picking and choosing which bits of what I have said you're wanting to talk about..... Which I find "interesting".

And a major part of the reason the AIM-120 in general can fly further is because of the much smaller control surfaces, which obviously means much less drag than the AIM-7.

The reason for that is fairly obvious, it is more profitable for ED to focus on aircraft and map modules than actually fixing the fundamentals.... Someone had to say it, so it may as well be me.

Well yeah, because the R-27ER does not exist in a vacume.

That's all that could really do, change the chemical composition and design of the motor, without a major airframe redesign, and doing that would cause problems, if you made it bigger overall, or did what the Russians did with the R-27 and simply make the back end bigger to make the ER, then any airplane that carried the AIM-7 semi-recessed would either need to be modified or simply not be able to carry the new shape.

Get a copy of "Gulf Air War debrief", there are accounts of quite a few of the engagements in there, and plenty of other topics like the airstrikes, and naval aviation, the later engagements tended to be against strike aircraft like Su-22's etc, some were no doubt rear hemisphere shots. Also don't forget that if we're going to compare the R-27 to the AIM-7 then you have to consider that the AIM-7's airframe was established in the late 1950's, and that set the physical size of the later versions, the R-27 was designed about 20-30 years later, so fitting a bigger more powerful motor was an option, were as with the AIM-7F/M/P it was constrained by what had already been established decades before.

Yes, they are, and that is what we're talking about, you can define max kinematic range quite well, but max effective range is more down to a judgement.... and the max range of the AIM-7M is about 50km, and its effective range if you use real world engagements as a measure is at most 30km, eg in GW1, and most launches that resulted in kills in that war were at about the 20km mark.

You would have to judge for yourself, there is info out there on both missiles, the general figure given for the AIM-7M is about 50km being its max range, some sources are slightly higher, some are slightly lower, there is also info out there about the R-27R and ER, with figures for the R of about 70-80km, and the ER of about 120-130km. So take that for what you will, but remember the R-27 is a larger missile, with a bigger motor, but not much heavier, so it's highly likely it will have longer burn time and thrust so a longer range is pretty much assured.

If modeled correctly there is no way in hell that the AIM-7M vs R-27ER is anywhere near an even match. What we need is ED to get on with sorting out the missiles, instead of this incessant bickering and calls for turning it into airquake.