Multiple target engagement

[zare]

Sorry for late participation, first to reflect some things about the Su-35.

 

The Terminator never saw it's production. In fact, the Terminator was testbed for vectorthrusted engines, mounted on SuperFlanker. I don't know exacly why Russia never pursued Su-37 production, but, the Su-35 SuperFlanker is in production, and there are 11 Su-35s in active service with VVS.

 

It uses N011 and N011M radars, fore/rear. N011 has the ability to track six targets at once.

 

Regarding the Foxhound, the aircraft and it's systems are based around long-range stategical interception. Meaning - take down the bombers. It's radar works exactly your singlecore CPU does. One process at a time, but on a timesharing base, with context switching so fast that you have a "virtual parallelism". Considering that large bombers cannot move fast enough to phase out a radar beam in the "switching" interval, the hound's system proves itself. And R-33 is a long-range missile. Agile or not, the hound can fire it from a great distance, and always make more capable fighters go defensive.

[4c Hajduk Veljko]

AFAIK, both PESA and mechanical radars lack the beam agility to designate 4 targets for attack with SARH missiles in an instantaneous manner - only AESA radars can direct multiple, fine radar beams from its antennae array AFAIK.

PESA does it sequentially (this is your assumption) and AESA simultaneously. End result is the same.

 

I do think that the MiG-31 uses time-sharing to attack targets simultaneously with multiple missiles…

Therefore MiG-31 can truly attack multiple targets simultaneously.

 

…(i.e. the designation of targets is not simultaneous, even though the attack is).

Therefore the attack is truly simultaneous. However, the target designation might be (you don’t know, you think) sequential, which in turn allows for simultaneous flying of 4 R-33 missiles towards four different targets (different speed, altitude, aspect angle …).

 

So, Pilotasso is sorta right IMO in stating that it's not a "true" multiple-engagement capability (where all targets are designated/tracked simultaneously), but it effectively accomplishes the same thing with SARH missiles by virtue of a PESA radar.

First you say that it is NOT true, and then you say that it truly does the SAME thing. Well …

 

In the end-game, of course, the "true" multiple engagement method allows the launching aircraft to break lock and leave, since it utilizes ARH missiles. The PESA/R-33 combination cannot.

So “true” multiple engagements use ARH missiles and “other” multiple engagement uses SARH missiles. Both of them will provide target info for multiple missiles flying simultaneously towards multiple targets.

 

So MiG-31 can truly engage up to 4 targets simultaneously. End of a story.

[4c Hajduk Veljko]

PS this post is not inteded for confrotation; i can accept disagreements, I could be mistaken about my assumptions but I do not see how can you fire 4 SARH missiles with 4 tagets in their viewcones. As GG says they should be time shared.

I don’t take your posts confrontational.

 

By the way, one (possible) method to paint multiple targets for multiple SARH missiles is sequential/multi channel. Se post #49 on this thread. The result is simultanious multiple target engagement with SARH missiles.

[SniperRu]

Su-27s are gradually getting uprgraded to SM variant, and those surely have the ability to engage multiple targets at once.

 

Just my 2 cents.

[GGTharos]

Yes, those will. However they're a couple decades late.

[D-Scythe]

Hajduk Veljko, I'm *agreeing* with you in that the MiG-31 can attack 4 targets simultaneously like the F-15C can. However, I'm *also* agreeing with Pilotasso in that the way the MiG-31 accomplishes is in a much different manner than the F-15C. The means is different, even though the end result is largely the same.

 

What the MiG-31 does (from publically available info) is to use its advanced PESA technology to overcome the shortcomings of SARH missile technology when engaging multiple targets.

 

Theoretically, the end result should be the same, but practically, there are important differences. For one, the more targets the MiG-31 attacks simultaneously, the less effective its AA-9 Amos becomes, since they recieve less updates less frequently. On the other hand, the F-15C/AIM-120 combination is not hampered by such a limitation, and being that the AIM-120 guides itself during the end-game, it's PK is not affected as significantly as the AA-9.

 

With the F-15C, it's a "true" multi-engagement capability in that missile PK isn't as affected when target number is increased, unlike the AA-9/MiG-31. Actually, from now on, I think we should stop calling it "true" multi-target engagement because that seems to push your buttons a bit. I'd call it a "normal" multi-target engagement, and the MiG-31 "SARH" multi-target engagement.

 

Yes, those will. However they're a couple decades late.

 

About 15 years. And if it's going to be armed with the baseline R-77, the -27SM ARH missile armament would also be about 15 years behind too, as that missile doesn't offer anything more than what the AIM-120A offers.

[4c Hajduk Veljko]

However they're a couple decades late.

Late for what?

[4c Hajduk Veljko]

Hajduk Veljko, I'm *agreeing* with you in that the MiG-31 can attack 4 targets simultaneously like the F-15C can. However, I'm *also* agreeing with Pilotasso in that the way the MiG-31 accomplishes is in a much different manner than the F-15C. The means is different, even though the end result is largely the same.

You do agree however, some other participants to this thread do not.

 

Actually, from now on, I think we should stop calling it "true" multi-target engagement because that seems to push your buttons a bit. I'd call it a "normal" multi-target engagement, and the MiG-31 "SARH" multi-target engagement.

Multi target engagement is only one. There are several methods to accomplish it;

a)radar-wise it can be done with PESA/AESA/Mechanical moving antenna radars

b)missile-wise both ARH and SARH can be used.

[Maximus_G]

So I guess, something like illuminating Target 1 for 0.1 seconds, on channel A, then moving onto Target 2 for another 0.1 seconds at channel B, etc. etc. until the radar cycles back to Target 1, channel A, 0.3 seconds later (in a 4 target engagement).

...

For one, the more targets the MiG-31 attacks simultaneously, the less effective its AA-9 Amos becomes, since they recieve less updates less frequently.

http://forum.lockon.ru/showpost.php?p=239922&postcount=67

Every R-33, regardless their quantity in flight, receives an update every 20 ms.

[Alfa]

The MiG-31 could guide those missiles easily, actually. It was one of the first aircraft with an electronically-scanned array, so its radiation patterns could be directed quickly enough to guide early SARH missiles to multiple targets.

 

Bingo! :) .

 

This is the reason why the MiG-31 can engage more than one target at a time with R-33 SARH missiles. But it isn't really a case of "guiding" the missiles, but rather that the instantaneous beam pointing allows for a CW-like illumination of more than one target at a time required by the SARH seekers of the missiles to home on the targets at terminal stage. Russian SARH missiles such as the R-27R/RE and R-33 employ a datalink for midcourse guidance and thus could be guided towards target from TWS mode in the same way as an R-77 or AIM-120 - the reason this isn't the case for the R-27R/RE is simply because TWS mode of the N019 and N001 radars doesn't provide the necessary CW illumination for the SARH seeker at terminal stage.

 

These radars(N019 and N001) - require the antenna to physically move to move the beam and since it is mechanically actuated, it cannot do this quickly enough to provide CW illumination for more than one target at a time.

 

Cheers,

- JJ.

[Alfa]

Okay, we all know the Russian aircraft aren't capable of simultaneously engaging multiple targets using TWS mode like the Eagle can..

 

No not the flyable versions modelled in Lock-on, but there are more advanced multirole versions of both the Fulcrum(MiG-29M and MiG-29K) and Flanker(Su-35, Su-34) with new multifunctional radars capable of multi-engagement with ARH missiles(R-77). Additionally there are upgraded versions such as the MiG-29SMT and Su-27SM, for which the original N019 and N001 radars respectively were upgraded with this capability.

 

..but today I was wondering why the Russian aircraft cannot engage multiple targets by using a SARH missile and then, while the SARH is outbound, locking a different target using an IR missile. It seems like it should be possible, but it isn't; the SARH will lose lock if you try using any other targeting mode. Such an option would very helpful when you're up against impossible odds in the flanker. I was wondering if this feature is a true technological limitation or something that simply wasn't implemented in LO.

 

Because the firecontrol system is set up in such a way that it can only engage one target at a time - it can do this either by radar alone, by EOS alone or use a combination of the two. But it cannot engage one target with one sensor and another target with another sensor.

 

To clarify: why, for example, can you not track one target with the radar and then use your helmet mounted sight to fire an R-27ET at the next target before the 27ER has reached the previous target?

 

A lock by the helmet mounted sighting device alone is not enough for a missile launch - the device is merely for designating the target for the missile seekerhead.....i.e. telling the seekerhead where to look for the target, but the seeker must see it by itself and lock on to it before the missile can be launched.

 

By the way, what was the first model of flanker and fulcrum that featured true multi-target engagement?

 

MiG-29M/MiG-29K and Su-27M(Su-35). These were fitted with new radar designs(NIIR-N010 "Zhuk" for MiG-29M/MiG-29K and NIIP-N011 for Su-35) that were "built around" the R-77 missile.

 

It should be mentioned that the initial version of the N011 radar was a planar slotted array, while only the later N011M version is a electronically steered phased array.

 

Also many people think that the MiG-29S(9-13S) was the first Fulcrum version to be compatible with the R-77 missile - this is not the case. This ability was a case of "back-fitting" the missile to a "baseline" MiG-29 version by modifying the N019 radar to recognise it.

 

Cheers,

- JJ.