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What's the difference between cage and uncaged?


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Posted

I've been reading through the Manual for the F-5e before i purchase it, and i've come across this before in the FC3 manual, it talks about caging and uncaging the missiles, bit i've not been able to find what the difference if between the two. Apparently the terms are used in the f15 manual but are wrong as it's referring to the boresight. Would someone be able to explain the difference between them and in which situations to use them?

Saitek X-52 | Track IR 5 w/ TrackClip | DSD "Trackzilla" Button Box



Flaming Cliffs 3 | F-5e | Mirage 2000 | A-10c | Harrier AV-8B

[sIGPIC][/sIGPIC]

Posted

"Caged" just means the missile seeker is in a fixed position (typically boresighted) and unable to move. "Uncaged" means the seeker is free to rotate to track a target.

 

In the F-5E, you acquire the target when the missile is caged, by flying your aircraft to put your target in the seeker's boresighted position (the gunsight symbology assists with this).

 

Once you hear the tone change indicating the missile has locked a target, you can either fire with the seeker still caged (it'll uncage automatically), or hold the uncage button to allow the seeker to roam about and track the target.

 

The benefit of uncaging the seeker is that you don't have to keep the target directly in the (fairly small) position where the caged/boresighted seeker can see it. The most common use is to allow you to pull some lead on the target before firing, which reduces the amount of manoeuvring the missile has to do upon launch, allowing it to use that energy to increase the pK.

 

Another use is to deliberately aim above the target when it's flying very low, so the missile's initial trajectory takes it up, and it comes back down to engage the target. This can help to avoid the missile flying an intercept course directly into the terrain.

 

On the other hand, fiddling with the uncage button while manoeuvring your jet in combat increases the likelihood you'll make a mistake and miss an opportunity to fire, so often it's best just to fire when you first get the lock in the caged position.

 

The above is basically a loose and possibly misremembered summary of this thread: Aim9P To cage or uncage

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