F18 RADAR is driving me insane!!

[blunt_waco]

F18 radar is frustrating me. I made a test mission and assigned su33 at 15,000 feet with radar ready for search. I fly at the same altitude and set radar for 80miles, 4 bars and 80 azimuth angle. Top of TDC shows 24,000 feet at 40 miles. RWR shows the su but radar doesn't. What's going on?

I was trying different bars 2/4/6 and I changed distance as well 40/60/80/160 and still nothing.

[Moafuleum]

How far away was that Su33? Which aspect did it fly? How fast was it? The radar is not a magic tool which shows everything within the spatial limits you give it.

 

Edit: about RWR. It only detects radar signals passively. Whether the radar beams, his RWR detects, are strong enough for your own radar to detect it as a contact is not implied here. His RWR is probably also showing your radar beam but only getting painted is not sufficient for also being effectively detected as a contact

Edited February 11, 2020 by Moafuleum

[blunt_waco]

How far away was that Su33? Which aspect did it fly? How fast was it? The radar is not a magic tool which shows everything within the spatial limits you give it.

 

Edit: about RWR. It only detects radar signals passively. Whether the radar beams, his RWR detects, are strong enough for your own radar to detect it as a contact is not implied here. His RWR is probably also showing your radar beam but only getting painted is not sufficient for also being effectively detected as a contact

 

 

I set the speed for the su-33 at 350, distance he wasn't far, even when I visually saw him at a distance when I zoomed in my RADAR would still not pick him up.

What do you mean by Aspect?

[razo+r]

Aspect, where was he heading towards?

 

Was he flying towards you, away from you or from one side to the other (90 degree to your flight path)?

[blunt_waco]

Aspect, where was he heading towards?

 

Was he flying towards you, away from you or from one side to the other (90 degree to your flight path)?

 

 

We were flying toward each other, he might be a little off to the right. Would this be a problem even though I set my RADAR at 140 degree?

[blunt_waco]

Aspect, where was he heading towards?

 

Was he flying towards you, away from you or from one side to the other (90 degree to your flight path)?

 

 

We were flying toward each other, he might be a little off to the right. Would this be a problem even though I set my RADAR at 140 degree?

 

 

Edit: I would say 30 degree to my right.

[Reckoner]

it's easier if you post a video or .trk file

[blunt_waco]

it's easier if you post a video or .trk file

 

 

I will try the same mission again tonight.

[Akula]

If he's heading towards you the radar cross-section may be quite small and hard to pick up. You could try climbing a bit or diving to get a better return and see if that helps.

[Raisuli]

You also have to remember you set your radar to look at an enormous volume of space the SU doesn't occupy. If you're head on starting at 40 miles co-alt try 1 or 2 bars, 40 degree sweep, 40 mile range.

 

 

If you can see the guy then you're inside about 46 miles (that's when I pick up bandits at max zoom). If you're not zooming she's way closer than that. 80 miles, 4 bars is overkill.

 

 

You can also set the bandit to a friendly country (because you're working on radar, not weapons), and play with the radar until it starts making sense. I can rely on my own radar, but I keep an AWACS in the air quite a bit as well.

[Kev2go]

Yeah, the radar sucks, that is why i always fly cap in the F-14.

 

Ironic when the only advantage the awg 9 should really have is absolute maximum range you can detect targets, otherwise the apg73 should be superior in virtually ever other aspect.

Edited February 11, 2020 by Kev2go

[blunt_waco]

If he's heading towards you the radar cross-section may be quite small and hard to pick up. You could try climbing a bit or diving to get a better return and see if that helps.

 

 

I was taught not do that but instead adjust the scan elevation

[blunt_waco]

You also have to remember you set your radar to look at an enormous volume of space the SU doesn't occupy. If you're head on starting at 40 miles co-alt try 1 or 2 bars, 40 degree sweep, 40 mile range.

 

 

If you can see the guy then you're inside about 46 miles (that's when I pick up bandits at max zoom). If you're not zooming she's way closer than that. 80 miles, 4 bars is overkill.

 

 

You can also set the bandit to a friendly country (because you're working on radar, not weapons), and play with the radar until it starts making sense. I can rely on my own radar, but I keep an AWACS in the air quite a bit as well.

 

 

I will try the TWS then and narrow my scan area to where I can see su-33 on the RWR.

[blunt_waco]

It's very easy to post a track.

 

 

I didn't say it was difficult. I didn't think of saving the track after the mission yesterday. I will load the mission tonight and save the track. :thumbup:

[Exorcet]

Ironic when the only advantage the awg 9 should really have is absolute maximum range you can detect targets, otherwise the apg73 should be superior in virtually ever other aspect.

Indeed, the F-18 has the best radar in DCS at the moment.

 

 

Su-33's should be detectable well over 60 miles away. It's either not in your scan cone, or it's in your notch (perpendicular to you).

 

 

Try narrowing your scan volume if you have an idea of where the target is. Keep in mind that large scan volumes might not be able to continuously track a radar contact. For example 140 degrees and 6 bars might find a target only on the 2nd bar sweep, once that sweep is done it will miss the target until it gets back to the 2nd bar again, which can take long time.

[Moafuleum]

I set up a simple mission to test your settings. 15k altitude for both, 350 kts grounds speed for both, hot aspect. I was able to detect the Su-33 even at ~80 nm as you can see at the screen shot. Maybe even further out, i didn't try that. The azimuth angle setting and the number of bars should in fact not matter just for detection. However, the larger the scan volume is (which depends on the bars and degrees setting) the update rate of the contact is slower.

 

 

 

What was your PRF setting? (PRF: pulse repetition frequency) You can choose HI, MED, Hi/INTL (high/interleaved) and is selected on the radar page at the lower left corner. I have mine automatically set to HI/INTL as you can see in the screen shot. This can have an effect on the detection, but in fact i never change it to something else than HI/INTL and never had problems with it. However you can try to mess with this setting and see if you observe any changes. (But as said, don't expect much from it in this case)

Edited February 11, 2020 by Moafuleum

[falcon_120]

Remember that the numbers on top and bottom of the tdc represent the altitute coverage at the range of the TDC. This is very important, since the radar is like a cone so if the target is closer, lets say 15 MN at 15K it is very possible that he is outside of the radar "cone" even if its say 24.000/10.000 on the TDC and the target is at 15.000, just because you TDC is at a different distance.

 

So a good practice is to always place the TDC around the distance where you expect to detect the target, that way the top and bottom figures will more representative of your radar coverage at that distance.

 

Enviado desde mi SM-G950F mediante Tapatalk

[CarbonFox]

Yeah, the Hornet radar is still a WIP. It's why I take the F-15 out for CAP missions.

[falcon_120]

Yeah, the Hornet radar is still a WIP. It's why I take the F-15 out for CAP missions.

 

You guys are definetely operating the radar in a wrong way. The APG73 as is right now in the sim is amazing. It is able to detect almost any kind of target over 60Mn and even over 80 MN and that is just fighters. Since the introduction of TWS is even more deadly now.

 

So if you are having trouble detecting any kind of target in any situation please post a track or at least a videolink so we can all help you out.

[blunt_waco]

I set up a simple mission to test your settings. 15k altitude for both, 350 kts grounds speed for both, hot aspect. I was able to detect the Su-33 even at ~80 nm as you can see at the screen shot. Maybe even further out, i didn't try that. The azimuth angle setting and the number of bars should in fact not matter just for detection. However, the larger the scan volume is (which depends on the bars and degrees setting) the update rate of the contact is slower.

 

 

 

What was your PRF setting? (PRF: pulse repetition frequency) You can choose HI, MED, Hi/INTL (high/interleaved) and is selected on the radar page at the lower left corner. I have mine automatically set to HI/INTL as you can see in the screen shot. This can have an effect on the detection, but in fact i never change it to something else than HI/INTL and never had problems with it. However you can try to mess with this setting and see if you observe any changes. (But as said, don't expect much from it in this case)

I left it on default for AIM120C which I think Interleaved

When you set the SU33 on the map what command did you give it for the radar?

[blunt_waco]

You can try F-15 radar simulator. It's similar enough to F-18.

 

https://tawdcs.org/radar-f15/

 

Thanks for this. What an amazing tool.

[p1t1o]

Im not sure about exact sim mechanics, but IRL:

 

1. Due to inverse square law and the signal only having to go one way, RWR has significantly longer detection range than radar.

 

2. Add to that, a beam does not have to be painting you directly to trigger your RWR.

 

3. As a consequence of that, just because you get an RWR warning, doesnt mean you are definitely on his radar scope. He may well be having the exact same problem finding you.

 

 

 

 

4. Radar beam is only 2-3 deg wide, to fully scan a volume, one must change altitude and antenna elevation parameters periodically, so that you are scanning the volume from as many different directions as possible, to create as dense a "net" as possible.

 

5. RWS scans a volume faster than TWS, as it is looking for less information, it does not need to spend so long scanning a set volume (during TWS, the radar scans as it does in RWS, but will periodically return to tracked targets to update their situation - thats the "track" part in TWS)

 

6. FA18 radar is actually quite a small set, radar capability is strongly correlated to antenna diameter, although it should perform well within its design parameters. Su33 (amongst others) radar is not as sophisticated, but is huge and powerful. Im not saying these factors directly inform the difficulties you are having, but its something to be aware of. Under some circumstances, you should not be surprised when an adversary detects you first and you cant find him, FA18 is not a magic bullet.

[Kev2go]

Well this is not real life, so in this sim the F-14 picks up almost everything coming straight at you at the same alt.

In this video they claim we will never see such a powerful radar again.

 

Pilot bias TBH. The f14 being super powerful is true to an extent, but without context paints it to be a much better radar than it really is. At least thats the case fo the F14A and B. AWG9 has large radar antenna but its potential is not fully realized due being limited by 1960s analog processing technology and lack of medium prf. Nor does it have a PSP, and thus lacks other modes like RAID so it cannot discriminate against very closely flying targets. Enters F14D's APG71 it 70% commonality of Strike eagles APG70 tech ( in alot of the tech that is also shared in the APG73 radar). Now that was a truly epic radar, that could have been called the most formidable for the american aircraft of Gen 4.

 

Even SO AESA radars you have on F22, or even on some gen 4 fighter like the F15C and E's of today in turn literally make just about any Mechanical array radar look like crap, and thus can be considered more capable than even the APG71 of the Super cat.

 

 

The F14 picks up everything if your flying over the ocean or at mid to high level altitudes over land. As irl in game it is worse at detecting targets flying down down very low compared to the other teen fighters, worse at detecting targets heading away from you, and if jamming was semi decently represented, non resistant to EW.

 

Radars with medium prf are in fact overall better even in DCS. I've had a similar situation happen what the op describes in the f14's , but against a pair of flankers flying at low altitude, except they were heading away from me and not towards me. I litterally had to get in visual range and only with PAL managed to aquire, but radar would not pick them up in any of the RIO's search modes. For whatever reason radars just don't always detect stuff even for aircraft that you would otherwise full know where they are .

 

The only aircraft where this has yet to happen to me is in the Viper, but maybe i just haven flown it enough to have similar issues. DCS radars can be weird sometimes?

Edited February 11, 2020 by Kev2go

[FalconPlot16]

Yesterday i've barely found 2 L39's at 30 miles. They were flanking.

[Moafuleum]

I left it on default for AIM120C which I think Interleaved

When you set the SU33 on the map what command did you give it for the radar?

 

I didn't set up anything for the SU33's radar in the mission editor at all. I have just put it there and set the altitude and ground speed.