Land-based CIWS units?

[PoorOldSpike]

Ship-mounted CIWS are very good at shooting down incoming missiles, even smallish air-launched missiles like this one (Russian KH-29T TV-guided), but on land there seems to be no equivalent CIWS unit, or am I missing something? I think there are none in the real-world too, is that right?

Notice too the ships HQ-16 SAMs are also getting in on the act, firing at the small KH-29T, yet as far as I know (correct me if i'm wrong) no land-based SAMs will engage small missiles in the game and in the real world?

 

 

 

Below: Missiles-eye view..

[Silver_Dragon]

In fact, the only antimissile systems similar to a CIWS has the C-RAM

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counter_rocket,_artillery,_and_mortar

 

That has more centred on counter rockets, artillery and mortar systems. Some of them have:

- US C-RAM 20mn CIWS

- Israel iron dome missiles

- German Mantis 35mm

- Italian Porcupine 20mm and DRACO 76mm

 

Other has Direct Energy lasers as Raytheon and Israel Iron Beam.

 

[Northstar98]

Tunguska is probably the closest you get to a guns (+missiles) based C-RAM in DCS.

 

Bare in mind though that at the moment, these point defence systems (either the Tunguska or CIWS on ships) will only intercept missiles, glide bombs and large laser guided rockets like the S-25L, they won't intercept bombs or rockets (say from an MRLS) or mortar rounds.

 

[PoorOldSpike]

Thanks guys, I've just run the tests below to see how Russian warships respond to Mavericks and Harpoons.

 

First test: MAVERICK AGM-65F's (TV guided)

1- A group of 3x Hornets each almost simultaneously launch 4x Mavericks in a saturation attack against a Russian Neustrashimy frigate, and the ship begins launching SAMs aganst the Mavs.

(Note: for the purposes of the test I tagged the planes as 'Invisible' to guarantee the ship would only see and concentrate on the Mavs)

 

 

 

 

2- The Sams are Tors, so the test proves that Tors launch against small Mavs.

BUT the ships Gatlings DIDN'T fire against Mavs despite my running the test multiple times.

 

 

 

 

3- The Tors shot down about half the 12 Mavs but the rest got through like this one, and I repeat, the Gatlings never fired at all-

 

 

 

 

Next test- HARPOON AGM-84D's

1-The Hornets release a fusillade of sea-skimming Harpoon 84D's and this time the Tor SAM's AND the Gatlings open up.

Presumably the Gatlings radar can see Harpoons but couldn't see the smaller Mavs.

 

 

 

 

2- Go baby!

 

 

 

 

3- Eat this Jack...:)

(The splashes at top right are from Gatling bursts)

 

 

SUMMARY- I also ran identical tests with every other Russian ship type, and NONE fired their Gatlings at Mavericks.

Some (but not all) did fire their Gats and SAM's at Harpoons, so we can conclude that the larger the missile, the easier it is for ship defence systems to lock onto them.

Let me know if I've overlooked anything, and post your comments and death threats etc in this thread.

I'll run some ground based tests later to try to get an idea of which ground units can shoot down which missiles..:)

[Northstar98]

Hmmm, this makes me wonder about the performance between the RADAR systems of the respective systems (Kashtan CIWS has it's own FCR(s) on its mount, the Tor/Khinzal uses the MR-360 "Cross Swords" and the AK630 CIWS uses the MR-123 "Bass Tilt" FCR)

 

Or this might just be another thing with naval assets that DCS trips up a little on, though to be fair to ED they have a heck of a lot on their plate, and the naval environment has yet to become something of a priority.

 

I know that the MR-360 has its own independent acquisition RADAR, but in DCS it isn't implemented (though it might be animated for the Kuznetsov EDIT: On the SC Kuznetsov it is).

 

As for ground units, I'm pretty sure that the Patriot, Tunguska (SA-19), Tor (SA-15), Buk (SA-11) and the S-300 (SA-10) can shoot down missiles, obviously the S-300 and Patriot are only really going to be targeting cruise missiles, same-ish for the SA-11. SA-19 and SA-15 should be able to shoot down near enough everything (so long as it's either a glide bomb or guided missile as in DCS regular bombs/LGBs/JDAMs aren't engaged by anything, even though they should(?)), though obviously effectiveness is going to drop depending on RCS of the missile (though not sure to what degree RADARs are simulated for AI units, presumably it's pretty simplified).

[Raisuli]

Did the single mav hit sink the ship? I've noticed in PG it can take multiple harpoons to sink one of the built-in commercial ships, but a single mav sends it down faster than Crossroads baker.

[Shadow KT]

Ship air defenses are quite broken and most of the time not working as intended or at all. I have couple of threads reporting the issue, but no response.

[PoorOldSpike]

Did the single mav hit sink the ship? I've noticed in PG it can take multiple harpoons to sink one of the built-in commercial ships, but a single mav sends it down faster than Crossroads baker.

 

What's PG and Crossroads baker?

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CARGO SHIP HIT TESTS

 

Top pic- The Hornets launch a hailstorm of Harpoons at the 3x cargo ships (circled)..

Bottom pic- One Harpoon hit is enough to sink each ship.

(I later repeated the test using Maverick F's, just one hit sank the Dry and Bulk ships, but it needed 2 hits to sink the tanker.)

 

NOTE- for the record, the ingame Encyclopaedia gives the warhead weight of the Harpoon 84D as 225 kg, but the Maverick F warhead is only 136kg

 

[PoorOldSpike]

HITS ON A DESTROYER

 

In this series of tests the Hornets fired volleys of Harpoon 84D's and Maverick F's at this warship; 5 harpoon hits sank it, and then 7 Maverick hits sank it in another test.

 

 

 

 

Below: noob note, you can check what damage a ship is taking by going to the F10 map like below.

A full green bar above the ship indicates no damage, but in the middle pic the bar has shrunk a bit because the ship has started to take hits;

and in the lower pic the bar has shrunk a lot and turned red after the ship took more hits and will probably soon sink-

 

 

[PoorOldSpike]

RUSSIAN AAA UNITS vs MAVERICKS

 

1- The test setup, There are only 4x Russian AAA units in the game as far as I can tell (circled), i added a couple of radars for good measure.

I placed a T-90 tank group just behind them for the incoming Hornets to target-

 

 

 

 

2- The AAA's-

 

 

 

 

3- The Hornets each launch 4x Maverick F's against the Russians (circled)-

 

 

 

 

4- But the AAA units DON'T fire, and the Mavs butcher the tanks, indicating that AAA's can't see small Mavs-

 

 

 

 

5- but the AAA's can see the Hornets and engage them-

 

 

CONCLUSION- Mavericks can't be shot down by Russian AAA guns so they're immune.

I'll run more tests later to try to find a Russian SAM system that'll engage them

[PoorOldSpike]

RUSSIAN AAA's vs TOMAHAWKS

 

1- Out of curiosity I ran these tests to see if the same four AAA's would engage Tomahawks being launched from this Ticonderoga-

 

 

 

2- The Tic launched 10x Toms in quick succession, they fly low most of the way to the target then zoom up and dive like the ones at top left are doing.

Note the AAA flak bursts around them, confirming that AAA does fire at the large Tomahawks-

 

 

 

3- The AAA uinits are the same four as I used in the Maverick tests.

Here the truck gun lets fly at the incoming Tomahawks-

 

 

 

 

 

4- A Tomahawk's view of the tracer coming up at it.

NOTE- Only 1 (or sometimes 2) Toms were shot down out of 10, indicating that Russian AAA is not very effective against Tomahawks-

 

 

 

 

5- The Toms strike home-

 

CONCLUSION- Russian AAA engages large Tomahawks but not smaller Mavericks.

[PoorOldSpike]

SHIP-BORNE SAMS and CIWS vs TOMAHAWKS

 

1- A test which confirms a Neustrashimy destroyer will fire its SAMs and CIWS against a Ticonderoga's Tomahawks-

 

 

 

 

 

2- A Tomahawk getting clobbered.

Note- The Tom is a land-attack missile and you therefore can't target ships with it, so for the purposes of the test I targeted that bit of coastline just behind the ship.

The ship's defences were excellent, shooting down about 8 out of 10 Toms-

[Boogieman]

I believe China uses the LD-2000 in the land-based CIWS role. Perhaps Deka will bring it in at some point...

[Dudikoff]

You should try with Tor or maybe Tunguska land units against Mavericks. They are too small for the manual ZU-23s and Shilka to track and engage it.

[PoorOldSpike]

Thanks guys, I've been testing every Russian Air Defence unit in the game and found that only the Tor will fire at Mavericks like Dudikoff said..:)

 

Below: the Russian Air Defence families (many are radar and command units, not actual launchers)

 

 

 

1- the setup for each test, this example (yellow circle) is the SAM SA-10 family consisting of 2x missile launchers (blue circles) and 4x supporting radar and command units.

I placed a tank group behind them and ordered a Hornet group to approach from the top edge and launch Maverick F's at the tanks-

 

 

 

 

2- the Hornets launch their Mavs-

 

 

 

3- but the SA-10's don't fire at the Mavs, and neither do the Tunguskas in this other test below-

[PoorOldSpike]

4- confirmation that the Tor is the only Russian Air Defence unit that will engage Mavericks-

 

 

 

 

5- Sometimes Tors will hit a Mav head-on as below, but at other times a proximity-fuse detonation will get the Mav.

HOWEVER- I estimate that the kill rate for each Tor missile is only around 50%.

A Tor unit contains 8x missiles but they usually only manage to fire 3 of them because the small Mavs arrive so fast.

Incidentally, although some units also have cannons, they never fired them at Mavs.

 

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Below:Like I said, only the Tor fired at Mavs, so just to make sure that all the other Air Def units weren't asleep, I ordered the Hornets to fly directly over them to see if they'd fire at planes, and they did, like these SA-10's are doing

(The Hornets are 20 miles away but the SA-10 radars have already detected them, and the big SA-10 missiles have the range to reach them)

 

 

 

A proximity burst gets this Hornet-

 

 

SUMMARY- so Mavericks are not immune after all, as long as there are Tors around to engage them.

The Russian equivalent of the Mav is the KH-29T, it's TV guided like the Mav, so I'll run tests later to see if NATO has got any Air Def units that can shoot down KH-29T's..:)

[Raisuli]

 

What's PG and Crossroads baker?

-----------------------------------------------

 

 

PG is Persian Gulf (map)

Crossroads Baker is the most famous Wilson cloud in history. The underwater Bikini test.

 

We, and this includes ED, already know the ship damage models are borked, but it's still surprising that the smaller warhead is more damaging to ships. Makes me wonder how that's modeled under the assembler.

 

I played with ship damage a months ago working on Harpoon launches from the F-18 and IIRC the Soviet destroyers' performance varied significantly based on terminal behavior and cruise height of the Harpoons. I also seem to recall two destroyers were significantly harder to hit than one. Unfortunately I didn't document those results as well as you, but I ended up bringing in some Tico cruisers at one point to bat cleanup after my flight of 4 F/A-18s were done.

[SJBMX]

Some additional notes for you:

• Nothing will engage Walleye, presumably because DCS classifies it as a bomb, rather than a missile.
  
• SA-10 and SA-15 will engage SLAM. The SA-19 will also engage, but only with guns. Haven't tested with the SA-11.
  
• SA-15 will engage APKWS, presumably because DCS classifies it as a missile, rather than a rocket. The SA-19 will not engage APKWS. I have not tested APKWS against SA-10 or SA-11.
  

[Northstar98]

Nothing will engage Walleye, presumably because DCS classifies it as a bomb, rather than a missile

 

That's what I thought, which is a bit silly, any weapon that is able to be tracked by whatever sensor and within the envelope for the weapons should be able to be engaged.

 

SA-10 and SA-15 will engage SLAM. The SA-19 will also engage, but only with guns. Haven't tested with the SA-11.

 

Sounds about right, the SA-11 should also engage. Only thing I will say is that I think the Tunguska's guns are automatically laid via the RADAR (though it probably has the same modes as the ZSU-23-4), but the missiles are command-guided SACLOS, whereby an operator tracks the target optically. Though the search RADAR should give a bearing and range.

 

SA-15 will engage APKWS, presumably because DCS classifies it as a missile, rather than a rocket. The SA-19 will not engage APKWS. I have not tested APKWS against SA-10 or SA-11.

 

That's pretty crazy that it can engage APKWS, I wonder if it could IRL.

 

I mean if it can engage those, what's stopping it from intercepting large shells fired from artillery?

 

[SJBMX]

Only thing I will say is that I think the Tunguska's guns are automatically laid via the RADAR (though it probably has the same modes as the ZSU-23-4), but the missiles are command-guided SACLOS, whereby an operator tracks the target optically. Though the search RADAR should give a bearing and range.

 

This is correct, and engaging smaller targets with only the guns should probably be the expected behavior, I think.

[PoorOldSpike]

US AIR DEFENCE vs KH-29T's

 

Below: the US AD units in the current game (November 2020)

 

 

 

1- The Russian KH-29T in action trashing an Abrams through its frontal armour, it's TV-guided and is the equivalent of the TV guided Maverick F-

 

 

 

2- My test setup, I placed a line of US AD units in front of a target group of AFV's to hopefully protect them against incoming KH-29T's,

changing the AD units for different ones in each test-

 

 

 

3- The leader of an SU-25T group launches his KH-29T's-

 

 

 

4- Only the Rapier and the Roland fired at the KH-29T's, nothing else did-

 

[PoorOldSpike]

5- A Rapier missile takes a KH-29L head-on-

 

 

 

 

6- The Roland gets in on the action-

 

 

 

NOTE- Sadly the Rapiers hit rate against KH-29L's was very poor, it only hit about 10% of the time.

The Rolands hit rate was better but still missed about 50% of the time.

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In the tests,I tagged the SU-25T's as 'Invisible' to ensure the AD units concentrated solely on the KH-29T's, but when I removed the invisible tag, the AD units all fired at the planes like this Patriot is doing-

 

..and gets a proximity burst kill-

 

SUMMARY: The tankbusting missiles Maverick F and KH-29T will only be shot at by the Russian Tor unit and the US Rapier and Roland units.

I'll sort through all the other nationalities tomorrow to see if they've got any groundbased AD units capable of taking on tankbusting air-launched missiles, and i'll also look at ship CIWS systems.

PS- For the record, everything in the tests was under AI control, I was simply a popcorn-munching observer.

(Also, the skill levels were Veteran for planes and the equivalent High for ground units)

[Northstar98]

Rapier is UK :smilewink:

 

Also with the Rapier what units did you provide it with? IRL the Rapier is SACLOS/ACLOS, with the launcher with search RADAR and uplink. Then if the optical tracker is present (no Blindfire) the missile behaves as SACLOS command guidance whereby a gunner tracks the target optically. If blindfire is equipped, Rapier can do ACLOS (automatic), using the Blindfire to track the target.

 

I'm not sure about Roland because I don't know what variant we have, though I think it's the Roland 2, in which case it should have RADAR ACLOS available to it.

[PoorOldSpike]

Rapier is UK :smilewink:

 

Also with the Rapier what units did you provide it with? IRL the Rapier is SACLOS/ACLOS, with the launcher with search RADAR and uplink. Then if the optical tracker is present (no Blindfire) the missile behaves as SACLOS command guidance whereby a gunner tracks the target optically. If blindfire is equipped, Rapier can do ACLOS (automatic), using the Blindfire to track the target.

 

I'm not sure about Roland because I don't know what variant we have, though I think it's the Roland 2, in which case it should have RADAR ACLOS available to it.

 

 

Yeah I know the Rapier is British, but it's also listed among the American and some other nations Air Defence units.

Likewise the Franco-German AAA Gepard is also used by America and some other nations.

In fact a lot of units of all types are interchangeable, heck NATO can even use Russian/Chinese units etc and vice-versa if we want..:)

 

PS- I did this thread about the Rapier-

https://forums.eagle.ru/forum/english/dcs-world-topics/mission-editor-discussion-and-questions/291792-planes-don-t-pop-chaff-vs-rapier

 

 

[Northstar98]

Thanks, I'll check it out :thumbup: