later in early access Flechette 2.75 rokckets?

[Viperrg]

       So I recently watched an interview with an apache pilot and he talked about using flechette rockets in Afghanistan. I found they used quite a bit in recent conflicts and wanted to see if we will be getting them in DCS. I looked around the forums and couldn't find anything about it, does anyone know?

[DaemonPhobos]

I think there is no official confirmation of this yet, but it is a valid armament for our apache, the aircraft can carry it, and it was in service during that timeframe, so I see no reason not to add it. (M255 flechettes)

[Ramsay]

47 minutes ago, Viperrg said:

So I recently watched an interview with an apache pilot and he talked about using flechette rockets in Afghanistan. I found they used quite a bit in recent conflicts and wanted to see if we will be getting them in DCS.

 

IIRC Polychop (or perhaps one their KW SME's) said they'd like to see flechettes but it might be of limited use in game.

 

It's not clear how easy it'd be to add a realistic flechette warhead in DCS as a sudden "cloud" of flechettes might degrade performance or cause lag spikes in MP i.e. the M255 (~2500 x 28-grain (1.8 g)) and the M255E1 (~1180 x 60-grain (3.8 g)), and that's without considering DCS's limited damage modelling for ground units, perhaps ED could model a cloud of flechettes to be similar to flack damage ?

 

I don't think we'll hear anything official from Polychop until the dev's have a working solution and are certain they will be added.

Edited August 30, 2021 by Ramsay

[AlphaOneSix]

Officially, as far as I can tell, ED only mention that they will be modeling the “Rocket Management Subsystem”. Personally, I suspect that includes all the zones. But I could be wrong. However, I have a sneaky suspicion that there will not be a wide array of rocket types available, at least initially. 

[NineLine]

We will release with predefined zones, but this is a tech we hope to develop during the early access period. Thanks

[FalcoGer]

Great opportunity to introduce fragmentation/shrapnel damage to soft and lightly armored units. Must be terrifying and painful to be perforated. The best kind of weapon to commit (virtual) warcrimes with.

[falcon_120]

Totally ignorant about this Rocket warhead type. 

How does it work? I mean, what is the principle behind a flechette rocket? Kind of a shotgun effect against infantry/light armour?

[QuiGon]

2 hours ago, falcon_120 said:

Totally ignorant about this Rocket warhead type. 

How does it work? I mean, what is the principle behind a flechette rocket? Kind of a shotgun effect against infantry/light armour?

Pretty much. You shoot the rocket towards the enemy and before it reaches it's target it will fire off hundreds of small tungsten darts that will saturate the area. It's pretty ugly for soft targets.

Edited October 25, 2021 by QuiGon

[Mad Dog 762]

Wags says in his into video flechette and MPSM rockets will come after early access.   So they are for sure planned.

[kgillers3]

Just now, Mad Dog 762 said:

Wags says in his into video flechette and MPSM rockets will come after early access.   So they are for sure planned.

Should be fun

[Mad Dog 762]

On 10/25/2021 at 3:37 AM, FalcoGer said:

Great opportunity to introduce fragmentation/shrapnel damage to soft and lightly armored units. Must be terrifying and painful to be perforated. The best kind of weapon to commit (virtual) warcrimes with.

In one of Ed Macys books he says that these little darts are going so fast they do not even have to hit you.  If one zips by your arm for instance the vacuum it creates passing by will suck the flesh right off.  At least thats what the Brit Apache pilots were taught.

[whiteladder]

I know being on the receiving end of anything an Apache is sending down range is not terribly pleasant, but flechettes round is not the way to go is it?

Edited October 26, 2021 by whiteladder

[AlphaOneSix]

1 hour ago, Mad Dog 762 said:

If one zips by your arm for instance the vacuum it creates passing by will suck the flesh right off.

Yeah that's not true AT ALL.  I read Ed Macy's books, and while they were greatly entertaining, they should be taken with a huge grain of salt. Lots of dramatic license in his books.

[Meathawk]

I said it earlier - I doubt flechettes are overly effective. Flechettes don't perform good in shotguns. I only found one Vietnam Video with some Hydra Flechette footage. 

 the Impact on those ammunition crates doesnt look very impressive to be honest ...
This one is a little more impressive - 

but it still doesnt convince me ... the spread seems pretty small and the penetration power is not clear to me.
This guy

says the hydras with flechettes ARE effective but "only" can reference british pilot liking them.
Anybody here that actually ever shot a flechette and can report on the actual damage?

Pardon my english.

[Remco]

40 minutes ago, Meathawk said:

says the hydras with flechettes ARE effective but "only" can reference british pilot liking them.
Anybody here that actually ever shot a flechette and can report on the actual damage?

Pardon my english.

Absolutely. I've used Flechettes in Afghanistan and they've worked great, especially against targets in tree cover where other weapons/fuses might not be as effective. Not as great as Ed Macy claims in his books but to be fair a lot of the things he writes are... dubious.

They're certainly lethal and I've heard the shotgun comparison before and it just doesn't hold up, the velocity is just so much higher the flechette design actually works with rockets, unlike the tumbling they do out of a shotgun barrel.

Edited October 26, 2021 by Remco

[Meathawk]

vor 9 Stunden schrieb Remco:

Absolutely. I've used Flechettes in Afghanistan and they've worked great, especially against targets in tree cover where other weapons/fuses might not be as effective. Not as great as Ed Macy claims in his books but to be fair a lot of the things he writes are... dubious.

They're certainly lethal and I've heard the shotgun comparison before and it just doesn't hold up, the velocity is just so much higher the flechette design actually works with rockets, unlike the tumbling they do out of a shotgun barrel.

 

Thanks for the clarification! Much appreciated! Can you say something about effective range and dispersion?

 

[FalcoGer]

How does the thing know when to fuze? Is it timed? If so is it variable? Is it set by the WP when launching the missile and getting the info for the range to target? If so can you alter it to fuze sooner? From the video it seems like the spread is about 10° with a large margin for error. If you can open earlier it would provide higher coverage with less density.

[Remco]

2 hours ago, FalcoGer said:

How does the thing know when to fuze? Is it timed? If so is it variable? Is it set by the WP when launching the missile and getting the info for the range to target? If so can you alter it to fuze sooner?

There different fuzing options, but whether those will all be in game is something we'll have to see.

2 hours ago, FalcoGer said:

From the video it seems like the spread is about 10° with a large margin for error. If you can open earlier it would provide higher coverage with less density.

Beware though you don't want it to fuze too early, its lethality becomes quite unreliable if the spread is too big. Under "normal" use a human sized target is expected to be hit by 2-3 flechettes, if you fuze too early its kill probability becomes pretty dodgy.

Also when judging the effectiveness, note we always fired them in pairs which gave a decent overlapping zone of double the amount of flechettes.

And no, they don't "suck the flesh right off"...

[FalcoGer]

From the vietnam video it seems like the rockets open up fairly early while the tree video shows them open really late though it might be a perspective thing. What's a typical distance from the target that you would want to deploy the flechettes?

[Enduro14]

Well the Flechette round for a Carl G is wonderful,  Air burst that sucker over a courtyard wall and everyone had a bad day.  Granted 84mm  probaly has more punch in the bowl.....

 

Regardless will be a great asset to have on Apache when ever the new ground damage model comes....

 

ya the whole suck flesh off thing,  thats dumb Hollywood think right there

Edited October 27, 2021 by Enduro14

[FalcoGer]

Would be nice to have in other aircraft as well. Jeez, just imagine an A10 with 6x19 rockets going ham. Don't have to worry about finding that infantry in the city anymore. The entire city can just die. At least from one side. I'm sure the USAF can pay the repair bill for the windows.

[Hummingbird]

Was wondering why the Mi-24P didn't have the option of flechette rockets, this explains it....

[FalcoGer]

1 minute ago, Hummingbird said:

Was wondering why the Mi-24P didn't have the option of flechette rockets, this explains it....

You mean there being no tech for flechettes in DCS (yet? I hope?)

 

Also how good would those be for anti air? I guess it'd be hard to fuze them correctly.

[Hummingbird]

12 minutes ago, FalcoGer said:

You mean there being no tech for flechettes in DCS (yet? I hope?)

 

Also how good would those be for anti air? I guess it'd be hard to fuze them correctly.

 

Yeah, I was wondering why it wasn't available in DCS, as according to some sources flechette rockets were used to great effect by Soviet Hinds in Afghanistan during their invasion in the 70's. 

As for their use against air targets, I doubt it would be particularly effective here.

 

Btw, a good way to ensure max lethality from such types of weapons is to use a proximity fuze to make sure the warhead bursts within a certain distance to the ground or object. Hence I wonder if this was ever made use of in flechette rockets.

Edited October 27, 2021 by Hummingbird

[Sobakopes]

15 часов назад, Hummingbird сказал:

Was wondering why the Mi-24P didn't have the option of flechette rockets, this explains it....

There was no big incentive to further develop ffar rockets for ED everyone is just top gun. They should've done it with mi8. But now there is hind, hip, apache, kamov. I hope this will be a good enough reason to not only give various hydras but also s8 and s5 rockets.