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AIM-54 Hotfix PSA and Feedback Thread - Guided Discussion


IronMike

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23 minutes ago, Whiskey11 said:

Hello, it's me again with more Missile Guidance Quirky Fun!!!!!!  On today's episode, attempting to get an AIM-54 variant into space!  Also, maybe an exaggerated case study on the lateral guidance issue I brought up earlier.  And finally, we look at the AIM-54C putting on it's best glider impression!  You are probably wondering how I got here, so 

Test Setup:
F-14:  33k feet, Mach 1.8(ish), travelling due north
Su-33: 36k feet, Mach 0.75, travelling HDG 210º - Set to Not React

The first set of shots I performed were using the AIM-54C and AIM-54A Mk60 at ~70nmi.  Lateral guidance is improved compared to the previous tests, but the problem persists in both cases.  I stepped this out to 85nmi to exaggerate the arc, and it got worse.  This got me thinking about the lateral guidance issue some more... a huge chunk of what I'm guessing is missing from the "equation" here is air resistance.  At shorter ranges, it largely doesn't matter, but at the longer ranges, the difference here is quite large.  See the picture below:
woah4.PNG
The above picture is a shot taken at 115nmi in STT against a Mach .65 Tu-95 at 36k feet.  The Missile is an AIM-54C.  It hit a peek altitude of 150,020 feet!!!!  As it was coming down in the loft profile it started pulling massive lead to try and catch up to the Tu-95 it was now trailing behind (showing the incorrect computed impact point).  As it got lower in altitude, it pulled less lead because the air resistance was actually providing the desired corrections as the fins started to work correctly.  

Thing is, this missile MISSES the target, but not because of any lateral issue.  It ran out of battery.  We'll talk about that here in a second though.

Because I was using the AIM-54C, which is slower, I decided to switch to the AIM-54A Mk60.  The results were frightening...  In terms of lateral guidance, the AIM-54A Mk60 has the same issue at these ranges.  The difference is the AIM-54A Mk60 is moving fast enough that the computed lead angle is "more" correct, so while there are still large corrections in the lateral guidance as it comes down from the bozosphere is "more" correct.  Also, speaking of bozosphere trajectories... the AIM-54A Mk60 hit a PEEK ALTITUDE of 171540 feet.  For perspective, I'm at 33k feet, and space starts around 328k feet... so half way to space! 😄  The AIM-54A Mk60's faster speed, and higher peek altitude actually gets it to the target with time to spare on the 240 second battery life.  Impact speed, just over Mach 3.0!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  The impact angle is also B-E-A-UTIFUL!

itallianhands.PNG

🤌Money!!!!

 

Lateral Guidance Lesson Learned?
nullClearly the issue here is a combination of air resistance (actually, lack thereof in the mid course), and the initial launch angle being incorrect.  The two, together, cause for some interesting energy bleed at long ranges and the "arc" in the lateral guidance... Because I'm not 100% familiar with who handles this in DCS, I'm not sure if this is a Heatblur thing or a ED thing?  I'm guessing it's an ED thing after launch, but before and at launch is Heatblur? Maybe @IronMike can share some insight?

 

To SPACE!!!!!
Well we didn't quite get there... in fact subsequent attempts to shoot at things at excessive ranges resulted in some uhhh... interesting behavior.... but not exactly space.  The only thing really interesting to report is the ability to smack Tu-95's and Tu-22's at 160-165nmi ranges with the AIM-54A Mk60.  I was able to hit my Tu-95, from 45k, at Mach ~1.75 at ~161nmi in PDSTT... @777coletrain was able to smack his Tu-22 at 165nmi IN TWS only going Mach 1.2 at 42k.  Yeah, that's pretty epic!

Loft Profiles and AIM-54C Glider Competition
Where things get interesting is the loft... maybe not the actual lofting maneuver, that looks pretty good, but the glide down from max altitude... in shots above about 80nmi, the AIM-54C starts the descent to the target earlier than the AIM-54A and then does a linear (vertically) intercept.  The AIM-54A Mk60 comes down in a nearly perfect ballistic arc like we'd expect.  Not sure what is going on with that vertical guidance, but this is what it looks like:
woah3.PNG

The AIM-54A Mk60 at slightly longer range in comparison:woah2.PNG

I believe this has already been brought up to Heatblur/ED before, so I'm not going to keep posting about those tests.

Conclusion
I believe the lateral missile guidance issue is related to a combination of incorrect original lead angle, and lack of air resistance calculations being factored in or some combo of both.  The vertical guidance issue is at least known, so I'm not going to beat that drum any more than I have.  I'll post track files in a follow on post.

 

F1454AMk60Test1.acmi 131.69 kB · 1 download F-1454CTest1.acmi 116.24 kB · 1 download F-1454CTest2.acmi 158.63 kB · 1 download WhatistheAIM54Adoing.acmi 113.31 kB · 1 download WhatistheAIM54doing.acmi 155.77 kB · 1 download

 

It appears that launching your missile at over a 13 degree pitch angle will cause the AIM-54 to go too high and cause it to never come down. Outside of that, the lateral issue is still a problem but is less of an issue with this new lofting profile. The new lofting profile seems to improve terminal speed by a pretty significant margin.

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Just now, DSplayer said:

It appears that launching your missile at over a 13 degree pitch angle will cause the AIM-54 to go too high and cause it to never come down. Outside of that, the lateral issue is still a problem but is less of an issue with this new lofting profile. The new lofting profile seems to improve terminal speed by a pretty significant margin.

None of these shots are manually lofted except maybe Cole's... mine were launched as close to zero vertical speed as possible.

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7 minutes ago, Whiskey11 said:

None of these shots are manually lofted except maybe Cole's... mine were launched as close to zero vertical speed as possible.

Yeah. It's just that that behavior is back again and that could allow your 54s to go to space once again.

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12 hours ago, Whiskey11 said:

Hello, it's me again with more Missile Guidance Quirky Fun!!!!!!  On today's episode, attempting to get an AIM-54 variant into space!  Also, maybe an exaggerated case study on the lateral guidance issue I brought up earlier.  And finally, we look at the AIM-54C putting on it's best glider impression!  You are probably wondering how I got here, so 

Test Setup:
F-14:  33k feet, Mach 1.8(ish), travelling due north
Su-33: 36k feet, Mach 0.75, travelling HDG 210º - Set to Not React

The first set of shots I performed were using the AIM-54C and AIM-54A Mk60 at ~70nmi.  Lateral guidance is improved compared to the previous tests, but the problem persists in both cases.  I stepped this out to 85nmi to exaggerate the arc, and it got worse.  This got me thinking about the lateral guidance issue some more... a huge chunk of what I'm guessing is missing from the "equation" here is air resistance.  At shorter ranges, it largely doesn't matter, but at the longer ranges, the difference here is quite large.  See the picture below:
woah4.PNG
The above picture is a shot taken at 115nmi in STT against a Mach .65 Tu-95 at 36k feet.  The Missile is an AIM-54C.  It hit a peek altitude of 150,020 feet!!!!  As it was coming down in the loft profile it started pulling massive lead to try and catch up to the Tu-95 it was now trailing behind (showing the incorrect computed impact point).  As it got lower in altitude, it pulled less lead because the air resistance was actually providing the desired corrections as the fins started to work correctly.  

Thing is, this missile MISSES the target, but not because of any lateral issue.  It ran out of battery.  We'll talk about that here in a second though.

Because I was using the AIM-54C, which is slower, I decided to switch to the AIM-54A Mk60.  The results were frightening...  In terms of lateral guidance, the AIM-54A Mk60 has the same issue at these ranges.  The difference is the AIM-54A Mk60 is moving fast enough that the computed lead angle is "more" correct, so while there are still large corrections in the lateral guidance as it comes down from the bozosphere is "more" correct.  Also, speaking of bozosphere trajectories... the AIM-54A Mk60 hit a PEEK ALTITUDE of 171540 feet.  For perspective, I'm at 33k feet, and space starts around 328k feet... so half way to space! 😄  The AIM-54A Mk60's faster speed, and higher peek altitude actually gets it to the target with time to spare on the 240 second battery life.  Impact speed, just over Mach 3.0!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  The impact angle is also B-E-A-UTIFUL!

itallianhands.PNG

🤌Money!!!!

 

Lateral Guidance Lesson Learned?
nullClearly the issue here is a combination of air resistance (actually, lack thereof in the mid course), and the initial launch angle being incorrect.  The two, together, cause for some interesting energy bleed at long ranges and the "arc" in the lateral guidance... Because I'm not 100% familiar with who handles this in DCS, I'm not sure if this is a Heatblur thing or a ED thing?  I'm guessing it's an ED thing after launch, but before and at launch is Heatblur? Maybe @IronMike can share some insight?

 

To SPACE!!!!!
Well we didn't quite get there... in fact subsequent attempts to shoot at things at excessive ranges resulted in some uhhh... interesting behavior.... but not exactly space.  The only thing really interesting to report is the ability to smack Tu-95's and Tu-22's at 160-165nmi ranges with the AIM-54A Mk60.  I was able to hit my Tu-95, from 45k, at Mach ~1.75 at ~161nmi in PDSTT... @777coletrain was able to smack his Tu-22 at 165nmi IN TWS only going Mach 1.2 at 42k.  Yeah, that's pretty epic!

Loft Profiles and AIM-54C Glider Competition
Where things get interesting is the loft... maybe not the actual lofting maneuver, that looks pretty good, but the glide down from max altitude... in shots above about 80nmi, the AIM-54C starts the descent to the target earlier than the AIM-54A and then does a linear (vertically) intercept.  The AIM-54A Mk60 comes down in a nearly perfect ballistic arc like we'd expect.  Not sure what is going on with that vertical guidance, but this is what it looks like:
woah3.PNG

The AIM-54A Mk60 at slightly longer range in comparison:woah2.PNG

I believe this has already been brought up to Heatblur/ED before, so I'm not going to keep posting about those tests.

Conclusion
I believe the lateral missile guidance issue is related to a combination of incorrect original lead angle, and lack of air resistance calculations being factored in or some combo of both.  The vertical guidance issue is at least known, so I'm not going to beat that drum any more than I have.  I'll post track files in a follow on post.

 

F1454AMk60Test1.acmi 131.69 kB · 3 downloads F-1454CTest1.acmi 116.24 kB · 2 downloads F-1454CTest2.acmi 158.63 kB · 1 download WhatistheAIM54Adoing.acmi 113.31 kB · 2 downloads WhatistheAIM54doing.acmi 155.77 kB · 2 downloads

 

Good analysis. I think you are giving too much credit to the guidance capability of the A at least. As for the lateral guidance, it's somewhere between a pure and lead pursuit, it's like this because just lead pursuit would cause the missile to burn energy when the target makes a course adjustment and just pure pursuit would cause the missile to lag behind as you noted.

 

There is a middle ground struck here, for a target flying in a straight line the missile will not fly the optimal path for this reason. This last update had the missile follow much more of a lead pursuit than previously, we are hesitant to change it too much as it will degrade the performance of shots where the target is making course adjustments. 

 

As for the loft, we are limited on the number of degrees of freedom, so we cannot change the descent stage without affecting the ascent greatly. This is the best balance that could be found. With regards to assisting the loft, I would advise against it, the 54 already has a very aggressive loft profiles and assisting the loft will have you encounter some strange bugs in the old missile api (which the 54 is using). 

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At this point I'd like to thank @JNelson for his efforts in improving the aim-54, he did around 2.500 tests over the last few months to get things just right within the limited possibilities we have, so you all can imagine how difficult and how much work it is to shape the missiles to a) more realistic behavior and b) a better performance within the scope of DCS.

More changes will be coming as well, to dial it in even more. In particular we will focus on the motors soon as well, we will have more info on that for you guys soon.

 


Edited by IronMike
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Didn't know what was meant by going into space until I tested it at 36k, going Mach 1.3. Let the Mk60 missile go at 57nm from target and didn't see it at first until I looked straight up.😄 The Phoenix leveled off eventually and guided right into the Su-27 I had set up as it was trying to notch. It's an interesting loft profile for sure.

I hope the AIM-54C gets the updates soon that really set it apart from the older A model Phoenix.

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3 hours ago, CarbonFox said:

I hope the AIM-54C gets the updates soon that really set it apart from the older A model Phoenix.

Tbh I think the majority of people that check in on this thread/post are eagerly waiting for an AIM-54C update that really makes it a better option than the 54A-Mk60.

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9 hours ago, DSplayer said:

Tbh I think the majority of people that check in on this thread/post are eagerly waiting for an AIM-54C update that really makes it a better option than the 54A-Mk60.

This is true, been checking threads every now and then for news on the 54C

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On 6/24/2022 at 8:42 AM, IronMike said:

At this point I'd like to thank @JNelson for his efforts in improving the aim-54, he did around 2.500 tests over the last few months to get things just right within the limited possibilities we have, so you all can imagine how difficult and how much work it is to shape the missiles to a) more realistic behavior and b) a better performance within the scope of DCS.

More changes will be coming as well, to dial it in even more. In particular we will focus on the motors soon as well, we will have more info on that for you guys soon.

 

 

Honestly this patch I am quite happy with the performance and flight model on the AIM-54. I think its finally pretty well dialed in. I would like to see accurate modeling for the 54C though, the AIM-54 MK60 is superior to the 54C in DC's in pretty much everyway, even though in real life that really wasn't the case. It was also rumored it be able to go active on its own without the need for the AWG-9 to tell it to. The new loft curve works quite well, thank you very much for your teams hard work on it!


Edited by HeavyGun1450
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  • 2 weeks later...

The 54A Mk.60 goes over 500+ knots faster when launched from 33 kft at a co-alt target 80 nm away for me. Resulting in a speed of 1500 KTAS (Mk47 C) vs 2000 KTAS (Mk60 A) once withing 10 nm of the bogey. That's pretty extreme.

 

Also noticed that the missile will go into a super high lofting arc even against targets at relatively close range of <20nm.


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On 6/26/2022 at 9:38 PM, HeavyGun1450 said:

Honestly this patch I am quite happy with the performance and flight model on the AIM-54. I think its finally pretty well dialed in. I would like to see accurate modeling for the 54C though, the AIM-54 MK60 is superior to the 54C in DC's in pretty much everyway, even though in real life that really wasn't the case. It was also rumored it be able to go active on its own without the need for the AWG-9 to tell it to. The new loft curve works quite well, thank you very much for your teams hard work on it!

 

More people use A rather C today, I guess C needa to catch up since C has better handling with ECM 🙂

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5 hours ago, Бойовий Сокіл said:

Because it's 60's technology and that's what the documentation says. The 54C on the other hand is an 80's development and uses a lot of the similar components and architecture the 120A later used just that it wasn't size restricted to fit all of that in. The current AIM54C we have in DCS is basically a worse A in every regard and couldn't be farther from a realisic/authentic representation of that missile.

 

Does anyone know what like... the tech that was installed in the C that made it work?

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Well an actual DIGITAL computer for one with actual memory. A better onboard radar unit, Inertial Navigation as well as simply lock on homing. Search patterns for active seeking. 
 

The A was basically a FOX-1 with the ability to also run its own Flood Illuminator and the ability to be commanded by a data stream IN the reflected radar beam while under AWG-9 guidance. 
 

The C had the ability to remember what it was told, to continue performing it’s task without the WCS being in constant contact. It also knew where it was absolutely with INS, as opposed to just knowing where the target reflection was in relation to it. 
 

And it could use it’s onboard radar to actually actively search for a target when it was active. Not just hope it was pointed straight at it.

 

The A followed it’s instructions, the C knew WHAT it was trying to do. 20 years of computer advancement over the 70’s and 80’s made that happen.

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For those people that didn't read or see this little message from IronMike relating to an overhaul/further development of AIM-54C and AIM-54 motor performance:

 

 

Sounds like we're in for a treat later this yea\r.


Edited by DSplayer
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On 7/7/2022 at 4:19 PM, Hummingbird said:

The 54A Mk.60 goes over 500+ knots faster when launched from 33 kft at a co-alt target 80 nm away for me. Resulting in a speed of 1500 KTAS (Mk47 C) vs 2000 KTAS (Mk60 A) once withing 10 nm of the bogey. That's pretty extreme.

 

Also noticed that the missile will go into a super high lofting arc even against targets at relatively close range of <20nm.

 

Tested with MK60A, it works so good.... thank HB's work 🙂

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Dear all,

I would like to apologize to all of you - as you may have seen we changed the AIM-54 guidance from parallel to PN this patch. Both ED and us have been under the impression all these years that it had been set to PN already, and luckily ED spotted the issue. This is ofc an oversight, and was owed to the fact that the setting is hidden behind a value that does not indicate this on first sight and the differences in guidance are very difficult to spot, if at all, in game, when monitored under the wrong assumption.

However, you should notice a difference now, where the missile will have slightly less energy on the fly-out while maintaining more energy during the terminal phase, as it should. We're very grateful to ED for spotting this, and ofc feel somewhat embarrassed to have been under the wrong impression all along. The AIM-54 ofc should have always been set to PN guidance.

The positive note is that the terminal guidance should be improved through this, and we are happy that this step brings us closer to the completion of the AIM-54 overhaul. We would like to thank you ever so kindly for your tremendous patience with us and I hope you enjoy the changes this patch brings.

Thank you and our sincere apologies again.


Edited by IronMike
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2 minutes ago, IronMike said:

Dear all,

I would like to apologize to all of you - as you may have seen we changed the AIM-54 guidance from parallel to PN this patch. Both ED and us have been under the impression all these years that it had been set to PN already, and luckily ED spotted the issue. This is ofc an oversight, and was owed to the fact that the setting is hidden behind a value that does not indicate this on first sight and the differences in guidance are very difficult to spot, if at all, in game.

However, you should notice a difference now, where the missile will have slightly less energy on the fly-out while maintaining more energy during the terminal phase, as it should. We're very grateful to ED for spotting this, and ofc feel somewhat embarrassed to have been under the wrong impression all along. The AIM-54 ofc should have always been set to PN guidance.

The positive note is ofc that terminal guidance should be improved through this, and we are happy that this step brings us closer to the completion of the AIM-54 overhaul. We would like to thank you ever so kindly for your tremendous patience with us and I hope you enjoy the changes this patch brings.

Thank you.

 

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11 minutes ago, IronMike said:

Dear all,

I would like to apologize to all of you - as you may have seen we changed the AIM-54 guidance from parallel to PN this patch. Both ED and us have been under the impression all these years that it had been set to PN already, and luckily ED spotted the issue. This is ofc an oversight, and was owed to the fact that the setting is hidden behind a value that does not indicate this on first sight and the differences in guidance are very difficult to spot, if at all, in game, when monitored under the wrong assumption.

However, you should notice a difference now, where the missile will have slightly less energy on the fly-out while maintaining more energy during the terminal phase, as it should. We're very grateful to ED for spotting this, and ofc feel somewhat embarrassed to have been under the wrong impression all along. The AIM-54 ofc should have always been set to PN guidance.

The positive note is that the terminal guidance should be improved through this, and we are happy that this step brings us closer to the completion of the AIM-54 overhaul. We would like to thank you ever so kindly for your tremendous patience with us and I hope you enjoy the changes this patch brings.

Thank you and our sincere apologies again.

 

I guess it is an Agile prcoess to keep the software getting better.

Thanks for the hard works overall...

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1 hour ago, IronMike said:

Dear all,

I would like to apologize to all of you - as you may have seen we changed the AIM-54 guidance from parallel to PN this patch. Both ED and us have been under the impression all these years that it had been set to PN already, and luckily ED spotted the issue. This is ofc an oversight, and was owed to the fact that the setting is hidden behind a value that does not indicate this on first sight and the differences in guidance are very difficult to spot, if at all, in game, when monitored under the wrong assumption.

However, you should notice a difference now, where the missile will have slightly less energy on the fly-out while maintaining more energy during the terminal phase, as it should. We're very grateful to ED for spotting this, and ofc feel somewhat embarrassed to have been under the wrong impression all along. The AIM-54 ofc should have always been set to PN guidance.

The positive note is that the terminal guidance should be improved through this, and we are happy that this step brings us closer to the completion of the AIM-54 overhaul. We would like to thank you ever so kindly for your tremendous patience with us and I hope you enjoy the changes this patch brings.

Thank you and our sincere apologies again.

 

Tbh with what you guys have been doing with the AIM-54 prior to addition of the "PN_gain" line still made the missile extremely potent. So even with that sorta "handicap", you guys were still able to make an extremely potent missile.

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Setup: i7-8700k, GTX 1080 Ti, 32GB 3066Mhz, Lots of Storage, Saitek/Logitech X56 HOTAS, TrackIR + TrackClipPro
Modules: F-14, F/A-18, JF-17, F-16C, Mirage 2000C, FC3, F-5E, Mi-24P, AJS-37, AV-8B, A-10C II, AH-64D, MiG-21bis, F-86F, MiG-19P, P-51D, Mirage F1, L-39, C-101, SA342M, Ka-50 III, Supercarrier, F-15E
Maps: Caucasus, Marianas, South Atlantic, Persian Gulf, Syria, Nevada

Mods I've Made: F-14 Factory Clean Cockpit Mod | Modern F-14 Weapons Mod | Iranian F-14 Weapons Pack | F-14B Nozzle Percentage Mod + Label Fix | AIM-23 Hawk Mod for F-14 

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So I decided to rerun the tests that @Whiskey11 had conducted last month utilizing the tracks that he had provided and basically the prior extremely noticeable tendency for the missile to not lead enough then do an arc to catch up to the target is no longer a thing (lateral guidance issues). Also, like what IronMike had said, the missiles had a lot of terminal energy. The only thing I noticed in my own testing (and not using these tracks) is that sometimes the missile will lead too much, especially against a maneuvering target, and could cause the missile to drain some more energy than it really needs to. I've included some tacview files so if you can compare the performance of these tests to the ones that Whiskey11 conducted last month.

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Tacview-20220721-115503-DCS-F14MissileGuidanceTest54AMk602.trk.zip.acmiTacview-20220721-115904-DCS-F14MissileGuidanceTest54C1.trk.zip.acmiTacview-20220721-120203-DCS-F14MissileGuidanceTest54C2.trk.zip.acmiTacview-20220721-120552-DCS-NOWWhatIstheAIM54ADoing.trk.zip.acmiTacview-20220721-120841-DCS-MissileGuidanceTest2.trk.zip.acmiTacview-20220721-121159-DCS-MissileGuidanceTestF14AIM54C.trk.zip.acmiTacview-20220721-115148-DCS-F14MissileGuidanceTest54AMk601.trk.zip.acmi

-Tinkerer, Certified F-14 and AIM-54 Nut | Discord: @dsplayer

Setup: i7-8700k, GTX 1080 Ti, 32GB 3066Mhz, Lots of Storage, Saitek/Logitech X56 HOTAS, TrackIR + TrackClipPro
Modules: F-14, F/A-18, JF-17, F-16C, Mirage 2000C, FC3, F-5E, Mi-24P, AJS-37, AV-8B, A-10C II, AH-64D, MiG-21bis, F-86F, MiG-19P, P-51D, Mirage F1, L-39, C-101, SA342M, Ka-50 III, Supercarrier, F-15E
Maps: Caucasus, Marianas, South Atlantic, Persian Gulf, Syria, Nevada

Mods I've Made: F-14 Factory Clean Cockpit Mod | Modern F-14 Weapons Mod | Iranian F-14 Weapons Pack | F-14B Nozzle Percentage Mod + Label Fix | AIM-23 Hawk Mod for F-14 

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