AGM-45 Shrike Quick Guide by Klarsnow - updated June 5th 2024

[primus_TR]

13 hours ago, Zabuzard said:

or tracking another player instead.

So,  the targeted radar must be tracking specifically the platform who launched the Shrike, for the Shrike to be able to continue tracking the radar? 

[Zabuzard]

1 hour ago, primus_TR said:

So,  the targeted radar must be tracking specifically the platform who launched the Shrike, for the Shrike to be able to continue tracking the radar? 

Not necessarily. You have to visuallize the radar beam going out of the SAM station pointing at for example your aircraft. The Shrike needs to ride that beam down, more or less. If you fly elsewhere, the SAM will keep the radar beam on you and your shrike will stop being able to "ride it down" as it now does not sit on the line between you and the SAM anymore. Same happens when the SAM decides to do business with another aircraft that isnt right next to you.

Or when it decides to switch to optical tracking, turning off its radar. Or when it sees the shrike and rather turns off their radar last minute to stay alive.

There are many cases that result in your missile hitting the dirt.

Edited September 2 by Zabuzard

[primus_TR]

I wasn't aware that shrike was a beam rider. Looks like this connects with the side lobe discussion above. Thank you. 

[Ivandrov]

1 hour ago, primus_TR said:

I wasn't aware that shrike was a beam rider. Looks like this connects with the side lobe discussion above. Thank you. 

Not technically a beam rider. It just tracks an emitting radar by its main lobe only. The radar has to illuminate the Shrike's seeker with the Main Lobe for the Shrike to track.

This means that my attack profile usually involves a split-s. Remain in line with the axis you fired on.

Edited September 2 by Ivandrov

[Zabuzard]

Yeah. The main takeaway is that the radar needs to point at the Shrike. Which the SAM has no interest in, it follows you or other aircraft. So that is something you have to keep in mind regarding positioning and similar.

[primus_TR]

It is strange than how the shrike has zero difficulty hitting a rotating search radar; if it is indeed following the beam, it should be swayed by the rotating beam.  That is not the case right now.  I can hit a p19 without fail every time,  but not the tracking radar. 

46 minutes ago, Ivandrov said:

This means that my attack profile usually involves a split-s. Remain in line with the axis you fired on.

Based on what is described above,  a split S would push the tracking beam down,  and a lofted shrike, which would be way above the beam,  would have zero chance acquiring. 

[Ivandrov]

46 minutes ago, primus_TR said:

It is strange than how the shrike has zero difficulty hitting a rotating search radar; if it is indeed following the beam, it should be swayed by the rotating beam.  That is not the case right now.  I can hit a p19 without fail every time,  but not the tracking radar. 

Based on what is described above,  a split S would push the tracking beam down,  and a lofted shrike, which would be way above the beam,  would have zero chance acquiring. 

It does not track the beam itself, it tracks the source. The main lobe is the area that the primary radar signal travels through and the shrike will track the emitting source based on look angle.

It will cross into the main lobe eventually. The loft takes it higher than the beam usually anyway.

Edited September 2 by Ivandrov

[primus_TR]

11 minutes ago, Ivandrov said:

It does not track the beam itself, it tracks the source.

That's what I thought also. In that case, it should not matter for Shrike where the tracking radar is directed at: me or some other target. 

[Ivandrov]

16 minutes ago, primus_TR said:

That's what I thought also. In that case, it should not matter for Shrike where the tracking radar is directed at: me or some other target. 

It does matter because you won't be able to see the radar signal and it's source if you aren't in the lobe and being painted by it.

A bit like how your RWR requires that the radar paint you before it knows that it is there and what direction the signal is coming from.

Edited September 2 by Ivandrov

[lee1hy]

Tor M1 E band MK23 E-F  / MK 50 VAR BAND G-H band
SA8 C band  MK37  
SA-6 Tracking C band  / Fire X band MK 37
SA-3   LOWBLOW TR (I band)   /  P-15 MK 37   C band
SA-11  SR - MK23  TEL-MK36

When engaging the SA-11, fire from 25,000 feet in DIRECT mode, with a loft of 60-70 degrees.
When you see the SA-11's smoke, fire and then dive to evade.

Edited Wednesday at 10:00 AM by lee1hy

[Northstar98]

On 9/2/2025 at 1:51 PM, Zabuzard said:

Not necessarily. You have to visuallize the radar beam going out of the SAM station pointing at for example your aircraft. The Shrike needs to ride that beam down, more or less. If you fly elsewhere, the SAM will keep the radar beam on you and your shrike will stop being able to "ride it down" as it now does not sit on the line between you and the SAM anymore. Same happens when the SAM decides to do business with another aircraft that isnt right next to you.

Or when it decides to switch to optical tracking, turning off its radar. Or when it sees the shrike and rather turns off their radar last minute to stay alive.

There are many cases that result in your missile hitting the dirt.

How does this work with radars that nominally rotate? By their very nature the Shrike will only be illuminated by the mainlobe a minority of the time and be illuminated by a sidelobe the majority of the time. 

The P-15/P-19 is what the Mark 37 specifically targets and that radar only rotates in DCS.

Several of the guidance sections target the Bar Lock, which also nominally rotates (though we don't have that radar as a functional unit). But I can also get the Shrike to consistently track the 1S11 fire-control radar for the SA-6, the SOC radar of the 1S51 for the SA-8, the Tin Shield, the Big Bird (which is a phased array and will present small sidelobes).

Of course the Shrike may still miss, but that's also the case regardless - the Shrike is still clearly observed tracking and making corrections all the way to impact, it just missed (usually as a result of it wasting energy due to bang-bang guidance, the inaccuracy of the bang-bang guidance itself and the lack of G-bias with everything but the Mk 49 Mod 1).

IRL, the Shrike was used (albeit less than successfully) against an AN/TPS-43F in the Falklands, which also rotates.

[Zabuzard]

I am by no means expert on the weapon at all. So I cannot answer these questions (maybe someone else can).

But these are points you have to consider if you are having a bad time hitting anything with them in-game and want to improve your experience. Once you kinda understand that they arent just "fire and forget" and put more thought into employing them, it will also work better  

Edited yesterday at 12:24 PM by Zabuzard

[Ivandrov]

3 hours ago, Northstar98 said:

How does this work with radars that nominally rotate? By their very nature the Shrike will only be illuminated by the mainlobe a minority of the time and be illuminated by a sidelobe the majority of the time. 

The P-15/P-19 is what the Mark 37 specifically targets and that radar only rotates in DCS.

Several of the guidance sections target the Bar Lock, which also nominally rotates (though we don't have that radar as a functional unit). But I can also get the Shrike to consistently track the 1S11 fire-control radar for the SA-6, the SOC radar of the 1S51 for the SA-8, the Tin Shield, the Big Bird (which is a phased array and will present small sidelobes).

Of course the Shrike may still miss, but that's also the case regardless - the Shrike is still clearly observed tracking and making corrections all the way to impact, it just missed (usually as a result of it wasting energy due to bang-bang guidance, the inaccuracy of the bang-bang guidance itself and the lack of G-bias with everything but the Mk 49 Mod 1).

IRL, the Shrike was used (albeit less than successfully) against an AN/TPS-43F in the Falklands, which also rotates.

It tracks when it is illuminated by the radar and stops tracking when it isn't.

You can see that if you follow the missile in. The guidance kind of pulses on and off. You can also see/hear it before firing, the director bars and the tone you hear also kind of pulse.

Edited 22 hours ago by Ivandrov

[Hobel]

vor 3 Stunden schrieb Ivandrov:

It tracks when it is illuminated by the radar and stops tracking when it isn't.

You can see that if you follow the missile in. The guidance kind of pulses on and off. You can also see/hear it before firing, the director bars and the tone you hear also kind of pulse.

Are you sure?

I think what you hear in the plane is programmed by HB so that when the F4 RWR “sees” xy, this audio track is played.

[Ivandrov]

8 hours ago, Hobel said:

Are you sure?

I think what you hear in the plane is programmed by HB so that when the F4 RWR “sees” xy, this audio track is played.

Not talking about the RWR tones, talking about the Shrike seeker tone and the Director bars on the ADI.

It very much pulses along as you get painted by the Lobes. The pulsing sounds nothing like the RWR New Guy Audio. Different tone quality between the Shrike Seeker and the RWR for the Dog Ear as well at least.

Edited 10 hours ago by Ivandrov

[Northstar98]

17 hours ago, Ivandrov said:

It tracks when it is illuminated by the radar and stops tracking when it isn't.

You can see that if you follow the missile in. The guidance kind of pulses on and off. You can also see/hear it before firing, the director bars and the tone you hear also kind of pulse.

That's the case in the cockpit - but the missile tracks continuously once fired.

And given that the Shrike doesn't feature target memory and that once radars go off the air the Shrike stops tracking and it doesn't resume tracking even if the radar resumes transmitting moments later, this behaviour is inconsistent.

1. On the one hand some argue that the Shrike cannot detect sidelobes but don't give a reason for it.
2. On the other hand the Shrike has a guidance section exclusively for a radar that rotates, a radar whose mainlobe is only 4.5° wide, with a period of 5 seconds (meaning that the Shrike is only illuminated by the mainlobe for just 0.0625 seconds for each revolution of the radar, with then a 4.9375 second interruption).

In cockpit, against the P-19, the tone from the cockpit is mostly continuous so long as it's close to the boresight with interruptions being few and far between and decrease in frequency and duration as the aircraft closes the distance - which inconsistent with #1 but is consistent with thew Shrike being able to detect other lobes so long as they're powerful enough. The interruptions decreasing frequency and duration also makes sense as distance closes, as more sidelobes (and even backlobes) become detectable.

Once fired, the Shrike appears to track continuously.

When fired against a radar that goes off the air after a short duration, the Shrike can be seen to lose tracking - the control surfaces neutralise and the Shrike is unguided flight. Once the radar resumes transmitting however, the Shrike resumes guided flight (though in my track, it still missed, probably due to, at least in part, me not giving it enough of a dive angle).

These points are contradictory - if #1 is true, why does the Shrike track the radar continuously and why is there a near constant tone in the cockpit, when this radar is only presenting a mainlobe for 0.0625 seconds out of every 5? If anything the tone from the cockpit would be reversed.

AGM-45_P-19_brief_offtheair.trk AGM-45_P-19.trk