Vikhr behaviour - Help needed

[Pizzicato]

Hey guys,

 

I consider myself a fairly competent Ka-50 pilot, but I'm having a nightmare with the Operation Medvedev II campaign. My issue is that my Vikhrs are constantly failing to home onto their targets.

 

I've attached a track.

 

The action starts at about 13:26 local time as I begin attacking a group of 3 tanks. The firing sequence looks as follows:

 

1. Miss

2. HIT

3. Miss

4. HIT

5. Miss

6. Miss

7. Miss

8. Miss

9. Miss

10. HIT

 

It's possible that wind is affecting the missiles, but it's only at 4 knots according to the PVI 800 and if it IS the wind, I have no idea how to correct for it.

 

Any help would be much appreciated. Thanks!

VikhrProblems.trk

[PhoenixBvo]

Check the real wind in the mission editor for that mission. I believe that campaign had some very strong winds, especially in the first few missions around Tskhinvali.

 

I have found that depending on the crosswind component, from a hover, you have to aim downwind from the target to get good hits. Look at smoke stacks along the missile path for the direction of the crosswind component. Switch to manual launch authority and put your aim off the target in the direction of the smoke stacks.

 

My explanation is that as the missile leaves its tube, the wind catches mainly on the larger vanes at its rear end and causes the missile to rotate like a wind-vane into the wind. As it accelerates, the missile then gains directional stability and hopefully finds the laser cone to guide it to the target.

[Rammit]

Another idea may be to fire as far away as possible, immediately after getting the launch authority, to allow the missile to correct itself and track the laser

[Bushmanni]

Make your chopper move with wind, ie. fly slowly forwards and sideways with wind so that the wind vane at the nose of the chopper isn't leaning to either side while pointing the nose exactly to the target. You most likely need to have manual mode turned on to get launch authorization. This way the Vikhr will stay in the beam and not be blow out of it by wind upon launch. The Vikhr pipper assumes zero wind and hence won't work in high winds.

[TurboHog]

I always judge the launch zone myself using manual weapons mode. Also notice that the PVI-800 indicates wind speed in m/s. So 4m/s would be 8kts...

[Daniel M]

It's because you didn't uncage your SADI :D

 

Agree with the prior posts, I think the wind is too much. Attached, checked direction from pvi*, flew upwind and didn't have nearly as much problem...though the bird was unruly.

 

*Mentioned above, remember PVI will show at mission start wind speed, not necessarily true, as it stands right here right now wind. If you watch the vanes off the nose of the chopper you can see them cocked pretty hard to the right as you're beginning to attack the first target.

 

I took over right after you shkvaled the first guy.

 

Edit: Bushmanni Are you referring to fly up/downwind to engage, or to simply point the chopper into the wind? If the later I could not get this technique to work. Mind posting a track if you have time?

 

 

 

Viral

VikhrProblems-Wind or Momentum Maybe.trk

Edited February 20, 2013 by Daniel M

[Pizzicato]

Thanks a lot for all of the responses, guys. Looking forward to getting home tonight and watching Daniel's track. Thanks for taking the time to put that together and post it.

 

The one thing I wonder, though, is what if the tactical situation doesn't permit you to get directly upwind/downwind of the target, e.g. FLOT runs East/West and wind is also blowing East/West? That would mean an approach from the North/South which would have you once more fighting the crosswinds.

[Daniel M]

Are you saying you can't engage E/W because the FLOT is E/W? I.e. friendly troops in path of engagement? You don't want to accidentally hit friendlys with an errant shot?

 

If so, my interpretation is you try to reduce the likely hood that you engage on the same vector, but if the tactical situation does not allow for a safer shot then sometimes you have to take it.

 

Other than that, get closer to the target??(may or may not be a good idea :D)

 

Brainstorming:

 

Any idea if shooting higher/lower in altitude would reduce the affect of the wind?

[Pizzicato]

Are you saying you can't engage E/W because the FLOT is E/W? I.e. friendly troops in path of engagement? You don't want to accidentally hit friendlys with an errant shot?

 

I was more thinking that a wide battlefront with wind running over it would make it suicidal to try to line up with or against the wind because it would place you directly above enemy units.

[Daniel M]

Gotcha, only thing i can think of would be to get closer and hit while on the move. But that's risky in and of itself. Not really sure, don't think I have enough experience in windy situations for any other ideas.

[159th_Viper]

Gotcha, only thing i can think of would be to get closer and hit while on the move. But that's risky in and of itself. Not really sure, don't think I have enough experience in windy situations for any other ideas.

 

Align your nose to the target in windy conditions, irrespective of HUD cues. That way the Vikhr will always track true from launch.

 

See the following post for an illustration: http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=1324038&postcount=9

[Yurgon]

Just to chime in, I flew the fist couple of campaign missions with a buddy (some kind soul reworked the campaign so it could be flown coop with two or more Ka-50s) and we had very similar problems, so after failing to hit our targets, we then spent quite some time in the mission planner to figure out how to best position our choppers so that our targets would be aligned up- or downwind.

 

I believe upwind may work as well as downwind, it's mostly the crosswind that screws with Vikhrs.

[Daniel M]

Align your nose to the target in windy conditions, irrespective of HUD cues. That way the Vikhr will always track true from launch.

 

See the following post for an illustration: http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=1324038&postcount=9

 

Awesome worked for me. So basically lesson to learn is don't use auto, point nose at target and wind is not a factor. Will have to try tomorrow in a hurricane :D

[Pizzicato]

Fantastic info, Viper! Thanks so much! :)

[159th_Viper]

No bother :)