From what I understand, it needs to be guided Fox One-style to the target until it is near enough (30-50km or so, for example), at which point it will reach the terminal phase and guide itself to the enemy.
J-10 Thread IV
- Thread starter Jeff Head
- Start date
But we don't know what "near enough" is, do we?
plawolf
Lieutenant General
Its actually a bigger issue with longer ranged missiles.
Active Radar Homing AAMs can only active home in once they are within seeker range and goes ‘pitbull’ (start to actively emit itself). But that active seeker range is going to be a small fraction of the total missile effective range.
In BVR combat, if you are not well into your evasive manoeuvres by the time your RWR detects a missile going pitbull on you, you might as well pull the ejection handle there and then, as you will have only seconds before you go boom.
You paint modern enemy fighter formations with your radar for missile lock and they will split formation as soon as they have launched on you right back.
The key to modern BVR combat is to veer off from your opponent while keeping him at the very edge of your radar gimbal range while diving so you can keep him painted for your missile as you drag his into denser air and extend the range to further waste its energy and give yourself more time. As soon as your missile goes pitbull, you go full defensive to defend against the enemy missile.
You are not going to manage that with more than one competent opponent at a time.
It's complicated, because there is EW, decoys and signature(s) in this equation.
Long story short - even with active missiles, TwS is less than desirable...when possible.
The information is not public, and it depends on numerous variables, such as what kind of aircraft or the size of it. Generally, the distance from target where the terminal phase begins is somewhere to the order of ~10-15km for PL-12, ~15-20km for later AIM-120C (excluding C8 i.e. D, which is probably like 30), and at least 30km, though possibly up to 40-50km, for PL-15. These are very rough guesses, but you get the idea. All of the ranges here get shifted downward if EW countermeasures are used, and especially so if it is against a fifth generation fighter.
More numbers of hard points or weapon stations means the more ability of playing multirole.
With more hard points the aircraft would be more capable of carrying more small and smart weapens so it's more capable of CAS tasks.
Two aircraft, one can carry 20x500lbs or 7x1500lbs weapons, another one is only capable of carrying 7x1500lbs bombs.
Nobody would think they have equal capabilities in CAS and air superiority tasks.
More weapon configurations means more flexibility, it's easy to understand.
Or.... Have your AWACS to pick up enemy at 200-300km, fighter launching BVR missiles with LOAL method.
This.
also for folks interested in BVR engagements i strongly recommend watching some of the BVR videos from Growling Sidewinder's Youtube channel. although it's in DCS, i think it's as close as it gets to real BVR engagements.
In a sense all fox 3s are LOAL (their onboard radar only works in the terminal stage), but at the same time before that terminal stage the missile need to get information update on the target. If the information is shared from an awacs then the issues become whether the awacs radar can provide the level of accuracy that the missile needs.
Im no expert on this but from my understanding nearly all of the current awacs (excluding the latest hawkeye to some extent) use radars that cannot provide fire-control information, so Im a bit confused on how the senerio that you proposed would work. No offense intended, just curious.