“Maverick B models have an electro-optical television guidance system. After the protective dome cover is automatically removed from the nose of the missile and its video circuitry activated, the scene viewed by the guidance system appears on a cockpit television screen. The pilot selects the target, centers cross hairs on it, locks on, and then launches the missile. The Maverick B also has a screen magnification capability that enables the pilot to identify and lock on smaller and more distant targets.”
“The AGM-65B Maverick is a TV guided missile with a 2.5 degree
magnifiable field of view. Image projection is provided in the cockpit
by a video monitor with adjacent controls for slewing the seeker to the
selected target. The missile has an 85 percent success rate but is range
limited by naturally occurring obscurrations such as precipitation, haze,
dust, and battlefield smoke. Hence, a 2-3 nm range is the nominal target
lock-on distance.”
Magnifiable vs magnified suggests that it can be zoomed in and out. First source also says the same
The devs aren’t going to make a change based on semantic nuance like this; you’ll have to find specific values for the FOV/magnification range. All the manuals I’ve seen never give any value other than 2.5˚ FOV for the AGM-65B. The A-10A Non-Nuclear Weapons Delivery Manual only says that the AGM-65D/G/K have variable FOV.
All variants of the “Maverick” rocket have the same normal aerodynamic plane scheme. A "M-65A and A "M-65B missiles differ from each other by the fact that the first one has a TV homing head with an angle of 5°, and the second one - 2.5°. Reducing the angle of view of the homing head allows you to detect the target and to capture it at a greater distance.
The AGM-65B Scene-Magnification Maverick offers new optics, a stronger gimbal mount and revised electronics. The new optics offer greater magnification (2.5 degree cone, equivalent to a 400mm lens on a 35mm camera), thus allowing the pilot to search for the target with the seeker of the missile and detect it at greater ranges than with the Mark 1 eyeball.
All that implies it’s fixed zoom, but I agree the wording “magnifiable” is confusing and would hint at changeable zoom.
I try to find out with people who worked with Mavericks…
magnifiable does not mean variable zoom like camera or sniper scope
So when manuals or document say “magnifiable field of view,” what they actually mean is:
The seeker was redesigned to increase magnification compared to earlier models.
The physical optics themselves were changed (better telescopic lens).
Not that the missile seeker can zoom in and out.