It would bring different loadout options and would have a special camo, no need to think much honestly.
There are some premium/event vehicles which are copypaste of the tech tree tanks etc.
This report will be nice to see if they can fix it by patch day.
Even if that is the case it wont be by much. Both have stated similar ranges and top speeds. MICA IR having DL is the real advantage here.
Mica IR also has a much better seeker. Mica IR NG will have an even better seeker than anything the UK could produce.
There is a reason France is in charge of development of the IR seeker for Franco-British generation-after-next missile studies.
Going into the nitty gritty, it would really depend on which one has the better flare rejection seeker (and I don’t know enough on either of them), but data link is going to be a major helper for the missiles that gets it. Especially in air realistic where everyone flares all the time to evade other missiles. In simulator they might perform more similarly
Idk if you could do 50km launch without datalink, in close fight it will be the same, but if you begin to do a max range shot i don’t believe you could even launch it to start with or it would be with irst and you would still not give it information if the target is slightly maneuvering.
Atleast in close fight one has thrust vectoring if both people hide behind mountains until they merge with each other.
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Produced by different divisions within the same company. MBDA are producing a new seeker for ASRAAM and no longer using the 9X one that was originally installed on the missile.
This tit for tat is going nowhere, so if the MICA EM/IR is superior in real world scenarios it wont be by much and ingame it will be less.
It has lock on after launch I imagine using Pirate you find the target and send the missile using Pirates data. Then the missile when it gets into range will use it’s own seeker. Because in an ideal world the jet you have shot at will not be aware and not take corrective action.
Yeah no. Missile seekers for France are developed by Safran (or Thales) under the direction of the DGA.
Missile seekers for the UK would be produced most likely by Selex.
The difference in capabilities between the two companies is night and day.
PIRATE can’t provide sufficient accuracy for missile lock on.
Well, it can provide direction, and with some pretty complex maneuvers, might provide a somewhat representative range. Even without range, you can still try to bulldog a missile towards the threat, but that’s less efficient than modern guidance of fox 3 missiles, which the MICA IR can take advantage of. I wonder how this would affect ranges of both missiles
Edit : yeah MBDA is not responsible for the seekers of any in service French missile, I would expect it to be the same for others
That’s not correct, PIRATE can provide positional data to allow ASRAAM and Meteor to be employed.
Both have LOAL.
You make SELEX sound like a tiny operation forgetting they have decades of experience and have been involved with numerous cuttng edge projects involving optical systems.
It can only do so by maneuvering and trying to triangulate the target relative to the plane. I don’t think it’s sufficient to give a « good » positional data, meaning I’m very unconvinced the LOAL is anywhere close to being efficient
According to the UK’s Defence Research Agency, the kinematic ranging algorithm can only guarantee an accuracy of within 20% for ranges of up to 100km. I’ve already made sure to pass this information to the devs.
It’s very questionable how effective it would be for launching missiles. In reality, its mostly used to estimate the range to the target via passive means and identify the threat, then the Eurofighter would become ‘active’ to engage the target.
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That wasnt the discussion point, it was PIRATE cannot provide the data for ASRAAM.
Meteror is designed to LOAL and even loiter.
ASRAAM is designed for long range and short. However more modern MAWS and protection systems are going to significantly reduce that capacity.
Well to me the discussion point was the ASRAAM, MICA IR and the capacity of the platforms carrying them, especially in game.
And if you want to keep the discussion on the PIRATE, I don’t think I was out of the subject.
You say that the PIRATE is marketed to be able to give LOAL capacities to its armement, I’m just responding that I doubt the range finding method of the PIRATE allows for efficient LOAL of its missiles (even for new ASRAAM with potential DL*), meaning kinetic range has to be lost to compensate for bad ranging.
I havent read that, but I cannot refute it. I did think PIRATE maximum range was 70km?
PIRATE was designed to detect the perceived threat of Russian 5th Generation aircraft. If you cannot reliably use the system to provide accurate positional data for a weapons solution. Then I struggle to see the point in it.
I mean, it is really just a glorified stadiametric rangefinder.
You can still use it to identify a target and also guesstimate the range to a target so you are not constantly emitting a signature. You have to remember that PIRATE is largely based on early 1990s technology.
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Well that’s another point for the 2019 version Rafale and the 2010 Typhoon.
I see they plan to upgrade PIRATE with later tranches.
How does the Rafale get around the limitations the PIRATE has?
Most importantly, you have to recognise that OSF doesn’t face anywhere near the same size and weight constraints as PIRATE. According to the brochure for PIRATE, the unit has a volume of less than 10 litres, and a weight of 8kg (though I would think it’s heavier, but oh well). For comparison, the constraints for OSF were 88 litres and 100kg, so a lot more functionality can be included.
The sizeable difference is likely due to space being reserved on the Rafale for the future OSF as early as 1988 in the design phase. This is probably not the case for Eurofighter.
In terms of functionality, PIRATE is for the most part a dual field of view thermal camera for very, very long range applications:
Spoiler
The narrow FOV is used for target search and tracking (~8° x 11.25°). The wide FOV is used for identifying planes. It also only operates in a single waveband (LWIR) which is disadvantageous for air-to-air applications. MWIR is preferable due to its greater sensitive. Having both is best.
On the other other hand for OSF, due to the less severe size and weight constraints, the thermal imaging channel (used to detect targets) can operate in two wavebands (MWIR and LWIR) which enables better target discrimination and performance in different weather conditions.
Spoiler
Due to more efficient target discrimination, the thermal imaging channel is able to afford a larger field of view for situational awareness (~80° x 60°) at the expense of resolution. This cost cannot be incurred for PIRATE since the single thermal camera is required to have a very high resolution for target identification and efficient clutter rejection.
Identification by OSF is instead performed by a separate sensor, the CCD visible detector. This is essentially a long range telescope with a FOV of less than 1°. It therefore has a very high resolution for target tracking, and can determine the range via a 300mJ laser rangefinder.
Both the thermal imaging and visible sensor are also on gimbals (unlike PIRATE) which provide a far greater field of search:
Spoiler
TL;DR: OSF can afford more functionality and performance due to being heavier and having over 9 times the volume of PIRATE. PIRATE has to make significant compromises to meet constraints, OSF not nearly as much.
/rant over
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