Well that’s what happens when you compare cutting edge 70’s ESA tech to 2010’s ESA tech on the Eurofighter
PESA, and like i said, just becuase its an ESA, doesnt mean its better, particularly with early ESA’s. That was LITERALLY the EFT designers decision to stay with mech scans over ESA’s, they did not consider them reliable enough at the time to be the primary FCS of a modern jet.
Im guessing SAAB felt the same with the PS-05/A. Botg are highly advances mech scan radars with “ESA-like” capabilities.
I’ve heard CAPTOR-M was generally considered on par with most earlier PESA radars and when you look at it. Its pretty clear why.
In radar strength and range its fairly similar (maybe even better?) and can do most of what any PESA or even AESA radar can do, which is maintain track on a large number of targets, even outside its current scan area using Priority Track.
It even could track air and ground target simutaneously.
The only area that PESA would be better is scan rate, but that is largely irrelevant if you’ve detected the target from further away and can fire further away.
Its only the later and more modern fully AESA radars that start to maintain more universal advantages, but even then CAPTOR-M clearly still holds its own, otherwise Eurofighter consortium members would have replaced the CAPTOR-M years ago, instead of doing it now.
Yeah, but I still find it wierd that Blue Vixen feels like a more reliable radar.
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No this wasnt compairing ESA vs ESAn this was considering comparable timeframe radars. The sovuets just had inferior radar tech. Not to say it was bad, it was just generally “inferior”.
100%. Theres no reason the CAPTOR or PS-05/A are similar or worse than the BV.
Well PS-05/A is BV. PS-05/A has yet to be modeled.
but CAPTOR-M is just hilarious how they’ve somehow managed to make a radar that just feels worse
That’s the whole point of an ESA radar, to be better across the board than M-scan.
And the reason why EFT didn’t have ESA is because they were all behind in technology and manufacturing capabilities.
PS-05 shouldnt be a BV, it has many of the same capabilities as a CAPTOR-M (according to the wiki atleast) they were both developped from a BV
I more or less imagine the PS-05 to be a mini-CAPTOR, instead of a mega-BV
Both should be far and away superior to a BV.
No…
Just No…
I have no doubt that AESA was well within their capabilities and we even see AESA radars being adopted in other areas, like the AESA Seaspray radar built by Ferranti (same people who built the Blue VIxen and ECR-90) being built in 2002 and was even adopted by the US Coastguard for their C-130s :D
So no. it wasnt that they couldnt build AESA radars, it was a decision to wait until the technology fully and completely matured
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It’s BV because of a source showing it was a modified BV, allowing us to get rid of the F-16D radar that it had before.
But over the past year, more sources and information have been found and they probably could implement some or more of the features of the BV. If nothing else, GMTI
I have the specific quote about the decision somewhere in this thread.
The EFT does not have NO AESA’s, they just dont have it as their primary fire control sensor because they did not trust first gen ESA’s for the job at the time.
Hence why i commented CAPTOR-M likely being in the same class as V004/RBE2, not in the same class as the RBE2-AA.
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Power output is kind of irrelevant, since iirc -ESA can put that power down more efficiently and effectively. CAPTOR-M can have all the workarounds, but in the end it is a mimicry of ESA radars and lacks the fundamental advantages.
F-22 AESA and Rafale PESA readily beat the CAPTOR-M in about every category anyways. APG-77 is from 1990’s too…
What can they do that CAPTOR-M Cannot then?
LPI, scan speed, significantly better multi-target and mixed mode operation, better at conducting EW, resist jamming much better, and very precise beam control.
There is an open bug report for the Foxhunter to get this. I wouldnt be surprised if CAPTOR-M also had the option.
The energy radiated by the antenna is generated by the ET963 coupled cavity Traveling Wave Tube (TWT) made by Leonardo in Italy. The device is able to provide enough power for the radar to transmit at peak power levels above 9-10kW while operating at voltages of 30-50kV. The average transmit power is stated to be around 1-2kW. In order to manage emissions to stay in a Low Probability of Intercept (LPI) profile, the radiated power is kept as low as possible in the respective operating modes. The average mean time between failures (MTBF) is stated to be around 600 hours - source
Granted, but that doesnt necessarily mean the CAPTOR-M is bad
Why?
CAPTOR-M was fully able to do this using interleaving. Tracking up to 20 air and/or ground targets at once
Have a source for that? EFT was fairly renowned for its EW suite iirc
have a source for that? Again, EFT was known to have a very good EW suite. Im sure that went both ways.
The digitized signals from the antennas are analysed in the receiver unit, a component jointly manufactured by Leonardo UK and Hensoldt in Germany. It has three distinct receiving channels, making it the first fighter radar in NATO to do so. Each of the channels has its own set of tasks: the first channel is assigned with target acquisition, the second channel is responsible for track management in both air and ground modes and the third data channel is employed for screening and classifying Electronic Warfare (EW) sources and suppression of side lobes, improving the radars electronic counter-countermeasures (ECCM) capacity. The ECCM channel also enables the radar to carry out jammer mapping, a function allowing the identification of EW threats that are targeting the aircraft.
And what exactly does this do? And any reason to suggest the CAPTOR-M was bad at this?
Considering CAPTOR-M’s stated peak speed of 333°/s and P-scan capabiltieis, ima guess its beam accuracy is quite good tbh. Maybe not as good as an ESA, but more than enough for the time period.
Another analogy would be the APG-63 vs AWG-9. iirc a good RIO with the AWG-9 was better than an APG-63 despite the APG-63 being a lot more advanced.
Yup, I imagine it was on-par with most AESA in that respect. (at least to as significant a degree as possible for an M-Scan)
Yeah, a Good radar is only as valuable as the systsms or the operator using them.
According to this source, the CAPTOR-Ms CPU was so good it was later adopted for the F-35:
The LRU hardware is powered by standardized CPUs which are also used on other components of the Eurofighter. The processors found on the CAPTOR-C are of the 68020 series designed by Motorola. They were first marketed in the 1980s, thus providing inadequate performance in certain operating modes. The chips were later replaced with more modern PowerPC-4 processors for Tranche 2 (CAPTOR-M equipped) aircraft. The PowerPC CPU has found wide applications in other fighter aircraft as well, such as the F-35. The radar has seen a significant performance boost as a result of this hardware upgrade. A prime example to demonstrate the performance increase is the SAR mapping mode. The quality of the radar images has been improved from a 1-meter resolution down to 30 centimeters for CAPTOR-M. - Source
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Oh! Thats the second source ive seen claim the CAPTOR-M has 30cm accueacy for SAR!
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