In-game as it is currently, players are limited to controlling their radar’s scan angles in a grouped setting simply referred to as “Change Radar/IRST search mode” which changes both vertical, and horizontal scan angles at the same time. In reality, pilots had the option to choose freely how much their radars are able to scan, both horizontally and vertically. This is often referred to as “scan bars” especially on US aircraft and their respective manuals.
If we refer to the F-4E AIRCRAFT WEAPONS DELIVERY MANUAL (NONNUCLEAR), TO 1F-4E-34-1-1, originally released in 15 December 1986 which you can find online on SCRIBD. This was also used in the suggestion for constant radar elevation toggle a few patches back.
We will find the following.
It clearly states that radar controls are separate for elevation and horizontal scan angles, they are two separate switches. The F-4E WSO had the option to choose how much vertical air is covered in each scan cycle, separate from the horizontal scan angles.
So, I suggest the following: separate horizontal radar control from the vertical for aircraft which this applicable. Because not all aircraft have this ability. Another option would be to grant this ability to all aircraft. But there are caveats to this.
Such as certain radar modes (such as TWS) on certain aircraft seeming to limit the amount of vertical bar coverage available. Especially mechanical radars that have access to TWS. I’ve heard for example that the Tomcat’s TWS was limited to 2 and 4 bars of vertical scan, so roughly the 4° and 6° we have in-game. But the Tomcat also had access to a tall 8 bars of vertical scan, which if I’m not entirely mistaken would be roughly 12° similar to the tall vertical scan angles available to other US aircraft with late mechanical radars in their SRC PD modes, which enhance their situational awareness greatly.
Now, another thing that should be taken into note is how Soviet aircraft, due to their nature of being heavily dependent on GCI (ground-controlled interception) had much more lacking radar controls. This is from the AIRCRAFT МiG-25PD FLIGHT AND COMBAT EMPLOYMENT TRAINING MANUAL, dated from most likely 1984, with full credit to overscan (PaulMM) on the www.secretprojects.co.uk forum.
Based on the document, the aircraft only has access to the 6° degree vertical scan in manual pilot control. However, when the radar is in Automatic control mode, where it is being directed by the Soviet GCI network through it’s 5У15К-11 equipment, GCI officers can direct the radar to scan up to 9° vertically in front hemisphere attacks, and up to 14° in rear hemisphere attacks. But these options are only available at high altitude intercepts (HMA, HMA-DN) or when in ATM mode (environments with interference form clouds or chaff) – basically, similar control to being able to directly select the vertical scan bars available are not something one can do on most Soviet aircraft. It’s hard to find sources on, but some of the research I did for this, did seem to imply that the MiG-29 and Su-27 both suffer from this issue, due to how Soviet air doctrine was heavily based on ground assisted interception.
The way I see it, this can be added to all aircraft, or aircraft like the MiG-25 are only given their 6° available to them under manual control, despite the radar having a mode that can permit it more, it just having to be activated by GCI officers.
- Yes
- No
- Yes
- No
- I voted no on the first question!
Either way, I personally feel this is a long warranted change, especially at the higher BRs, where most aircraft would have access to them. But you can clearly see that there are aircraft like the F-4 that would have access to fine tuning of their vertical scan height, but do not have this feature currently.
That would be all! This thread took a bit to find good sources for. But this is a feature I want added.