Ada142508 1984 weapons file
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Idk why i havent been sniffing around the DTIC website for new AIM-54 info, look of potential goodies in there.
AIM-54A has home-on-jam and, contrary to what some devs and what gaijin has stated publicly and believe, is an effective missile against small maneuvering targets:
Spoiler
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If I had to guess, 4000 lbs is likely the peak thrust and not average thrust. A constant 4000 lbs thrust for 30 seconds with 170kg of propellant would suggest a specific impulse of over 330 seconds, which is not realistic for a solid propellant motor.
Thrust is more or less accurate in-game. The weapons file is not a good source as there are other sources (even primary ones) stating lower thrust figures. It is possible that the thrust reaches 4,000 lb-f… but the overall output deltaV would be too high if this was for 30 full seconds at that thrust rating. The rating is allegedly around 99,000 to 100,000 lb-s with 25-30 second burn time. This would indicate an average thrust rating of 4,000 pounds for 25 seconds or 3,300 pounds for 30 seconds depending on conditions.
Was not realistic at the time, but is possible today with some very experimental propellants. Nonetheless, the figure is wrong. Outsider’s view states the AIM-54 to have approximately 97,000 lb-s total impulse. This is not possible with 30 seconds burn time and 4,000 lbf thrust.
Thrust model in game is simplistic where it assumes thrust is constant for entire duration of burn. The thrust of solid rocket motor depends on the shape of propellant and their composition, this changes over time.
It is entirely possible to craft a single stage solid rocket motor that match all of these figures in its thrust curve, by adjusting propellant shape.
For example, a star shaped hollow cone, with 10 or more pointy arms, in propellant will yield higher thrust during first few seconds of burn, then reduces to a stable level of thrust.
Also, solid rocket motor don’t just turn off at the end of burn, there is always some propellant residuals that takes rocket motor few seconds before its thrust drop to zero. Base drag reduction still exists during this time period and missile enjoy few more seconds of reduced drag after burn ends.
Sadly these info probably never will be released to the public.
So quoting total impulse is more reliable than thrusts X over Y seconds.
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He said 4000lb may be peak thrust.
If Aim54 starts the burn at 4000lb force, then reduces and reaches 2500lb at end of the burn, then the total impulse will be around 97,500lb-s = 30x2500 + 30x1500/2.
This also means the average thrust is 3250lb, which translates to 14456N of force, very close to in-game value.
On the other hand, the higher thrust at the beginning of the burn will significantly improve missile’s kinematics; since the reduced thrust at the later portion of the flight acts as a “sustainer”.
It is possible the “too much drag” issue mentioned earlier in the post wasn’t due to missile having too much drag, perhaps it was rocket motor in game uses average thrust as constant thrust, where IRL it had much higher thrust at the beginning of the burn.
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Such as?
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I read it twice, it said nothing about small manuevering targets. Only made the distinction that it has had successful targeting against small targets as well as manuevering targets. It didn’t combine both.
Yes my bad, my point was that gaijins statements about the AIM-54 being ineffective against anything but high altitude strategic bombers is patently false, this is just another document to support that.
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Fair enough, btw, do you have that quote?
This isn’t entirely true, they have modeled the booster and sustainer. There is no dynamic thrust plot, as you said… but we know the AIM-54 to be a long sustainer-only type burn at a constant thrust.
The document referenced states 4,000 pounds for 30 seconds. We know thanks to primary documentation that it does not have a boost-sustain type motor, rather that it burns for a constant thrust over a long period of time. The in-game thrust is approximately a total of ~96,780s impulse. This is slightly short of the 97,000s quoted in the currently known materials… but it is not 25% off as claimed.
One could make the assertion that to properly model the drag, the thrust would need to be increased maybe 10-15% above normal levels to simulate the reduced drag during motor burn time though. This, and the drag is already too high as it cannot reach its’ top speeds by altitude of around mach 6.
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The Aim-54 has and ACM (air combat maneuver) active mode the pilot himself can switch to for close range dogfight situations. The Aim54 was utilized this way on several occasions during the Iran/Iraq war. The Aim54 has proven record of killing small fighter sized targets. There is YouTube videos of radar intercept officers specifically speaking on the ACM active mode.
Whoever typed the description for the devblog is intentionally misleading the Aim-54 capability and unfortunately its evident they may intend to keep it in that state. Hope not.
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6 aim-54A kills. Do I have the record?
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lol probably. That was awesome.
I only ever gotten 4 kills in the Early way back.
Send it to thundershow :D
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Would be nice to get the active off the rail mode and proper TWS functionality to fire AIM-54’s without having to get a lock with the missile itself as long as the TWS has lock
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The AIM-54 is effective against maneuvering targets, to some extent, but the missile itself is very large and very heavy. You must also consider that it is an order of magnitude easier to dodge missiles in WT than it is in real life, and I think the lethality of the AIM-54 in DCS somewhat reflects that.
Also the AIM-54 is designed to shoot down anti-ship cruise missiles and heavy bombers launching those cruise missiles. This isn’t really in debate, it’s just that it happens to be relatively good at shooting down fighters also. The thing is designed for range and warhead size, not for defeating a fighting maneuvering at accelerations that would liquefy any normal human.
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Everything is effective against maneuvering targets to extent sure.
Interesting wt reference. Well how much easier is it to dodge the r27? As opposed to real life? Being that the R27 is a technologically inferior missile with a very poor success rate? How is the r27 so much better being that it relies on a signal that comes from far inferior radars to that of the AWG9 and does not have the ability to transmit a signal of its own?
The aim54 should be the most accurate missile in game as it literally has its own radar which produces its own signals and illumination becomes stronger the more it closes the distance. As you said it has the ability to shoot down cruise missiles. You just forgot to mention low altitude cruise missile part though.
The aim54 has the ability to cut out relying on the middle man, the firing aircraft’s radar signal for guidance and the distance the signal must travel and potential for disruption. Additionally the aim54 has a far more advanced fire control to calculate the proper lead and tracking. Weight should not matter unless outside of the weapon employment zone. To top it off the aim54c should have a reduced smoke signature.
Lastly the F-14 should have the greatest ability to manipulate radar frequencies via radar intercept officer in the backs seat, and many advanced digital
signal processors to filter out those returns for the best target picture. It’s TWS has the greatest ability to mask that it is targeting anyone. None of these are properly modeled in game. For whatever reason.
How does it happen by magical coincidence to be able to shoot down fighters? It has a literal mode called ACM ACTIVE MODE for close range engagements. It is by intentional design to be used as a secondary measure for targets performing air combat maneuvering. That is what acm stands for.
So, The R27 it’s primarily designed for extended range. It is much heavier with the same exact control surfaces and not much of a stronger engine than the previously. But only a longer burning motor. That is why they are called the long burning alamos.
So why does it magically retain all its dogfight capability going Mach 3 less than 5 seconds off the rail at all altitudes and retains all its performance through out the entirety of its flight envelope?
Yes you are correct, the aim54 is intentionally held back as of now as well as the awg9. It’s not really a debate.
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It should be noted the AIM-54A was never intended for shooting down very small sized targets. The lack of threatening bomber fleets post-inception of the Tomcat led to them modifying the AIM-54’s proximity detection devices and other components to better be able to identify and kill smaller targets. One of these changes was the warhead type… now it can focus the blast in a specific direction. These improvements can be found in the AIM-54C…
A 22-24G missile with a larger warhead can be as lethal as an AIM-7, but only within the certain speed ranges where 22-24G is possible. Currently in-game it lacks this improved overload capacity and is stuck at 17G. The turn radius for the missile and the available AoA is relatively correct… for single plane… but the missile has some more improvement left in her. It certainly will not be spectacular in war thunder as a ‘dogfight missile’… any semblance of ‘dogfight’ capability discussed from IRL about this missile can be dismissed / thrown out the window. For the high level of situational awareness and tactical gameplay the AIM-54 simply won’t be smacking people in ‘dogfights’. This likely refers to combat at very high altitudes compared to what we get in-game.
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