The thing is that the penalty for range isn’t that high compared to the much better performance at high AOA.
And the drag is neglegible until the missile slows down to transonic and subsonic speeds. But at that point the target is most likely in NEZ anyway.
Planar fins literally experience more wave drag at supersonic speeds, due to their continous surface area.
Grid fins split the surface area, in order to lessen the shockwaves, which lessens resistance.
Then there is also the thickness of planar fins which acts as parasitic drag, while grid fins suffer less from that due to their thin structure.
“Good range and high mobility”
Well, yeah. That’s why grid fins have been chosen.
Because they allow that.
Not sure from where that made up story about TVC came.
TVC kinda suffers in range. Which was already obvious with the R-73.
Not exactly great for a BVR missile.
Havent touched R-77s yet but the 120B/C feel very nice now aside from the weird wobble they do when you launch them.
Im hoping they look at derbys next patch since from what i can see they weren’t touched with the current changes.
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again, that is not the case
and has been shown to be false in testing
with grid fins having higher parasitic drag at all speeds
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Yet the MICA EM has 80km range same as the quoted R-77-1.
MICA NG will exceed that while still being TVC and having both IR and ARHM seekers.
And 120D which has been in service since 2013 will wipe the floor with it. Now Russia are seeing deliveries of the R-77M which is about the equal of the 120D
What testing?
MICA only good for close range and lower end of medium range
pretty much every single credible report on the subject
I even mentioned a specific one found on DTIC in my initial comment that was a very in depth study
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R-77-1 range is up to 110km.
So the MICA NG is kinda outdated. Which just further proves why grid fins have been chosen over TVC for a BVR missile.
Yeah, pretty much.
Though a better seeker on the R-77M.
Not in the real world, War Thunder gimps it’s range for balance and the MICA NG and Meteor Rafales are gong to be real scary
Not anymore, it’s quite accurate now. The MICA was never going to be as capable at range as something like the AMRAAM or PL-12
Even MICA-NG will likely be roughly comparable to a 120D at range
Isn’t the NG supposed to be dual pulse?
So I’d expect it to have a bit more range, if it also has a longer battery life.
MICA NG is barely in service, I think you mean IR
MBDA says “up to” 40% better range than MICA since this means that 99% of the time it will be less than 40% better by varying amounts. That puts it at 112km assuming the best case scenario for that 40% boost is the maximum range one
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Not available, so hard to say.
So far I mostly remember about Belotserkovsky’s book (Vympel engineer). The book was entireley about grid fins.
He did state that at lower supersonic speeds, wave drag is insanely high due to bow shocks forming in each cell, which basically chokes the airflow.
Yet at supersonic speeds, it forms attached oblique shockwaves. At that the air flows freely through the lattice which causes the overall wave drag coefficient to drop significantly.
And again, the reason for dropping grid fins seems to mainly stem from their terrible RCS and not being able to fit in internal bays.
I meant mica ng’s stated range, which basically rivals the R-77-1
idk about you
and its a shame that the site is down
but I would rather trust a very detailed report on DTIC, that included both analytical and real world testing with clearly presented results, over a book like you had described
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I understand your concerns about my source.
But a paper from the US DoD could also be questioned of its practical value.
and a book written by a vympel engineer is much more suspect
vs a report that clearly shows the results of empirical testing
with both the methods and results included
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