Problem with the AGM-65G in VISual - Area Mode
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Hello.
I seem to have encountered a problem with this specific Maverick model and this specific mode during the Training Mission #13.
I’m having no problems when launching and boresighting Mavericks in PRE mode, but when using the Area mode the Mavericks in flight decide giving up on tracking the target after a couple of seconds and going ballistic.
Here’s the ACMI: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1UJITqrM7hozeBFQYUlhQkhKKyrBVD308/view?usp=sharing
It starts with both AGM-65Ds in the air tracking their targets and scoring good hits. Then I make my way to the next target, the bridge, while low flying to avoid the SA-10, and by the last few minutes in the video I fire my AGM-65Gs in VIS mode.
I was aiming at the 3rd Pillars of the bridge, the leftmost one and the rightmost one. Got a good lock with the narrow FOV, waited about 3 seconds to make sure the cross would not blink and RIFLE!
If you notice (more noticeable with the second launch), the missile tracks the target both horizontally and vertically, making it’s correction (with the second launch you can clearly see it corrects it’s azimuth, aiming towards the desired bridge spot I marked). But then, after a couple of seconds in flight, it decides to cut it’s engine off too soon while having a negative attitude, ending up losing too much airspeed and becoming unable to maintain altitude, striking the water instead of the bridges (sadly, the fish kills were not accounted).So, after analysing the ACMI, I started to believe this is a bug. With a bad boresight / bad launch parameters, the missiles would just go ballistic after launch as I noticed when I was learning to use the Mavs. But in this scenario, they’d track the target, but only momentarily, as if they lost it while in flight and decided to cut the engine mid flight or something.
If I remember correctly, I got 100% hits when using the VISual BOH or WOH modes, but this problem arises like 50% of the time when using the Area mode.
Anyone else has had this problem?
Thanks.
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Rocket motor is solid material. It should have a very predictable. I happen to have a recent G launch which started from a platform 375 KTAS, within a second was 600 KTAS, and reached 680 KTAS 4.5s after launch. Call it a boost-sustain type motor adding 300 knot delta-V over 5 seconds. It gained about 2,000’ over launch height at the 19s mark. G-bias was 5g max in the range 0.5-0.75g during coast.
Area track is funny business with Mavericks. In real life it is image processing but in BMS it is in relation to a stored geographical point instead. Perhaps the point stored as the target for launch was not what you intended. BMS area track missiles don’t consider non-terrain objects afaik. At shallow look angles a small change in angle represents a large distance over the ground.
Your engine thrust profile was the same boost-sustain over 4.5s total with dV 634-318=316kt. Your G-bias was notably less being 2g max but otherwise following the trend of reducing to 0 and then 0.5 approaching 1.0 during coast. That’s more or less the same profile qualitatively. It is known the g-bias is a function of firing position relative to target.
I wonder how this behavior would be different at incrementally higher track and launch altitudes.
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Oh, solid fuel, so it can’t control it’s burn time, correct?
Then, perhaps, the target altitude, due to the way AREA mode is modelled in BMS as you said, was “a bit” off (as if the game thinks the actual target to be below the point I aimed for)?
As for the G-bias not going past 2g’s, it may not be a problem here? I thought it should have maintained a climb after launch while pulling more G’s in the start.
And since the DMax is calculated using both my airspeed, altitude and distance to target - and I fired both missiles well inside parameters, with the caret inside the brackets - it probably didn’t fail due to it not having enough energy to get to the target, right?I should probably try again later from a higher altitude (hoping the SA-10 won’t shoot me down) and not in AREA mode.
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Update: Tested now in the normal WOH (not AREA) mode and they worked like a charm, climbing like rockets.
Here’s the ACMI if you want: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1JtIIRa5SsEb53S1uHtK-J0wqOkn96MCU/view?usp=sharing
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It is a known issue with AREA track, the flight profile is not correct. VIS do not matter, you will see the same in PRE/BORE. We have a similar problem with the HARM in POS.
For those of you interested, the missile stays on the first set of guidance gains. For the Maverick, it has a tendency to kill loft, and on the other end of the spectrum for the HARM, it has a tendency to exagerate it and never correct.
IIRC it indeed can make a difference for low-altitude Maverick releases.
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So area track stays on initial gains while centroid switches from first to second gains?
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So area track stays on initial gains while centroid switches from first to second gains?
Exactly.
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Oh well, glad to know it’s already known as a problem.
I still had a slight thought it could’ve been a problem on my end.