FCR air-to-ground sighting options
-
Supanova is pretty much correct. The idea of Offset Aimpoints is from a different era.
- Imagine you have no GPS
- Imagine you have no targeting pod
- Imagine the weather is undercast or the target is really hard to find visually and you want to bomb from medium level or something and it’s also hard to find on radar
- Imagine you have an old INS that has a high drift rate so it becomes too inaccurate while you are inbound.
So yes, you might know what the coordinate of the target is, and these days you’d just drop a JDAM, but in those days you have no way to accurately find the target cause even though you punch in the coordinates, your INS isn’t accurate enough so it might drift off.
So you have a problem. But, you do happen to know that there is a very distinctive radar feature nearby (for example, a tip of land that points into the sea or something) and you know the exact location of that as well. You define your offset aimpoint because you know how far this land feature is away from your target coordinate.
As you get close to the target you bring up your radar, your OA and look at the radar. If it is showing smack on the land feature, you know your INS hasn’t drifted that much and you’re OK, so you switch back to and drop on your original target (not the OA).
If the OA is showing offset from the recognizable radar feature, you know your INS has drifted so you bring a slew into your system to line up the OA with what you see on your radar. This same slew will be applied to target and will bring your solution to on target. So now you again drop on the target, with the slew in the system.
And then if the stars line up and you can actually discern something from the POS radar then your old school string of MK82s will hopefully hit somewhere close enough to the target to do some kind of damage.
So yeah, it’s an 80s/90s thing that doesn’t make sense in today’s environment. And good luck avoiding collateral damage too btw
-
Supanova is pretty much correct. The idea of Offset Aimpoints is from a different era.
- Imagine you have no GPS
- Imagine you have no targeting pod
- Imagine the weather is undercast or the target is really hard to find visually and you want to bomb from medium level or something and it’s also hard to find on radar
- Imagine you have an old INS that has a high drift rate so it becomes too inaccurate while you are inbound.
So yes, you might know what the coordinate of the target is, and these days you’d just drop a JDAM, but in those days you have no way to accurately find the target cause even though you punch in the coordinates, your INS isn’t accurate enough so it might drift off.
So you have a problem. But, you do happen to know that there is a very distinctive radar feature nearby (for example, a tip of land that points into the sea or something) and you know the exact location of that as well. You define your offset aimpoint because you know how far this land feature is away from your target coordinate.
As you get close to the target you bring up your radar, your OA and look at the radar. If it is showing smack on the land feature, you know your INS hasn’t drifted that much and you’re OK, so you switch back to and drop on your original target (not the OA).
If the OA is showing offset from the recognizable radar feature, you know your INS has drifted so you bring a slew into your system to line up the OA with what you see on your radar. This same slew will be applied to target and will bring your solution to on target. So now you again drop on the target, with the slew in the system.
And then if the stars line up and you can actually discern something from the POS radar then your old school string of MK82s will hopefully hit somewhere close enough to the target to do some kind of damage.
So yeah, it’s an 80s/90s thing that doesn’t make sense in today’s environment. And good luck avoiding collateral damage too btw
YAY! I get it now – I think LOL! It’s basically a very rough boresighting of your INS to a recognizable land/radar feature? So OAs really can’t be used as originally intended in BMS because IIRC presently BMS jets don’t have any INS drift regardless of the block or aircraft even?
-
For example, I can understand it as a visual cue when set with VIP, but what does the option to mode select it do?
Making the XXX-TO-XXX text go reverse video with mode select simply turns on that VIP or VRP mode. It’s the same function as when you M-SEL to the top line text in any of sub-pages in VIP or VRP. The thing that turns on any of these points is that the RNG is > 0 feet.
So I think it’s more accurate to say that in BMS the OA can become the target?
Yes, we complain that the target is changing with sighting selection. Even in BMS if you have TGT selected it will give weapon aiming for TGT. The TGT should always be the weapon aiming point regardless of sighting location selected, not just when sighting location is TGT. It is not possible to attack sighting points other than TGT in the real airplane.
Well yeah, that does seem pretty useless to me when I had the target steerpoint to begin with.
This assumes two things rather rashly: that you had the target coordinates exactly and that your INS positioning is perfect. Imagine a special forces team is in the woods and sees some enemy troops in a wooded area 700m east of a big radio tower. The special forces team knows the relative positions of target and tower well but their own position poorly. Last Wednesday the USSR blew up half the GPS satellites and is jamming the other half. When you show up to the target the coordinates you got were only good to the nearest minute or two L/L and from the jamming bubble to target might be 30+ minutes. Your INS will have errors and the coordinates won’t be exact. Even if both aspects were perfect an extra level of verification is desirable. From a low level loft attack seeing the triangle over the OAP a few miles away might be the only verification you get that you’re on target. Slinging a couple tons of explosives warrants some care. We aren’t UPS after all.
The utility becomes apparent when you fly a few missions with the GPS switch flipped off. Every mission must be able to be accomplished with or without GPS.
Are there any issues with VIP and VRP implementation?
A few.
Because the target changes with the aiming rotary the HUD symbols shift around incorrectly, the target-designation box should stay on the target location when the rotary is cycled. OAP get the triangle, PUP circle, IP/RP diamond, and target the box.
There’s the VIP/PUP bug where the PUP placement is relative to a point which is relative to the steerpoint in a chained arrangement. All the offset points are one layer of offset from the steerpoint. There is no “A is 1000’ west of steerpoint and B is 1000’ west of A” going on. In this case the PUP should be relative to the IP since that is the steerpoint in VIP.
IP/RP slews are a separate layer than system deltas. If you roll in and do a IP/RP attack using lots of slews and on egress there is no change to the system deltas. The IP/RP slew layer doesn’t change the navigation (i.e. GCSC) solution.
On transition to IP/RP the SOI goes HUD and the sighting rotary is initialized IP for VIP (or TGT for VRP). A partial reset happens on leaving and returning to the IP/RP steerpoint, the IP/RP slews remain from last time but the other resets happen. On leaving mode like MRM and back a different kind of partial reset occurs where just the one-time position update is allowed again.
HUD SOI, TMS up does a one time (until reset) position set for the IP/RP slew layer and on fly over automatically changes sighting location and SOI to FCR/WPN.
We aren’t able to use ranges in nm or km, only feet.
Slewing rates vary based on symbol closest in HUD FOV.
-
-
For those that are curious, I did a second test with an airfield runway as preplanned STPT 5. Punch in 270 for 5000 ft where there is an imaginary Tank.
You can either cycle through the site points using TMS Right or OSB10 when the FCR is the SOI. For this document I just say “CYCLED” and usually I reference the label on OSB10 (“IP”, “TGT”, and “STP” when dealing with VIPs, “RP” and “TGT” when dealing with VRPs; “OA1”, “OA2”, and “STP” when dealing with Offset Aimpoints. Note: sometimes even if the FCR is not the SOI, TMS Right intermittently cycles the sight point but I don’t know why. It could be a glitch.
Also, keep in mind before selecting VIP-TO-TGT or TGT-TO-VRP and pressing M-SEL to highlight it, there is no change in visual cue and CYCLE does nothing.
VIPs
MK82. CYCLED to TGT, I get a visual cue where Runway becomes IP (diamond) and Tank becomes target (box) – however the drop cue is pointing towards the Runway/IP . When CYCLED to IP, I get only the target box for the Tank (no Runway IP) and the drop cues points towards. Both points are shown as IP 5 on the DED home page, rather than STPT 5.
GBU39. CYCLED to STP (not TGT anymore) I have a diamond on the Runway IP and the drop cue is pointed to it. CYCLED to IP I have a box over the Tank and the drop cue is pointed to the Tank. Also, Regardless of being CYCLED to STP or IP, I only get 1 visual clue (either the box or the diamond).
VRPs
MK82. CYCLED to TGT, I get a visual clue where the Tank becomes the IP and the Runway remains as the target with the drop cue still on the Runway. When CYCLED to RP, I get only the target box for the Tank (and the drop cue pointed at the Tank).
GBU39. CYCLED to STP (not TGT anymore) I have a box on the Runway and the drop cue is pointed to it. CYCLED to IP I have a box over the Tank and the drop cue is pointed to the Tank. Regardless of being CYCLED to STP or RP, I only get 1 visual clue (always a box).
OAs
I set OA1 to 270 for 5000 and OA2 to 90 for 5000.
MK 82s. CYCLED to STP I have a target box on the Runway and triangle to the West (on the Tank) and another triangle to the East and the drop cue is pointing to the Runway. CYCLED to OA1 I have box on the Tank with the drop cue pointed there and a triangle to the West and nothing on the Runway. CYCLED to OA2 I have the box over 090/5000 (say an imaginary orphanage) with drop cue, a triangle over the Tank, and nothing on the Runway.
GBU39s. CYCLED to STP I have a box (and nothing else) over the Runway; CYCLED to OA1 I have a box over the Tank; CYCLED to OA2 I have a box over 090/5000. In each case the bomb cue is pointing to wherever the box is.
Oh and I went and repeated some of this by flying out and finding a building and MARKing it and selecting it as steerpoint 26, and the behavior appeared to be the same (although I didn’t test everything).
-
I think you can step through the sighting rotary with HUD SOI or I’d be quite surprised if not. Doing things by HUD SOI slewing seems like equal or greater priority in design than the FCR or other sensor (hence V in VIP/VRP).
Your first test shows the deeper mistake with BMS VIP: it is treating “TGT” = steerpoint (which is IP) and “STP” = IP (which is relative point). There’s a labeling error. It’s treating VIP in some ways like it is structured like VRP (like having the steepoint be the target).
It looks like GBU-39 doesn’t participate in IP/RP/OAP sighting except as alternate targeting locations. I wonder what weapons do and don’t participate in IP/RP/OAP sighting like MK-82s. Mavericks are supposed to participate (judging by the SOI auto change to WPN mentioned) and I’ve never tried.
-
I think you can step through the sighting rotary with HUD SOI or I’d be quite surprised if not. Doing things by HUD SOI slewing seems like equal or greater priority in design than the FCR or other sensor (hence V in VIP/VRP).
Your first test shows the deeper mistake with BMS VIP: it is treating “TGT” = steerpoint (which is IP) and “STP” = IP (which is relative point). There’s a labeling error. It’s treating VIP in some ways like it is structured like VRP (like having the steepoint be the target).
It looks like GBU-39 doesn’t participate in IP/RP/OAP sighting except as alternate targeting locations. I wonder what weapons do and don’t participate in IP/RP/OAP sighting like MK-82s. Mavericks are supposed to participate (judging by the SOI auto change to WPN mentioned) and I’ve never tried.
The HUD very well might have been the SOI of interest when I noticed the “cycling” I could not explain – I tend to be a FCR/TGP kind of guy – thanks for the reminder! It was pretty fun to play around with and try to figure out what was going down. I wanted to address their utility to see why I would want to use them in game. The discussion of the real world application informs what might be possible, but I wanted to sort of focus on what I could do with it to enhance the in game experience. I haven’t really come up with any in game scenarios beyond what’s already been discussed (i.e. setting it up so you will have visual cues around the target area).
But when it comes to BMS single player:
I think VRP would be my choice when I have made a target steerpoint in the Recon map and the target is not a mobile target. I can use VRP mark either a threat near the target or an Ingress Point or an Egress Point.
I think VIP (not OA) would be my choice when I have or lay down a steerpoint on the go and I want to hunt down targets from that steerpoint. So right now I am playing ITO and Egypt has armor moving East. I spot GMT armor, as I roll off after my first pass, I can convert that steerpoint 26 into an IP and place the target box 5nm out to the East (or the direction of the road they were on). I now have a pretty sweet visual cue on the HUD for the known or suspected direction of travel (at least with MK82s at the ready).
I think OAs would be my choice for creating a triangle on the HUD. So instead of a kill box, you have a kill triangle. Also, for columns that are moving back and forth around a corner, you would place the steerpoint in the middle and one OA down the road East and the other OA up North. Again, a pretty sweet visual clue to help you make multiple passes and I can set it up pretty quickly.
I realize those are not necessarily how they are mainly used in real life, but I don’t have the option to fly jets, let alone travel into the past where these tools were used differently. But I think using these special forces to pilot, INS drift correction, backup tools when OPFOR knocks out your satellite tools relevant and useful in BMS will be fun. I just am thankful that supanova started this thread and so many have participated in the education process!
-
There’s the VIP/PUP bug where the PUP placement is relative to a point which is relative to the steerpoint in a chained arrangement. All the offset points are one layer of offset from the steerpoint. There is no “A is 1000’ west of steerpoint and B is 1000’ west of A” going on. In this case the PUP should be relative to the IP since that is the steerpoint in VIP.
If I understand you correctly you’re suggesting that the VIP PUP is positioned relative to the steerpoint rather than the IP. But in testing VIP I find the PUP is positioned relative to the VIP as expected. With VRP the PUP is relative to the steerpoint, also as expected.
-
In VIP the IP is the steerpoint. The PUP is being placed relative to target instead of IP.
-
I understand now.
The VIP becomes the steerpoint, and the VIP bearing and range position the target. The PUP then incorrectly takes its position relative to the target.