Forum: F-16 versus XYZ

Hi,

I'm from germany and have a question. in a german forum we are discussing dogfights. my first question would be, if dogfights are still actual because there are some guys that said dogfights belong to the past.
my second question would be, is it possible to take down an f16 for example, with an amraan from a distance of 10miles. is it possible to escape from it? could you give me some information of actual dogfights and how todays air fights look like?

Thanks a lot

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Once launched it is very hard to dodge AMRAAm's at 10 miles. But your picturing a scenario of a combat that has already started.

Before I start, let me give you some principles of missile employment:

1)Max range: Maximum range you can shoot the missile head on. Usualy it reduces if the target aproach speed reduces. Either he slows down or turns to one side or 180º away.
You can find yourself firing missiles head on and then the target turns away resulting in a Heads-Up-Display indication that the distance to target must be shorter now to achieve a kill, i.e. You have wasted the missile you just shot.

2)Max No-Escape-Zone range. It is the range where, once launched the missile can cover any distance the target might be able from then on. No matter if he turns away. Theoriticaly he can still evade if the missile's seeker looses him or if he pulls a daring turn the missile cant match (very hard).
So this NEZ range is basicaly taken in Kinetic terms excluding everyting else.

IRL with potent aircraft on both sides, you want the enemy in your NEZ but at the same time you want yourself out of his. This might result in firing missiles in between ranges 1) and 2) in wich case if the target has less time to react, but if he does he might work as a decoy making you waste missiles and dragging his wingman closer to you unnoticed for a shot at range 2) NEZ.

One trick to shoot and minimize the chances of letting the enemy reach his NEZ to you is to shoot and then turn to one side keeping a the lock at the corner of the radar screen (maximum radar cone of view angle). This is called F-pole. And he might try do the same on you unless you fire first and this trick.

Another thing is active radar VS smi active radar missile combat. Like russian R-27ER Alamo missiles VS AIM-120 AMRAAM.
With the R-27 you have more range but you are forced to keep a lock i.e. keep aproaching him, F-poling or not, untill it hits.
With the AMRAAM you have slighly less range but once the missile gets within 10 miles or so, it goes autonomous and you can evade his R-27's by turning away, perhaps robbing them off their range they need to hit you.

This also gives the R-27 user a temptation to keep stubornly a lock on you in vain taking an AMRAAM in the face.

Another scenario would be over cautiious combat on both sides and firing all BVR missiles outside the NEZ, and if both play it smart, all long range missiles could have been wasted, degenerating the combat into a knife fight, so there you go, combat at short range is still possible, and not necessarily unlikely because long range missiles do miss to other factors than just messing arround with range.

As for escaping a 10 miles shot, it depends. If the shooter is higher, then it is unlikely you can run away, but if you do a turn in order to make the missile go to you left or right in perfect 90º angles, and dump chaff for long enough, the missiles seeker might loose you. AMRAAM's have built in software to predict targets position after the missile goes blind. So your best bet is to estimate when the missile should have gone blind and then pull out of your neat predictable curved turn into some other more umpredictable manuever in another direction. By the time the missile would catch you again, you would not be there anymore but somewhere else.

But this is extremely hard and dangerous. 60% of all shots taken at that range have killed their targets. And these odds are going to increase unless your flying in a low observable aircraft.

Active Member Joined: Mar 14, 2007 - 11:44 PM Posts: 155

i have a question
at what range u can launch a aim-120 at a slow moving target let`s say 150 knots flying circles at 3500 feet

Forum Veteran Joined: Dec 15, 2006 - 12:28 AM Posts: 760

Myth: The days of dog fighting is over
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgIT6Mg0vpw

Active Member Joined: Mar 14, 2007 - 11:44 PM Posts: 155

hardly the aim9b or the aim-7e could compared too something like this:
http://www.israeli-weapons.com/weapons/ ... thon5.html
http://www.israeli-weapons.com/weapons/ ... Derby.html

Hi mka82. In response to your first question people have been predicting the end of dogfights since the end of world war one. But they seem to keep reappearing.
So yes they are still possible. If both sides use smart tactics and ecm it will be a daily event in the next war.
And the next war is one day closer with ever sunset.

Everytime someone has said that dog fighting is dead they have had to eat their words. If the future is Stealth and you can only acquire a bandit by seeing them, then guess what?

Merge and Turn.

I keep thinking back to all the times when the guys in charge have required a visual ID. Guess what? That means WVR and fight's on Thumb

!

Active Member Joined: Mar 14, 2007 - 11:44 PM Posts: 155

usualy superiority fighters like the f-15 and f-22 avoid dogfighting and try to keep the fight in BVR...
f-16 did not have initialy BVR capabilty hence it had to be better in WVR.
if a dogfight would happen the f-16 was build for it.

Forum: F-16 versus XYZ

Dogfights