hornetfinn wrote:eloise wrote:garrya wrote:I found this photo recently,
f-117-radar-scattering.png
Frontal RCS remain very low above 0.4 Ghz, that put an end to "counter stealth" L-band myth
Very true. Besides if I read this correctly, then there are rather narrow spikes even in lower than UHF frequencies. This would mean those radars would likely only see fairly infrequent detections (radar plots) and maybe rather sporadic tracks. This is because low frequency radars usually need quite a few plots to generate track as otherwise they'd have a lot of false target tracks. AESA technology will help somewhat, but the effect is still there.
Not to claim that low frequencies are useless or not a threat (especially for a manned cruise missile like F-117). However low frequency radars are hardly the silver bullet some people claim or wish for.
Is the relationship between the frequency and the number of plots required for a track linear? I.e.: If you decrease frequency by half, you need about twice as many plots for a track?
From what I understand, while absence of detectability or absence of track are desired, stealth is mainly about decreasing the range or probability of attaining a sufficiently timely and precise targeting solution. I presume the range cell resolution is usually precise enough but the azimuth/elevation cells might be much larger than the effective damage area of a warhead. Even with a precise-enough targeting solution, you need to update it often enough if the target takes evasive maneuvers, otherwise it's like playing an online first-person shooter with a 5FPS framerate. Add to that that a stealth strike aircraft would likely be supported by EW to generate even more false tracks and survivability might be much increased.
How would a system trying to take down an F-117 or similar go about distinguishing between true target tracks, false target tracks from jamming and false target tracks from unintentional noise?