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Post by Cougar on Apr 20, 2004 13:19:46 GMT 9
Question for MA-1 "weenies".... What was the maximum range for target acquisition on the 106; Radar and IR Was the range always the same during the Operational life of the aircraft or did it improve
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bart
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Post by bart on Apr 21, 2004 23:42:44 GMT 9
Acquisition Range depends on the attack angle (how much reflection you get) and how big he is (again reflection). In the early 60's with the old radar antenna and receiver, running a beam attack (From the side) a 40 to 50 mile detection was pretty good on a good day against a box car or a BUF. In the late 60's with the new radar antenna and parametric amplifier receiver, beleive it or not, if the radome had no stardust on it at night and no sunspots during the day and generally good conditions, a beam attack on a BUF, or the Six at low altitude and the BUF at high altitude so you are looking at his underside (reflecction) the detection range could increase to 60 miles. Not as good as an F-14 but remember the MA-1 lead to the LRI to the F-12 to the proposed F-106 C/D and E/F the became real in the F-14. Some heritage. John Bartoszewicz JackElaine2000@cox.net
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bart
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Post by bart on Apr 22, 2004 23:04:21 GMT 9
Forgot about the IR. IR always put you in a pursuit mode, so depending on speed advantage, it pretty much depended on how hot the exhaust was. We were flying disimilar ACT missions at Tyndal in 74 against F8's out of Huston, all Vietnam Vets. The Six pilot pulled into Quickfix and yelled that he couldn't get a lock on the F8's J-57. When you boresight a bird you do it with a level bird and a boresigt board and aim at different places on the board. However somewhere way out there in space all these points will meet at a single point. Back to the F8, I sent a young troop way out in front of the Six and told him to light a cigarette and I would position him with hand signals. As he walked out there, I dropped the optical sight and positioned him on the furthest point on the ground coinciding with the dot in the sight. I put the sight up, said a quick prayer, selecter weapons and threw the IR boresight switch. It caught the cigarette, I squeezed off a lock on and waved my arms to go evasive. My comment to the pilot was "And You can't find a J-57?" . In my book that's sensitive, but no one can tell you exact ranges since there were so many variables. Just imagine a clear starlit night with -20 degree temp on the ground and the Six is at 40,000 ft chasing a BUF at running near full mil. I hear the IR could see him at 100 miles far before the radar could. John Bartoszewicz
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MArv
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Post by MArv on Apr 27, 2004 2:22:56 GMT 9
Just to give you another answer to digest! The Maximum lockon range of the radar system was set with the alignments to be 31.5 Nautical miles. That equated to about 35 miles of straight-line distance, from the aircraft to the target. That figure was pretty well locked in stone throughout the life of the F-106. The system had those limitations even with the Air-2A (Special Weapon) selected. Actual acquisition of a target depended on the angle of reflection of the radar beam and what else was in the atmosphere at the time. At low levels, clouds could interfer, especially really big thunderboomers! Rain and wind shears also played some part in the acquisition of a target. Some of the radar energy was lost with differences in the atmosphere, at different altitudes the beam was scattered much more and at others remained focused. The system actually had the capability to "SEE" a target out at the 220 nautical mile mark! That is if the "Radar Expanded Sweep" was working correctly and the atmosphere was clear and the pilot had enough altitude to take advantage of this feature! The "Expanded Sweep" feature let the pilot see what was in a 20 mile stretch of video during a normal search attitude. The pilot positioned the range gate along the "B" sweep and pressed the Exp Swp button. This allowed that "next 20 miles of video" to be displayed to the pilot. In the 200 mile sweep selection the pilot had the capability to see from the 200 mile marker out to 220 nautical miles. Or so the Tech Reps and HUGHES Acft engineers taught us! I personnally NEVER tried it in flight! On the ground, it seemed to work out to the earth horizon of about 100 miles. How about one of the Flying officers??? Did you guys EVER really know about this feature and use it??? IR is an entirely different animal! Like Bart said! Depending on what else was out there, the IR acquisition was much farther, but accurate ranging for IR was the real problem. Last, the missles had a limitation on lockon sensitivity, but even more-so was the flight time and manuverability beyond about 3 miles! Hope you learned something!?!? MArv
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