Su-27/33 ECM Pod Doubt

[fedaputa 0]

Hi all

 

I have a question regarding the ECM pods of the Flanker family, and maybe someone can help me.

 

What's the advantage of using it. I mean... for me there is none. I've heard that ECM pods prevent of getting locked, but bandits will lock on me every time, with or without it. So what's the point of using it?

 

Thanks in advance.

[+ravenclaw_007 7,221]

the sam ´s as well

i used my ecm-pod my chaff and flare and still one sam found me :fuk:

[SayethWhaaaa 245]

the sam ´s as well

i used my ecm-pod my chaff and flare and still one sam found me :fuk:

 

They won't protect you against IR missiles. You have to use it in combination with chaff/flares, you can't just rely on it to protect you. They're best used with other CMs. Also it depends on how close you are to nearby radar sources. ECM has a more noticable effect when fighting BVR. Sparrows, R-27s etc don't perform as well at longer ranges in a high jamming environment. There's also the missile effectiveness tab in LOMAC. What do you have that set at? The higher the setting, the more effective the missile is.

What version are you using. In the default version (1.0) the US/western aircraft have a slight advantage (in terms of weapon effectiveness) and in Flaming cliffs, the Russian weapon systems have a slight advantage over the US/Western systems, although I'm not sure if this has been balanced out with patches.

[JediMaster 451]

Fly with ECM off and then on and you'll see the difference is the range at which they lock you up. SAMs and fighters will lock you up outside of 30nm without ECM, but with it on they generally seem to close to within 20 before firing.

 

Once the missile is fired at you, chaff and evasion are what will save you, not ECM.

[Ruggbutt 45]

I see too many people online turn their ECM on as soon as they're wheels up. That makes them an easy target because it transmits to everyone where that aircraft is. If EWR or AWACS is in the mission, all I do is wait for you to get into range and even if I can't lock to fire I'll just fire an HOJ (home on jam) missile. You get no launch or lock warning, and your radar guides the missle for me. That being said, I only use ECM rarely and it's in just a few circumstances. The other thing you need to understand is that when you turn ECM on for your whole flight, friendly a/c cannot ID you as being friendly. I have a hot key setup requesting that people on my team turn off jammers, and for the most part when that shows up in team chat they usually do. The ones that don't after 4 or 5 attempts get shot at. It's just not me doing it it's most people who are in squads who will fire an HOJ on someone who refuses to turn their jammers off.

 

Say we're head on and we've fired on each other roughly the same time. Depending on the missile that you've fired and the difference between our altitudes I may wanna go completely defensive, split s and run away from your shot. I'll kick on the ECM because then you won't know which direction I'm headed nor my altitude as I evade you. If I'm going away from you and I'm out of burn thru range even if you shoot at me I'll be out of range for a tail shot. If we're a two (or four) ship and we've been spotted, one of us might go ECM on so that it's hard to lock the other guys in our formation. Be advised, that in certain circumstances (especially with the Russian planes) that if you fire a missile with ECM turned on the missile won't track. I'm seeing that about 40% of the time, your ECM emissions make it difficult for your missile to follow the radar lock. I've seen this with SARH and ARH missiles both. Secondly, when you have jammers on you're forcing the bandit to close WVR (within visual range), where his shot has a higher PK (probabliltiy of kill). Say I'm flying against a guy who is at my altitude or lower but he's jamming. I can tell by the launch warning and what's on the RWR/SPO if it's an active missile or not. If I'm flying an F15 I know my AMRAAM has a similar range to the R77. So I lock the jammer and fire. I don't have to support my ARH missile with my radar till the missile goes autonomous. Again, the guy jamming is helping me by supporting my missile shot. ;)

 

Use ECM sparingly but most importantly use it wisely. More often than not I get kills on enemy using ECM because most that use it don't use it properly. Unfortunately LOMAC doesn't model ECM the way it is IRL. Reason being that ECM technology is highly classified. I rarely use ECM and on the Su's I don't even load ECM pods most of the time. ECM isn't the end all and be all and in LOMAC it's more of a detriment to use.

Edited June 4, 2007 by ruggbutt

[fedaputa 0]

Thank you all for your answers.

 

ruggbutt, just curious...

 

Suppose you're flying Su-27/33 and you get locked by an F-15C for example, what kind of things do you usually do to break the lock for a few seconds?

 

Thanks

[Ruggbutt 45]

Suppose you're flying Su-27/33 and you get locked by an F-15C for example, what kind of things do you usually do to break the lock for a few seconds?

Beam them. Put them at your 3/9 o'clock. In LOMAC it's actually about 3:30/8:30. The way this works is doppler is modeled from the real radar systems. Doppler radar measures speeds coming or going away from the target. IRL there's something like a 70knot filter that ignores anything moving at that speed. So when you "beam" your opponent, you're not moving towards or away from him you're traveling laterally. Which is filtered out and thus you "disappear". Practice it against AI. Don't load any radar missiles, just IR but the AI will still use his radar. Practice notching him. I can break an air or ground radar lock at will using this procedure.

[JediMaster 451]

Does HOJ ever work? I've NEVER gotten a hit with it once.

Maybe it's because by the time you're in range for the missiles the radar burns through anyway, plus all the missiles seem to have less range than the HUD says they do, but I never ever bother with HOJ because it seems like it's just a way to reduce your missile load without going through "jettison" procedures.

[fedaputa 0]

Thanks ruggbutt !

[Ruggbutt 45]

Does HOJ ever work? I've NEVER gotten a hit with it once.

In the russian planes at the bottom center of your HUD is a range marker, it defaults at 10(k). You estimate how far the jammer is and it sets that profile for the HOJ missile to fly. I've gotten plenty of HOJ kills. ;) HOJ shots don't follow a lead pursuit course like they would if you had a radar lock. So they're shorter ranged but you can still get a kill, especially if your bandit keeps closing w/out manuevering to get within range. In fact, I got 2 ER HOJ and 1 ET maddog kill in one sortie. I think I still have the track of it somewhere.