FFAR A2A

[+hgbn 91]

I have read about these weapons, and have tryed them myself in the F-86D/L F-89 Its very had to hit anything with them, so my question must be: In real life had those rockets a proxsimity fuse of an sort so they work like AA shells??? Or did they only explode on inpact??

[column5 63]

The difference between real life and the game is that the pilot used the radar to place the aircraft into a firing position, and was given a shoot cue when he was in the best position to score a hit. Even so, they were an unreliable and inefficient method to shoot down a bomber. But you have to put it in the context of the times--it was felt that there was an immediate need for large numbers of interceptors to defend against Soviet bombers, and guided missile technology was still years from being mature enough to deploy. Hence firing salvos of unguided rockets, rockets with nuclear warheads, etc.

[+hgbn 91]

I know these aircraft was never intended to be used in a dogfight and I cant blame them, But thinking being coupled with an radar the prox fuse could work. It works on AAA shells, now I'm not talking about the game but in real life.

[+Florian 394]

In real life, it surely worked, at least somehow.

But bringing down some bad guys with unguided rockets worked for real.

1967 a Skyhawk erased a MiG-17 out of the sky over ´Nam with ZUNIs.

An israeli Scooter did the same with a syrian MiG-19 over Lebanon in 1970, as far as i know.

[+Spectre_USA 7]

Not to mention a proximity fuse is much more sophisticated than IR or Radar guidance.

 

Maybe on a timer, but that would be tricky as well.

 

Impact would probably be the best suited to the era.

[+Dave 2,322]

Well these aircraft were guided by SAGE. Semi-Automated Ground Environment

 

SAGE buildings, were hardened concrete blocks or bricks with no decoration or distinctive architectural features. Radar inputs were brought in from all over the country-side over common telephone lines, so there were no classy radomes or antenna masts. With over one-hundred thirty thousand square feet of floor space, each center consisted of either a 150x150 foot four story block or a 150x270 three story brick. A center contained two 55,000 vacuum tube, 32 bit, three megawatt computers. Except for their size and the fact that they consumed more electricity that the City of Moses Lake, they were a lot like circa 1987 personal computers. Like the Grant County blockhouse, SAGE control centers were often located in the middle of Strategic Air Command Bases so that most folks never got to see one.

 

The intercept plane was guided to their target and were told when to fire. This eliminated the probability for human error upon launch.

[sugarblues 0]

Hi,

 

The only story I've ever heard about FFAR's being used "for real" was in something called "The battle of Los Alamedo's" or something like that... the USN lost control of a Hellcat drone flying out of Point Mugu, and the Air Force launched F-89's to take it out, as the drone was headed directly for Los Angeles... the end result, was that they fired off all of their unguided rockets, which started a couple of forest fires, and the drone kept "droning along"... eventually it crashed in an unpopulated area just outside of L.A.

 

The entire concept of using the rockets centered around the inability of the early jets to pull enough G at high altitude to get a lead on high performance bombers - so the concept made great sense, and really was the best that anybody could come up with before guided weapons became available, but incidents like the California episode showed just how hard it could be. Sure, a Hellcat is a whole lot smaller than a Bear or a Bison, but until the sidewinder came along, firing off unguided rockets trying to get an A/A kill was a prospect that made an awful lot of pilots say "Yeah... RIGHT!"

 

SB

[Guest Saganuay82]

The unguided rocket was a weapon system that our CF-100 Canucks would have used against Soviet bombers back in the day. We carried two pods, one on either wingtip and when the radar had a solution, they would fire the whole lot into the formation.

[+Gocad 26]

I have no doubt that a whole lot of unguided rockets are well suited to break up bomber formations, but to achieve a kill? Nah.

 

But then again one has to admit that people back then had some crazy ideas regarding how future weapon systems would work...remember the first nuclear missile cruiser, the Long Beach?