Grom Missile - Able to unlock?

I'm new to the Mig-21 and have a question about the Grom missile. If I use radar beam riding mode and decide to lock a ground target but the pipper is initially off, how do I go about unlocking or adjusting the the pipper? I know this can be done when the target isn't locked and just by manually riding the pipper, but I can't figure out how to disengage it once locked.

Thanks,

Cancel button on the radar filter panel. The Grom is always radar beam riding mode. The difference is whether radar beam is steady relative to air frame or ground point.

You can still lock ground targets? I thought this was unrealistic and got removed, so you have to keep your pipper on the target by fly towards it like IRL?

You can still lock ground targets? I thought this was unrealistic and got removed, so you have to keep your pipper on the target by fly towards it like IRL?

Pretty sure you can still lock. The Mig-21 BIS is not supposed to be equipped with groms, entire grom implementation is fictional (was another variant that could do this which is what this is approximated off. This makes alot of people mad, but I'm glad we got an upgrade to our LN variant :P).

I always simply just put the radar switch into standby, then back into active. It works but probably isnt the best way of doing it (not sure if it stresses the radar as far as the sims concerned).

Note the Grom in DCS is actually quite stable, unlike the problems it suffered IRL. You can actually disable the radar / beam to egress quite early without having to stay on target, and the accuracy does not suffer very much. This is great for precision striking bridges.

Caveat to the above is its maybe 6 months ago since I actually used the Grom.. should take it out and see if it still conforms to memory.

Note the Grom in DCS is actually quite stable, unlike the problems it suffered IRL. You can actually disable the radar / beam to egress quite early without having to stay on target, and the accuracy does not suffer very much. This is great for precision striking bridges.

I so have to try this :O. Thanks for the info :).

Pretty sure you can still lock. The Mig-21 BIS is not supposed to be equipped with groms, entire grom implementation is fictional (was another variant that could do this which is what this is approximated off. This makes alot of people mad, but I'm glad we got an upgrade to our LN variant :P).

I know and I'm actually one of these mad people. ;)

But even in the other Fishbed variants that were actually able to use the Ghrom I don't think they were able to lock ground targets. AFAIK the pilot needed to keep the radar beam on the target manually by pointing the nose at it.

I know and I'm actually one of these mad people. ;)

 

But even in the other Fishbed variants that were actually able to use the Ghrom I don't think they were able to lock ground targets. AFAIK the pilot needed to keep the radar beam on the target manually by pointing the nose at it.

Radar lock works the same way no matter what you point it at, so it should (theoretically) be possible for a radar like the RP-21 to lock surface targets that have a strong radar signature compared to the background. Tanks are right out, but locking up a surface ship was probably achievable.

Radar lock works the same way no matter what you point it at, so it should (theoretically) be possible for a radar like the RP-21 to lock surface targets that have a strong radar signature compared to the background. Tanks are right out, but locking up a surface ship was probably achievable.

That's the point. Land units don't provide this, as you said. Ships might indeed be lockable IRL.

Given a flat featureless Earth, "lock" would not be bound in elevation or azimuth. The return would only have extent in range. Thus a terrain track could not be a normal track as it cannot find the edges to steer the beam in azimuth/elevation.

My hypothesis is that AG radar tracking in the MiG-21bis is always done in fixed beam and simply range gates the return spread from the fixed -1.5° staring beam. Thus if the nose began to wander during the attack the ranged point also would change as the beam would be intersecting a different place on the ground. Too rapid a beam shift (by swinging the nose to different places) would cause the track to break as the range gate would have to change too suddenly. Presumably the screen-out circuit for slow targets would be disabled in such a mode.

The radar could be (but guessing not) more sophisticated for AG ranging in the following ways:

1. Radar LOS based on pipper position to range along the direction of aiming instead of the fixed -1.5° line of sight.

2. The radar once directed toward the ground varies elevation and azimuth in an inertial way such that the direction of look remains constant (disconnected from the nose position.)

3. Similar to 2 except with parallax corrections appopriate for the range and side look angle in an attempt to range to the same point on the ground when the motion of flight has a sideways component.

I think if radar ranging could choose a different direction associated with pipper then it would be recommended for bombing as a ranging tool.