A/G Gun and Rockets performing poorly?

I have set up an A/G mission in 3 versions for "modern" aircraft:

A10C, AV-8B and F/A-18C and I find the F/A-18 currently last effective.

This mission has 9 trucks and a BTR-80 APC as targets.

1. A-10C (carrying 70 rockets): I can kill the trucks with one very short gun burst each. The APC which is very small and not very visible sometimes takes two gun bursts. Actually I can kill all trucks with rockets and only need the gun for the APC, as the rockets are very accurate.

I have to admit that I have had the A-10C for more than 5 years which means a lot of practice.

2. AV-8B: very effective gun, almost every short burst hits and kills. The APC is hard to see (I have not managed to reduce HUD opacity in the AV-8B) but one or two bursts kill it. With the rockets I have very little success but I may not use them effectively as I don't fly this plane much.

3. F/A-18 (carrying 76 rockets): I can only kill only about half of the trucks with rockets and have to use the gun for the rest. The APC which is much smaller and "harder" is very hard to hit and I usually spend all remaining rounds without killing it. Even when I take control of my wingman's plane and use the full load of gun rounds, I cannot always kill the APC.

So in conclusion, my limited success with the rockets may be due to lack of skill. But the gun seems definitely ineffective against compact ground targets like the BTR-80.

I wonder if this will improve.

I would not wonder that the FA18 gun is less effective that the A10's. The A10 IS basically just the gun with also some wings attached. Nothing comes close to that..

It took months and months before the A-10C was any good also. Well, actually it was good, then it was bad, then it was good, then it was bad...... Pretty much all the time.

The A10 has the 30mm Avenger cannon and a PAC system designed to make it extremely accurate and deadly in air to ground attack. Likewise, the Harrier is a 25mm cannon, not as focussed as the A10 but still bigger than average.

Most fighter/bombers, including the F18, have the Vulcan 20mm cannon. Aside from being smaller than the 30 or 25, I think it’s also consider d more a secondary weapon for Air to Air or soft air to ground targets. It’s just not designed to take on armour.

There's also the 22 mil accuracy issue with the F-18 gun... it should be 8 mil. We'll see if that gets addressed. It'd be super easy to fix...

The A10 has the 30mm Avenger cannon and a PAC system designed to make it extremely accurate and deadly in air to ground attack. Likewise, the Harrier is a 25mm cannon, not as focussed as the A10 but still bigger than average.

 

Most fighter/bombers, including the F18, have the Vulcan 20mm cannon. Aside from being smaller than the 30 or 25, I think it’s also consider d more a secondary weapon for Air to Air or soft air to ground targets. It’s just not designed to take on armour.

erm, the Harrier's gun is ULTRA focussed right now, like a laser.

The Hornet's gun's dispersion is quite wild though. Accurate but not precise.

I believe Wags commented on a youtube video that the Hornet's gun is not effective against armored vehicles. Only soft targets & trucks.

check Wags' comment in this video:

What Sandman1330 said... There is a huge difference between the 30mm Avenger and the 20mm Vulcan. The 30mm simply carries a bigger punch. Keep in mind ther Hornet is still early access and the Harrier is more feature complete and mature.

The Hornet's weapon systems and immplementation are still being tweaked and once the Hornet matures we will start to see improvements in weapons' performances and effectiveness.

--T

Hornet`s Rockets and gun are not bad. You`re just poor pilot. Need to practice more. Just for example, yesterday i killed a BMP-1 and MT-LB APC`s with Hornet`s 20mm Vulcan. And i killed many tanks with Zuni rockets. I `ll make a track and send you if you not believe me.

Well thank you for these kind words Vlado! Maybe you can tell me how to select the number of rockets I want to fire. I'm sure there must be a way, but I cannot find it.

... Just for example, yesterday i killed a BMP-1 and MT-LB APC`s with Hornet`s 20mm Vulcan. And i killed many tanks with Zuni rockets. I `ll make a track and send you if you not believe me.

I added a MT-LB APC to my targets and killed that with a single run. Seems to be softer than the BTR-80.

Will try Zuni rockets next.

As there was mentioned, the Vulcan in F/A-18 has too wide spread than what it should have, but you can use it as your advantage because you just can now spread at the direction and get hits.

But why you are not accurate with the F/A-18C either is we do not have the A-G radar capability to measure ranging. The AV-8B N/A is the most accurate one because ARBS system and doesn't alarm the ground unit from being targeted by radar (SAM systems etc has similar to RWR to give them direction and distance) by being totally passive.

What comes to the calibers, most Soviet era armors were designed to withstand 14.5mm autocannon from front or front hemisphere. So 12.7mm is not so effective at them but 20-30mm will penetrate them. Most tanks will as well take damage from a 20mm calibers but don't even try to shoot at MBT as those has too effective armor that you can't penetrate with even 30mm. You an make with 30mm a mobility kill if you get to shoot straight at the engine and penetrate those armor plates protecting them. But that is very lucky thing to do.

Currently the rockets are little underwhelming as we do not have fragmentation modeled. Why you need direct hits against armors. And one day in future we get the laser guided S-8Kor and APKWS rockets that makes it possible to destroy plenty of the ground units with very good accuracy.

There's also the 22 mil accuracy issue with the F-18 gun... it should be 8 mil. We'll see if that gets addressed. It'd be super easy to fix...

Correct, but you can also do temp fixes yourself until ED provides a permanent one. You have to do this after every update.

In DCS World\Scripts\Database\Weapons open the shell_table.lua. Under the values for the yellow tracer M61, change

"Da0 = 0.0022" to "Da0 = 0.0008"

Your F-18 now has a waaaaay more effective gun.

Well thank you for these kind words Vlado! Maybe you can tell me how to select the number of rockets I want to fire. I'm sure there must be a way, but I cannot find it.

Love Both of your attitudes. As for selecting amount of rockets there is option but better just to watch trading videos as I cant explain how.

Correct, but you can also do temp fixes yourself until ED provides a permanent one. You have to do this after every update.

In DCS World\Scripts\Database\Weapons open the shell_table.lua. Under the values for the yellow tracer M61, change

"Da0 = 0.0022" to "Da0 = 0.0008"

Your F-18 now has a waaaaay more effective gun.

What about the other M-61 ("M61_20_AP" "tracer_bullet_white")?

... As for selecting amount of rockets there is option but better just to watch trading videos as I cant explain how.

I've looked at several videos that had "rockets" in their title, incl. Episode 8 by Wags. None of them showed how you can select the number of rockets to fire (except Single and Salvo).

Hornet can currently only fire a whole pod, or all the pods. Wag's mentioned somewhere they'll add single rockets sometime.

Correct, but you can also do temp fixes yourself until ED provides a permanent one. You have to do this after every update.

In DCS World\Scripts\Database\Weapons open the shell_table.lua. Under the values for the yellow tracer M61, change

"Da0 = 0.0022" to "Da0 = 0.0008"

Your F-18 now has a waaaaay more effective gun.

I would hope that that wouldn't pass integrity check, though. (I fly mostly multiplayer)

I would hope that that wouldn't pass integrity check, though. (I fly mostly multiplayer)

It does not pass IC. I tried.

Hornet can currently only fire a whole pod, or all the pods. Wag's mentioned somewhere they'll add single rockets sometime.

Thanks for the info! No need to keep trying. I expect that we will be able to select the number of rockets per salvo. The current mode is wasteful.

What about the other M-61 ("M61_20_AP" "tracer_bullet_white")?

Don’t know. F-15? I’d assume the white tracer M-61 should also be 8mil. Generally speaking it’s the same gun.

I would hope that that wouldn't pass integrity check, though. (I fly mostly multiplayer)

Yeah I don’t know, probably not. I currently only fly SP. It’s unfortunate because the current value is wildly inaccurate. According to some weapons guys I know (Air Force, but same gun) a Vulcan would be pulled from service long before it could ever shoot a 22mil spread. One of the guys said they’d never seen worse than 12 mil on a bench test. 22 is a heavily damaged gun.

Thanks for the info! No need to keep trying. I expect that we will be able to select the number of rockets per salvo. The current mode is wasteful.

I think I saw Wags mention that a Single fire mode would be in the next update. I think! Whether that means we’ll be able to select the number I don’t know.

I expect that we will be able to select the number of rockets per salvo. The current mode is wasteful.

You can’t do that in reality, hence it’s not possible in sim. In reality there is a physical selector on the rocket pod itself to switch between salvo and single modes. The launchers do not work with ripple pulses sent by the SMS.

This is true of all aircraft, it works exactly the same way in the A-10C in reality as well. The ability to set a ripple quality in the DSMS is a game feature.

20mm (F-18 ) vs 30mm (A-10C)...hmmm, yeah it must be a bug that the Hogz inflict more damage than the Hornet

Thanks quinncidence - I knew the trick from F-15c's M61 same discussion some time ago but didn't remember it. I will try it now.

It's right that M61 A/G runs we can see on video are more concentrated than what we have, but when it comes to effectiveness against light armored targets, there's also the fact that M61 A/A purposed gun has short barrels, so after a very short time flying, the projectile has lost his power.

I find the M61 very effective even against light armored vehicules, but you have to fire a short burst at very close (danger zone...) range. Good thing that the hornet is very agile and quick.

No luck with this equipement against battle tanks but, the same way, the 30mm 2.3 meters long barrels gun of A10c does the job, short burst short range right in the back.

Did we had an official word on M61 dispersion 22 mil instead of 8 ?

Thanks quinncidence - I knew the trick from F-15c's M61 same discussion some time ago but didn't remember it. I will try it now...

 

...Did we had an official word on M61 dispersion 22 mil instead of 8 ?

I first noticed it when doing some very basic A/A testing in the F-18. Was trailing one of the four-engined Russian transports by 600-800 feet. I’d spray him and only get a couple little poofs here and there. It took most of my ammo to bring him down. Didn’t seem right at all.

Searched the forums, found the .lua adjustment, flew the same mission and this time I cut the sucker’s tail off.

As far as “official” official confirmation of 8 mil I don’t have that. My weapons friend says spec is absolutely 8 mil but he’s been out awhile and doesn’t have any docs lying around confirming it. Here’s a link to a ground-fired M61 shooting an eight inch circle from 1000 feet (8 mil):

https://youtu.be/owhg0oeurkc

And here’s a previous thread where I got a lot of my info. It was started by a pilot with experience firing the Vulcan:

https://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=211966