MK82Air bombs land long when dropped from above 500 ft

[Bog9y]

I was practicing dropping HD bombs at a bombing range with a scoring script and noticed that when you drop MK82AIR bombs in the HD configuration they always land long. My release parameters were:

- 1200 ft release alt

- 500 kts TAS

- 10 degree dive

Subsequently I also tested releases at lower altitudes and the bombs are much more accurate (ie not landing long) when you release around 500 ft. Changing the dive angle did not make a huge difference if the release alt is above 500 ft, they would still land long if the dive was steeper.

I tested this mainly with the AV-8B but also with the A10C, F16 and F18, all had the same result so I suspect the bomb trajectory is suspect here. I wonder if maybe the retard chute deploys later than what the weapons (mission) computer uses to compute the trajectory?