Ian R -> USN AEW radars - October 1945 (3/8/2021 11:18:14 PM)
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This following emerged from an unrelated discussion thread in the general forum. quote:
ORIGINAL: Ian R quote:
ORIGINAL: JohnDillworth Well how about the declassified ship damage reports? https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/w/war-damage-reports.html Very good, and navigating back to the Reading Room unearths a lot of other stuff. Edit-This is interesting: https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/a/anti-suicide-action-summary.html quote:
1. AEW.--This is a powerful airborne radar which will detect aircraft at ranges up to 70 miles and surface vessels at ranges up to 150-175 miles. Radar returns are relayed from the aircraft to a surface display console on a ship having AEW receiving equipment. This equipment is being installed in two types of aircraft--the TBM, which will carry 2 radar operators, and the B-17, which will accommodate an airborne CIC. One 4-plane TBM unit will be equipped by 1 October 1945, and 5 other units by 1 November. The first 4-plane element of B-17's will be ready about 1 December, and other units, to a total of 16 planes, will follow as completed through January 1946. Four surface units are being installed in ESSEX class carriers, and units for smaller ships and amphibious application are expected to be ready for shipment in November. Trained personnel will accompany all AEW installations. I don't think the game has code for AEW per se, so I'll need to do something Dunniganesque with this. Something like a very long ranged radar that can be acquired by taking an Essex off line for an upgrade, perhaps. So, what we firstly have is, starting October/November 1945, TBM-AEW aircraft operating from Essex class carriers equipped with the surface unit component of the radar. As far as I know, there is no exe code for AEW, and to the extent that there is A2A intercept radar, it is carried by the all weather (night) aircraft and only helps them (If I was wrong about that that would be helpful). One way to abstractly simulate that would be - - don't worry about actually depicting the aircraft; - and instead - have a new radar device (actually two, one SAR, one SSR) that can be acquired by Essex class carriers in an upgrade in October 1945. - the range of the radars should be the sum of (the ranges quoted in the report + orbit radius of the aircraft), which might be uncovered by some more research. - there is a problem in terms of vectoring the search. It will work 360 degrees. There may need to be a trade off for that. Another way to do it would be to actually have a TBM AEW element with very powerful on board radars... but I can see problems - if it is rated as a fighter it might not be in the air, and if it is rated as a search aircraft, it might RTB after detecting an xAKL. Also, airborne radars accuracy/effect is rated well below ground (and ship) radars. The second thing we have is the B17 flying AEW and "CIC". If the actual aircraft are "factored in" to the device, as JFD would say, that neatly sidesteps the problems of base, range, search station, etc. It seems to me that the B-17 is still relaying detection data to the ships - the reference to a CIC may simply be to something a bit more capable than the 2 operator system on the TBM. Looking at (US) ground radar device numbers, the mid late war types have accuracy 70, and effect 7. The range can vary considerably though. The SU SSR in slot #1606 (available 4112, but very short ranged) has accuracy 75, effect 8 - so heeding Alfred's advice to look at known values, so as to keep modifications within ranges consistent with the code algorithms, that looks to be about the maximum. There are a couple of later war sub mounted ASRs in with accuracy of 72, but they are also very short ranged. The values for airborne search radars are much lower than ground radars, e.g. the 1945 ASH radar is Accuracy 40, effect 5. Note that APS-15 (SSR) is accuracy 60, effect 7, but is only carried by PB2Y and PBM. At this stage the solution seems to be to add the AS radar to the ship, give it accuracy 75, effect 8, and range of, for the air search 124 + aircraft orbit radius. The SS set would be 265+ orbit radius. Thoughts? Criticisms?
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