World War II Radar

[iculus]

"Yes," you're thinking, "another radar post..."

Can anyone describe the capabilities of actual WWII era radar?  Was it accurate enough to make out single planes?

Certainly what we have know is not historically accurate... but are there limitations from the interface that make what we currently have neccessary?

As it is, I feel sort of like we're chasing "dots" all over the place, instead of "keeping sharp".  What are the pros of this system?  Is there a comprimise?  How long will it take for this thread to go to the dogs?

Thanks,
IC

[juzz]

Of course WW2 radar could make out single planes!

The maximum detection range is going to depend on the size of the aircraft, altitude it's flying at, weather conditions, skill of the radar operator, etc...

The diagram below, for the British Chain Home radar illustrates typical performance achieved by experienced operators on an average size bomber such as the Heinkel 111.
 

See this page for detailed information on Chain Home: http://www.radar.pages.cwc.net/index.htm

[tofri]

The standard radar of the Luftwaffe was a combination of Freya at 34.5 - 177MHz and mostly FuMG 62 Wuerzburg at 9cm (I'm too lazy to recalculate in Hz  ).
The Freya Fahrstuhl radar were used to detect incoming planes at long distances depending to the planes altitde (230km@10.000m - 65km@2000m). The precision were about 2°-3°(side) in direction and +/- 50m-1000m in height and distance. So you got an rough image of your room.
The Würzburg radar (the radar in AH looks a bit like it) was used to guide flak or nightfighter. The range for detecting was about 80km (FuMG65) and tracking 40-60km with an inaccuracy of 15-20m. The precision was
+/- 0,2° in height and side. But there had been types with higher precision like FuMG77 Marbach with a precision of +/- 1-2'.
These type of radar could only track one plane at a time.

TMHO the radar model in AH is undermodelled for the detection range and overmodelled for low flying planes.
But who cares! It's just a game and a good one!

ToFri

[MrSiD]

Just there was a small difference to the radars today - without sufficient training you couldn't read jack toejam from the 'blimp' on the screen.

WW2 radar had nothing to do with modern radars visually. I doubt any of us could make use of the radar if it required the skill it did back then..  

The map/dot radar we have in aces high is *cough* startrek material in terms of realism.

Only one place during those times had anything relevant to our clipboard available and that was the flight operations control center with its manually updated ac position markers on a paper map.

[Karnak]

MrSiD,
How would you recommend simulating WWII radar infrastructures?

It would be more unrealistic to expect each fighter to be deciphering a WWII radar screen.  Heck, we'd probably have at least as good a chance of interpreting a WWII radar display as a real WWII pilot would, maybe better because of our familiarity with technology.  The pilots of day fighters never saw radar displays.

In reality they had people on the ground who were skilled at deciphering what the radar screen was showing them, then relayed that info to people who plotted the enemy's position, altitude, course, speed, numbers and then told the fighter pilots where to go.  If we can get 50% of the guys logged on to work in ground control it might then work.  Want to bet on the odds of that happening?

------------------
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother

Bring the Mosquito FB.MkVI Series 2 to Aces High!!!

Sisu
-Karnak

[Dowding]

I second what Karnak says. In WW2 there was some work on putting radar in single-seater aircraft, but it was a failure; the pilot simply had too much to do just flying the plane, nevermind reading a radar screen. It's why the majority of night fighters that carried radar are multi-engined with at least two crew members.

A good example is the Typhoon. There was research which involved putting radar in a tiffie, but it was a complete failure for the reasons given above.

[Fidd]

If we assume that the map is in fact "representing" the controller/radar/observer units, then what we have is *reasonably* ok. However, I'd far prefer to see a lower sampling rate, so that the map presented a "snapshot" of a point in time, rather than a realtime actual locations. I'd suggest every 2-3 minutes or so.

This would allow:

Surprise low level raids, Bomber streams fooling fighters by feints (to a small degree), and less use of radar to as IFF.

my 2p worth.

Fidd

 

Originally posted by Karnak:
MrSiD,
How would you recommend simulating WWII radar infrastructures?

It would be more unrealistic to expect each fighter to be deciphering a WWII radar screen.  Heck, we'd probably have at least as good a chance of interpreting a WWII radar display as a real WWII pilot would, maybe better because of our familiarity with technology.  The pilots of day fighters never saw radar displays.

In reality they had people on the ground who were skilled at deciphering what the radar screen was showing them, then relayed that info to people who plotted the enemy's position, altitude, course, speed, numbers and then told the fighter pilots where to go.  If we can get 50% of the guys logged on to work in ground control it might then work.  Want to bet on the odds of that happening?

[kfsone]

I think it would be nice for precision of dar to be based on distance from the observing dar. However, once airborne, I don't think we should still be getting world-wide-dar, perhaps only a few sectors out from us.

The idea is that the apparent startrek-HUD display we have on the clipboard is infact representative of ground support, etc.

Certainly within 25 mi of base, the dar should be more or less in it's current state. Outside those sorts of ranges, it should become fuzzy. When you're flying over an enemy base, it should not be presenting the player with ICBM co-ordinates for the enemy cap.

I'd also suggest dotting the terrains with a few little 'radarsvilles', little town-type structures that house a radar station, a handful of buildings and maybe a single ack or two. Something that would be a great target for a blennheim or a mosquito. Maybe some non-stationary ground targets like supply lines etc....


K

[iculus]

Thanks for the feedback!

Here's an idea.  (...Which I'm sure is lacking in some manner  )

"What if":

While on the ground (in the tower) you got the radar that we have now: see everything.  While flying, you get nothing... well maybe sector counters.  Now here's the possibly neat part:  

Anyone in the tower can give vectors *graphically* to pilots, by drawing a vector on their clipboard.  This "data" is then sent to all of the pilot's clipboards.  One problem with this is that you could get too many people doing "ground control", which means too many vectors on the inflight clipboard.  This problem could be surmounted by having perhaps five radar "channels". Simply "tune" your clipboard to get the data you want. This means only five radar operators at once, and you get data from only the one you want.

This is just a rough idea.  What are the problems I didn't think of?  

Salute,
IC

[This message has been edited by iculus (edited 05-14-2001).]

[Fokker]

There is a good reference for this discussion in WB. In the WW2 arena of Warbirds you only get the worldwide dot dar of AH when you are in the tower. In flight you have no dot dar at all.

Pilots in tower will notice on radio the position of enemy plots. A good way to do it. I would like to see the same in AH.

[Ripsnort]

WB's radar beats AH radar IMO.  Their maps too!

I like Iculus's earlier mentioned suggestion, that others have suggested too.  Dot dar in tower, have the sector bars, but no sector bars for A/C under 500 feet.

[Effdub]

Radar? Perk it!  

but seriousy... I also liked the WB radar better

Effdub

[hblair]

I agree with exactly what Fokker said.

[MrSiD]

Well, in my opinnion if you really wanted to simulate WW2 time radar control, you'd have to have a flight controller giving you readinds on enemy positions pre-flight and on flight.

That is, if the pilot has a _working_ radio during the flight. That was rarely the case.

Like: Blue flight, multi-engined enemy ac approaching sector bla bla your vector this'n that. Now don't ask about implementing this to game.. I don't have the answers. Clipboard is ok with me as it is.

In real world radar observator is backed up by visual and acoustic observation (which were pretty sophisticated back then..)

Stereophonic listening devices could be used at all times to pinpoint the bearings to the aircraft and I guess that an experienced observator could also guess if it was a bomber or a fighter in question judging from the sound. Of course not reliably.

If the enemy came in low enough, visual observation units (many times volunteer women) would use their ac charts to reckognize and report the enemy.

[Nexus]

As it is now AH DAR is pretty flaky. Often times I only see friendlies on DAR, even though I have visual contact of enemies.

Nexus