I want to emphasize that radars get VERY complicated and inconsistent at times, and without talking about individual radars it's impossible to cover all the little quirks. That means the only way to truly learn the ins and outs of a radar is just by using it and gaining experience; you get a feel for each radar with time. For example, the F-15's radar can switch between TRK PD and TRK PD HDN when locking from pulse-doppler or between TRK and TRK PD when locking from pulse. Or the MiG-21's radar doesn't show an asterisk next to scan area, but can still change it which affects the vertical area. I was trying to keep this video short, under 15 minutes, which was challenging. Or up until just a few days ago the APG-66 listed 19km ACM range when in reality it was 9.2km... There are little things like this that change over time, which is why I tried to focus on the big picture. I'm also not getting into real life stuff. Again, extremely complicated and mostly irrelevant to the average war thunder player. Apparently some of gaijin's naming and display symbology is wrong to real life, but discussing why that's the case would only add length to the video and brings nothing to a player just trying to figure out how to launch some sparrows. I didn't talk about radar band here since that's mostly relevant to RWRs, but the short version is that if you're playing a MiG-21 or MiG-23 or F-111 or Kurnass 2000 (and maybe a few others) your radar can not be detected by certain RWRs. And in sim, not only are there band restrictions but also specific radar restrictions that are done on a per-radar to RWR basis; to name one example, Su-27 can detect Mirage 2000's radar but not Mirage 4000's radar in sim. That's a story for another time. I also want to note that TWS is sort of an oddball; in a way it's kind of an acquisition mode and can possibly be grouped with SRC/ACM/TRK, but I didn't put it there because it's accessed with the "change radar mode" keybind. I think if you have a radar with TWS it's pretty intuitive to find.
@@ccclll987 Basically there's three types of RWR in sim: RWRs that can detect any radar within their band range (for example, most top tier digital RWRs, like the ones the F-16 or Gripen have). Radars that can be detected but not identified (? contacts) still get picked up. RWRs that can only detect a specific list of radars (like ALR-45 used by F-4S/F-14A). With the ALR-45 example that's a list of (usually) older pulse radars, like the ones on the Mirage 3 and F-4E, but pulse-doppler radars like the one on the Mirage 2000 and F-4EJ Kai aren't on the list so they don't get detected. Non-identified threats (the ? threats) that you would otherwise see in realistic battles do not get detected. And then there's RWRs that have a list of radars that they are specifically blocked from detecting in sim. For example, SPO-10 has a list 26 pulse-doppler radars that it isn't allowed to detect in sim. Which RWRs behave in which way (and which radars get blocked) varies from RWR to RWR which is why it probably deserves its own video.
Hey, great tutorial, got a question, thought it makes sense to ask here, maybe you know some details? So, I noticed that "Sight stabilisation"/"Activate target point" keybinds seem to let you force a radar in TWS mode to attempt a lock at where your camera is pointing, even if its outside the current scan area but still within the gimbal limit, so kinda like an HMD of sorts, (seems to work even on F-14A which doesnt have HMD nor the Bombcat's telescope thing) but it seems to require some specific circumstance since sometimes it works like that and sometimes those buttons do nothing
@@hstdrk I've noticed it as well, I think the goal was to let you lock from the F-14B's TCS but I honestly haven't figured out how to reliably get it to try to lock let alone actually succeed in locking. It seems to help if you just spam the button. I'm not a knower unfortunately
This video is the equivalent of teaching the basics of music theory on the guitar in 14 mins. Absolutely insane. I cannot thank you enough for making this, you found me just when I started getting into radar!
This video alone went from me sucking at high tier to knowing what I'm doing and succeeding. Thanks, so much man. I sat in Test Flight while watching this video to play with the controls and got most of it figured out. Now I can be useful in the JA37C and later planes.
What i noticed with hdn modes is that they're also better against targets flying low. I highly recommend to use it whenever possible as it forces the target to fly lower than they're usually used to and can really catch people off guard.
Awesome video man! Thank you for schooling some people on the misconceptions that have gone on in this game about some of the features of radars in game. Great work!!
Great videa as always, really helps with WTs absolute mess of radars. PS, could you do video about minor missiles, like AAM-4, Python-3 and PL-5B, and funny missiles like Fireflash that dont have family to do video about so you could group them all in one video?
The best radar video I’ve ever seen, and I think I’ve seen them all. Congratulations on the video and thank you for the enormous research and pedagogy work you have done. You already have one more subscriber.
For those curious about how MTI/Pulse-Doppler from Wish works more technically, it sends a signal as if it was just searching normally, stores said signal for one broadcast, compares it to the next signal on the display and if it didn't change, filters it out so only the signals with a change compared to the last one show up. Obviously a very rough simplification, but that's the soviet wizardry that is the Sapphire-23 radar summed up.
were you a fighter pilot IRL holy shit, great video . just picked up the f4s, i got a few other jets with radar, now i can use IFF to check for friendlys thank you, sim battles draining my account because of ff
Love the video. Biggest tip i can give for using a radar is "just use the lock within visual range" its usually a waste of a missile trying to get a snipe." I use radar missiles for head ons, and all aspect for side/rear shots.
10:15 HDN mode has another advantage - as everyone is getting ready to enter the big furball at the beginning part of the match, you can filter out the clutter of your friendlies and the AI aircraft. HDN mode will hide aircraft with a relatively low closure rate. I’ve also found that it’s much more resistant to chaff, but more susceptible to notching since lower closure rates get filtered - not that PD is particularly susceptible to chaff anyhow though. I pretty much stick to using HDN mode in stuff like the MiG29 where I can throw an R27ER at quite a long range early on, and then start notching and bleed my own altitude to escape the swarm of missiles that inevitably come toward a high flying target.
super helpful video. honestly been really disappointed with the war thunder community for a while now, because no one seems to want to answer questions. the specific information I end up looking for is buried in random reddit posts or on a YT video, however the actual hunt for which reddit post or which video is ridiculous at times to say the least. I've been playing for something like 2-3 years and essentially most of what I know about WT is self taught. And oh boy are those controls an annoyance. I spent like 6 months tweaking my scheme on PS5 and one day it reverted back to an old version of that save or something. talk about frustrating at times. I guess the point is I think you did a really great job here with your video. Super informative and actually understandable. It may take me watching a few times since theres so much info to deal with radar, but this is definitely gonna help step my game up in top tier air.
@@vecturiongreysteed9171 100% agree, this game is probably the absolute worst when it comes to the game itself telling you absolutely NOTHING. They'll happily sell players $70 premiums but they dont care about adding a robust tutorial system to teach players how to use it, or a ui that explains all the info in an easy to understand manner.
6:00 slightly interesting fact, you CAN access ACM mode on any radar that has it with this keybind too. all you need to do is turn your radar off first
A fantastic guide, coming from someone using manual target queuing via TDC. The GTM mode on the Su-39 is a typo or error on Gaijin's part, it's supposed to say GMT or Ground Moving Target.
To be completely honest, I only clicked on this video for the keybind recommendations, since I am incapable of doing that on my own 😅😂 But I stayed for the quality content. Good job my man.
Very informative, thanks. I finally got to high enough BR where my radar is no longer useless and I had never used it before so this video came in clutch.
I just accidently realised that I have a radar while flying my sea harrier frs1e in a custom battle by pressing he wrong buttons and activating ACM. Now that I know how to use it hopefully I will have less flare troubles! :D Cheers!
i already know alot about radar but getting into this again in 2024 it is just helpful in warthunder once i forget something or just want to understand . thanks jaek.
I think you forgot to mention that ACM mode will locked on to your friendly even with a radar that have IFF ability, otherwise great info for beginner❤
As far as my experience stands, the main use to be had with RADAR Gunsights is with Cannons that have no tracers. So the Harrier GR-7, anything Swedish with a 30mm Cannon and a RADAR and so on
I am new to WT. There's an ergonomic vertical mouse I found that has a built in joystick for $30~. I cant wait to get it in the mail and play the game that way.
Another great video Jaek! My only constructive comment would be to slow down your monologue some and pause a bit more. Anyway, thanks for the great content.
O7 m8 huge thanks for this video. I didn't know how to use PDV but thanks to you I finnaly understood how the damn thing works and tbh it's quite usefull imo.
man i just want to missile goes brrrt , why is that breaking my head so much jesus christ on a motorbike holy cow there so much stuff to learn about to simply play
What do you mean with "they mess with the missiles on the Swift F7" at the end? Those are beam riding missiles, they follow your radar beam by design (and that radar beam will guide them straight to a target when locked onto one, or keep them in front of your nose when not)
I don't know how it works in real life with the Swift F7 specifically, but in war thunder, the radar gunsight and the beam that the missiles follow are separate, but if you get a radar lock it will "aim" the beam at the target. With the radar off, the missiles follow your nose, effectively making them mouse guided. With a radar lock, I'm pretty sure it points the beam at the target, but this leads to worse missile performance and if the radar locks onto the missile itself (which happens) the missile will go haywire.
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