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Aircraft Radar Detection Ranges
Aircraft Radar Lookdown Detection Penalties
A chart showing the detection ranges of all air to air radars in DCS, all values are hand tested with the conditions listed at the top of the chart, I wrote a script to give me a realtime debug window showing me the target aircraft ranges and lookdown angles so I can test them all quickly without having to open the F10 map and use a ruler.
Modules that model Probability of Detection (Mirage 2000C and JF-17) add an extra level of complication, to measure those I have an array of 10 aircraft flying directly towards me while I'm in active pause, as they get closer I wait until I detect 1%, 50% and 100% of jets per sweep and record those ranges. All target aircraft have no payload/stores and fly at an aspect angle of 180 degrees (Directly head to head)
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F/A-18C and F-16C have had a huge radar overhaul this patch, they now feature PD (Probability of Detection), range resolution and atmospheric propagation loss. In practice you will initially detect targets at significantly longer ranges than in 2.8 but they will have to get closer to form stable track files on them. For example in 2.9 the Hornet can get an RWS low probability detection at 100nmi now compared to in DCS 2.8 where a reliable detection that was first visible at 55nmi.
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Both aircraft have a very large spread in probability of detection, more than any other module currently ingame. This can result in track files being dropped easily if you have a large scan zone or they are at the edge of your detection range, you may need to reduce your scan volumes significantly or use STT instead to maintain reliable tracks.
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There has been a lot of discussion about lookdown penalties recently so I thought I'd test it all and share my results so the discussion goes beyond anecdotal experiences
All ED modules have a massive penalty that will come into effect around 1.5° and 2° lookdown angle in all PRFs (Exact formula discovered here), as an example with the Hornet as soon as you pass that angle your detection range drops by 33% from 48nmi to 32nmi. Beyond that 2° cutoff there is no further penalty, even down to 15-30° lookdown. This behaviour has not changed since at least February 2022 (See chart notes for more details)
JF-17 also has a pretty sharp penalty in RWS HPRF past 2.5° dropping detection range by ~20% and a minor MPRF penalty that's only noticeable past 7.5°, Velocity Scan has no penalties. Most other modules have either 0 or minor penalties that won't be particularly noticeable in real world gameplay.
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Values gathered from https://github.com/Quaggles/dcs-lua-datamine
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