Frag Out! Magazine
Issue link: https://fragout.uberflip.com/i/1064315
Foto: Steve DockMOD, OGL snowfalls. The problem has been noticed in the West, where vehicles are equipped with large thermal identification panels – sounds like a good idea, but if we don't want to be seen from a huge distance... In the case of the Spike, even a misidentification of a target makes the operator able to intentionally miss it after marking the vehicle's affiliation once again – correctly. In the case of the FMG-148, misidentification will mean strik- ing own vehicles. The feature of a CCD optical camera in Spike's CLU is well-motivated – in good weather conditions, its target detection range is 8 km, and is even bigger than that of IR cameras. Both systems have had some features implemented to become more functional – this re- sults mainly from the fact that a CLU is a great observation tool for small sub-units, and is very often used as such. Americans fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan have learned about it – the latest versions of Javelin's CLU have an additional laser pointer, a laser rangefinder, and a GPS module. It makes it possible to turn FMG-148's CLUs into a system of guidance of air or artillery support. Spike's CLU has been used in many areas since the beginning, and Polish soldiers have been many-time precursors in this context. One of the areas of development was telemetry, i.e. loading the image from the warhead during its flight to a separate tablet. It has turned out it is possible to mark and indicate targets for other launchers this way (after the first missile is launched). It is possible to transmit approximate coordinates of e.g. artillery in the same way. The user-friendliness of Spike's CLU and the fact that it can be powered using a battery or a replaceable ac- cumulator with a long service life of the IR camera have made this CLU become an unofficial "go-to" observation device. The most important area where significant differ- ences can be seen is the solution regarding missile guiding. The Javelin offers automatic and fully autonomous F&F guidance at a target thermal contrast set manually by the operator. This has several serious consequences. First, you simply can't do anything once the missile is fired. In theo- ry, a homing missile keeps the course automatically at the thermal contrast set by the operator, but if it loses it in the Block 0 version (after e.g. the target drives into a natural obstacle), it means a miss. Block I offers some ways to compensate for the prob- lem thanks to a much improved missile warhead and a steep upward trajectory the missile follows when approaching its target. Another – even more serious – problem is the reliability of target indication for the missile's homing warhead. We should bear in mind that the parameters of missile homing warheads are several times lower than that of a CLU. In the case of Javelin Block 0, the specification is IR 64x64 elements with a field of vision of 1° x 1° and zoom: 9x. Javelin Block I offers a warhead with 128x128 elements and the same zoom and FOV. Spike LR, in turn, features a cooled IR war- head with 120x120 elements, a CCD day vision camera with 550x400 ele- ments, a field of vision of 1.5° x 2° and a 10x zoom. Spike's dual guidance – fiber-optical and with a human in the loop – offers a range of advan- tages compared to the Javelin when it comes to the reliability of marking and guiding the missile to the target. In the case of very hot targets with a high ΔT, marking them and locking the seeker of an FMG-148 warhead on them will be easy. Unfortunately, the battlefield abounds in situations when the said ΔT is small, and the Javelin warhead may have serious LAND FORCES