Beriev A-50 awacs capabilities

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17 years 1 month

Posts: 198

Sorry to break into the non-stop obsession with fighters/interceptors but wars aren't fought only with these!

Does anyone have any feel for the capabilities of this bird and whether it compares with western types? I feel sometimes that this type of machine escapes 'the radar'!

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18 years 6 months

Posts: 3,718

Sorry to break into the non-stop obsession with fighters/interceptors but wars aren't fought only with these!

Does anyone have any feel for the capabilities of this bird and whether it compares with western types? I feel sometimes that this type of machine escapes 'the radar'!

I said in that thread and I say again: AWACS stands for AWAC System. it is not the radar by itself, but the integration into a working system. A big part of the equation is processing capability and software. Both require maintenance. So, although this question is interesting and actually of much higher relevance than questions concerning turn rates, nobody here is possibly able (or willing) to answer them.

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17 years 1 month

Posts: 198

I belive I asked aprox the same question about a year ago, and we got a nice little discussion going:

http://forum.keypublishing.com/showthread.php?t=57086&highlight=A-50

Enjoy! :)

Thanks for that, Gauntlet. I think many of the 'fighter obsessed' lose sight of the fact that modern warfare isn't a matter of 'one-man-and-his-plane'.

The best fighters in the world aren't of much use if they're in the wrong place at the wrong time. That is a lesson which goes back at least as far as the Battle of Britain.

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19 years 1 month

Posts: 661

I said in that thread and I say again: AWACS stands for AWAC System. it is not the radar by itself, but the integration into a working system. A big part of the equation is processing capability and software. Both require maintenance. So, although this question is interesting and actually of much higher relevance than questions concerning turn rates, nobody here is possibly able (or willing) to answer them.

This is the AWACS

http://ve.ida.org/rtoc/images/awacs.jpg

While all of these aircraft are classified under the generic term AEW&C

http://ve.ida.org/rtoc/images/awacs.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/c/c0/Aust_Wedgetail.jpg/300px-Aust_Wedgetail.jpg

http://www.canit.se/~griffon/aviation/img/saab/x_340aew_3.jpg

http://avia.russian.ee/pictures/russia/a-50.jpg

Just as this is an AEGIS vessel

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/08/USS_Arleigh_Burke_(DDG-51)_at_sea.jpg/300px-USS_Arleigh_Burke_(DDG-51)_at_sea.jpg

and this is just another AAW DDG with a phased array radar system

http://www.bloggang.com/data/skyman/picture/1149280385.jpg

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19 years 5 months

Posts: 832


and this is just another AAW DDG with a phased array radar system

Well most of the time its the western media that mades mastakes in labeling new platforms with american platform in mind.

i.e. the 052C was never labeld aegis until Kanwa coined the term red aegis.
Then people picked up the term and somehow it even made it onto the annual report to congress. Now you can't condemn people for using the term since it already have seen widespread use.

If it's like comparing mandarines and oranges and condeming those that call a mandarines an orange. Its nice if they knew the difference but quite inconsequential as we know what they mean.

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24 years 2 months

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This is the AWACS

http://ve.ida.org/rtoc/images/awacs.jpg


No, it isn't. It's the Sentry. It's an AWACs.

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17 years 4 months

Posts: 26

Has the Topic is also about Awacs,

Tell me something, What is Difference between an AWACS and AEW?.

Like example do AWACS like the Phalcons have a longer range and AEW Erieye?

As far as I could research, AEWCS is less versatile & less costlier than AWACS. Thus an AEWCS lacks processing of data onboard.

Can anyone plz give a Nice Detail Explanation.

Member for

18 years 9 months

Posts: 13,432

Has the Topic is also about Awacs,

Tell me something, What is Difference between an AWACS and AEW?.

Like example do AWACS like the Phalcons have a longer range and AEW Erieye?

As far as I could research, AEWCS is less versatile & less costlier than AWACS. Thus an AEWCS lacks processing of data onboard.

Can anyone plz give a Nice Detail Explanation.

Nothing to do with radar range, or the range of the platform. All to do with onboard facilities.

AEW = Airborne Early Warning
AWACS = Airborne Warning And Control System

AWACS does AEW, but also has facilities to vector aircraft (or missiles, or whatever) onto targets. "Pure" AEW just acts as an airborne radar, & relays information to ground stations which do the controlling.

The original Swedish Air Force Erieyes were intended to function as just AEW, and were intended to work within a ground environment. Export versions, & the Brazilian Erieyes, use the same radar but also act as airborne control posts. But even the original Swedish AF Erieyes had some ability to process data on board, & had a couple of operator posts, so could act as limited AWACS, in case the ground environment was severely degraded by an attacker.

I think the early AEW helicopters for shipborne use were pretty much pure AEW. Not sure what the latest ones are.