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Aviation History
1956
1956 - 1741.PDF
7 December 1956 905 Little John XM47...... . SS,M- ballistic, spin-stabilized missile propelled by short- duration sohd sustamer. Length, about 12ft; fin span, about 30in; body diameter318mm (about 12im); weight, about 980 Ib; range, 18,000yd. ' ' Matador TM-61 B. SSM with 4,600 Ib-thrust J33 turbojet; launched with solid-propellant boost motor. Overall length, about 45ft 10in; wing span 28ft 9iin- body diameter, 54in; weight, about 13,8001b (TM-61A is 12,000)- cruising speed'M = 0.9; operational range, 600 miles. 18 months' time, although an interim system is virtually ready nowDart's Army designation is SSM-A-23. It is designed particularly for anti-A.F.V. use and has a shaped charge in the nose. For field useit is fired and guided from a simple launcher on an M59 personnel carrier. Guidance is effected by a unique optical-tracking system byH. A. Wagner Co., the rocket motor (by Grand Central Aircraft's rocket division) being smokeless, and sodium flares being fixed to the Dart toassist in tracking. During a recent demonstration a Dart went through the edge of the bull on an 8ft-square moving target at 2,100yd. Honest John. Strictly speaking not a guided weapon at all, thisawe-inspiring missile is nevertheless worthy of inclusion in that it ful- fils a typical SSM function. It is a standard 762mm (30in) artilleryrocket used for tactical purposes. It was in May 1950 that Army Ordnance prepared the first study.Douglas Aircraft worked rapidly on this specification and submitted detailed proposals for a production missile. They were accepted, andthe first Honest John was fired at White Sands in August 1951. Douglas started bulk production at Santa Monica in January 1953. Army unitsstarted conversion to the new weapon early in 1954 and it is now widely used in several theatres.Honest John is virtually a much-scaled-up Bazooka. For use, a missile body is drawn from store, taken to the launching site and fittedwith a suitable warhead—nuclear or otherwise. It is then mounted on the single launching rail on a self-propelled launching vehicle (developedby Rock Island, 111, Arsenal), and the stabilizing tail is added. If not required for immediate use the propulsive charge and warhead are keptat the correct temperature by a G.E. electric blanket. No connections to the missile are necessary apart from the singlefiring cable, and no tests are necessary. Aiming and fire-control are virtually the same as the procedures used in normal artillery. Thelaunching vehicle is steered to the correct azimuth and the rail is elevated to the required angle for the range.Acceleration at firing is very high. Propulsion is by a single 2,000-lb (weight) cast charge made by the Hercules Powder Co. There is noguidance system, but the missile is spin-stabilized by four small M-7 rockets firing tangentially around the rear of the warhead. Theserockets give rise to a white cloud which surrounds the missile during firing; the spin which they engender is maintained by a slight cantingof the four stabilizing fins. Well over 600 Honest Johns have been fired at White Sands alone,and many thousands have now been made by Douglas and by Emerson Electric, for some years a second-source supplier. Introduction toArmy service has been simple, in view of the few new procedures involved. The missile has proved to have better battlefield manoeuvr-ability than heavy artillery and to "pack the heaviest punch." Range with the 1,500-lb warhead (the most usual size) is 30,000 yd. Trajectorydata are: 11-deg elevation, peak altitude of 900ft in 9 sec and 10,000 yd strike in 16.5 sec; 50-deg elevation, peak of 30,000ft in 41 sec and strikeat 30,000 yd in 87 sec. Intensive field trials have been held in Japan and in the Grafenwoehrarea of Germany, the 7th Field Artillery being a major European user of the missile. Studies have been made for launching from large heli-copters, and the Marine Corps are also to use the missile. It is being supplanted by Little John (q.v.). Jupiter. At the inception of this IRBM programme it wasenvisaged that it would be a joint Army/Navy undertaking. It was soon appreciated that one missile could not suit both Services, and thata compromise would suit neither. Originally the project was for a 1,500-mile missile to back-up Thor, and it was accorded high priority.Prime responsibility was vested in Redstone Arsenal, and the programme used all the resources of this arsenal and of many sections of industry. Early in 1956 it was reported that the Navy were to work out anIRBM for themselves, and the weapon is referred to below, as "Naval IRBM." Meanwhile the Army Ordnance weapon has crystallized asJupiter C, a successor to Jupiter A (i.e., Redstone). Chrysler have system responsibility, and will probably handle production. TheJupiter C will, like its predecessor, be a slim single-stage missile with a liquid-propellant motor. Rumour has it that much of the structurewill be of magnesium, although this would not stand up well to kinetic heating. Ford Instrument Co. are again responsible for inertial guid-ance. Gen. Medaris recently stated, "we have very great hopes of this weapon, and development is maintaining schedule." Lacrosse. This programme for a close-support missile was originated by the U.S. Marine Corps in 1947, and in August 1953 the Corps expressed pleasure at its progress. Development was handledby the Cornell Laboratory, who had systems responsibility and con- ducted trials at White Sands. Late in 1954 production bids were called,and the first contract—for from 20 to 100 airframes—was placed with Martin. Launchers and guidance units were also bought, for truckmounting. This contract was a joint U.S.M.C./Army purchase and the pro-gramme is now directed by Army Ordnance. Originally the mission was similar to that of Honest John, but there are now two Lacrosse variants,one of which has an all-weather guidance system which does not require that the target should be visible. In the original contract the Marinessought £214,000 for the control system and £135,000 for the missile. Five months ago Marine Corps personnel began to visit Redstone,Ft. Sill and Martin for training. Lacrosse should be operational next year. Little John. In May 1955 the Army stated that "progress has beenmade on a greatly improved tactical support missile which has highly significant logistic and operations advantages over the currently avail-able model. Work is continuing on a longer-range model which will allow maximum exploitation of available destructive effect in new andimproved warheads." Little John, a refined tactical missile evolved from the bulkier HonestJohn, has for two years been made by Redstone Arsenal. Although it can match its parent's performance and can have a nuclear head, it issmaller and neater and can be carried in an ordinary truck. Supply to forward troops can be by helicopter. Matador. Basic investigation into the design of a pilotless tacticalbomber for the U.S. Air Force was begun by Glenn L. Martin (now the Martin Company) in 1947. The design was worked out in detailthe following year and took the form of a small mid-wing machine of almost perfect streamline form. Power was provided by an Allison J33turbojet fed from a ventral intake behind the centre-fuselage tanks. The first launching was on January 20, 1949. During the ensuing three years the design was appreciably altered.Fuselage length grew in order to increase the fuel capacity, and the wing was shifted to the high position. The empennage was completelyredesigned, the height of the vertical tail being increased, and a bullet- fairing was added at the junction with the tailplane, which was modifiedto have dihedral. The machine was designated B-61 Matador and, after acceptance by the Air Force as a basis for a useful weapon,a complete system was evolved around it. The missile itself was sub-divided into sections—centre fuselage andfuel cells, tailplane, fin, rear fuselage shell, port and starboard wings, nose cone and engine can—each of which was arranged for shipmentin a specially designed crate. The design was so prepared that only one in each batch of Matadors needed to be assembled in the Martin factoryin Baltimore, the bulk of the components, all completely interchangeable, being crated for shipment to an Air Force base for subsequent fieldassembly by enlisted men. In addition to the seven crates, separate boxes were designed for the tail cone, electronic guidance shelf, warhead(in either one or two sections) and RATO bottle. The weapons system was completed by a zero-length launcher, ground-support vehicles, basearea, automatic go/no-go sequential test equipment, packaged spares for long storage, and other items such as depot and housing facilities. Martin's airframe design is a model of how a requirement can beeconomically met. The Matador's structure is largely built up from bonded metal honeycomb, contoured by one pass of a band-saw, andused as a filling between stressed skins. The powerplant was also completely re-engineered from the basic engine used in piloted aircraft,in order to provide a cheap and reliable turbojet suitable for the missile. During development there were several off-shoots from the basic design.In 1953 a recoverable drone system was tested and such aircraft, then designated QB-61, were used as targets for Nike and other anti-aircraftweapons. Early the same year the Air Force voted £230,000 for a project to modify six Matadors to carry calibration equipment forinstrumentation intended for use in connection with Falcon (q.v.). By late 1954 Matador squadrons were deployed in Germany, themissile itself then being designated TM-61. The first unit was actually "activated" as early as 1951 but it took three years for the system tobecome operational with Tactical Air Command. Each squadron has 53 officers and 543 airmen. The vehicle is assembled in jigs which forman integral part of the transport vehicle, and the warhead and RATO bottle are added on the firing pad. Complete assembly and check-outmay take from one to five hours, and the missile can be held at readiness for a fair period, although there is a danger of electronic burn-out. The zero-length launcher has its own hydraulic, electric and fuelsystems for supplying the missile. Launching is effected by running up to 100-per-cent power against a hold-back bolt, which is finally shearedby the firing of the RATO bottle. Guidance is effected from a missile- control and target-selection van, which also governs the pre-launchingchecks. Crews are trained on T-33s equipped with a Matador-type brain, and a simulator (made by Link) is also used to generate TM-61signals. Each squadron requires a large number of 60 kW generators, indicative of the tremendous electrical consumption. Each launcheris linked to the squadron operations centre by a U.H.F./F.M. network. TM-61B. Production is now centred on this appreciably moreeffective development. The original TM-61 A was limited not by fuel but by the maximum range of the guidance system. In the newMatador a completely revised and self-contained guidance system is fitted, the basic inertial system having been test-flown in February ofthis year in a modified TM-61 A. Responsibility for guidance has been shared by A.C. Electronics (ex-Spark Plug) Division of General Motor*and by Goodyear who have developed the Atran system. Severing the radar communications between the missile and the launching site hasgreatly increased the distance to which accuracy can be maintained. Accordingly, the tankage has been substantially increased and theTM-61B has a longer and far more capacious fuselage in consequence. Like the TM-61A, the new missile can have a nuclear warhead andcan reach supersonic speed in its final dive on to its target. The first
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