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Aviation History
1962
1962 - 2062.PDF
FLIGHT International, 13 September 1962 453 and improved performance against low-altitude and other "difficult" targets were even then appreciated. At the same time, it was clearly desirable to produce a guided-weapon system more or less optim ized for use by the Army in a mobile campaign. Accordingly, English Electric were entrusted with the task of evolving a much improved Thunderbird with CW guidance. While this work was still at an early stage, the Army became inter ested in air-portability, and the entire system was redesigned to enable all of it to be brought to an unprepared site in Service aircraft. From the outset it was seen that Thunderbird 2 could be made very much more flexible in operation than Thunderbird 1, both in deployment and in its use in action. While retaining the ability to operate without a tactical control radar, in an autonomous role with a field army, Thunderbird 2 can defend fixed installations in conjunction with an existing defensive environment. For example, a number of Fire Units may be linked to a tactical control radar; or a larger number of Fire Units can be automatically controlled by an air-defence radar. In the latter case the FUs may be many miles from the ADR, and in all cases the launchers may be coupled in by push-button from a single point by a v.h.f. digital link, sent either along a telephone wire or beamed from a microwave aerial. This is very different from the Thunderbird 1 battery, the siting of whose launchers is dictated by the length of the cables. Another valuable advantage of Thunderbird 2 is its automaticity in operation, and the very much reduced demands which it makes on both skilled and unskilled manpower. Thunderbird 1 requires a considerable logistic "tail" to receive, uncrate, assemble and test each missile. In contrast, Thunderbird 2 can travel 100 miles across rough country in any weather in a ready-for-launch condition. Missiles are received by the launchers virtually like rounds of ammunition, and the field maintenance requirement is limited to immediate replacement of faulty components in a matter of minutes. The missile itself was illustrated in last week's issue. It differs far more than appears from external inspection, superficial changes being limited to tapered wing trailing-edges and larger boost motors. Inside, however, improved rocket propellants and motor design have enabled flight performance to be greatly increased; and tran sistorized printed circuitry has allowed additional electronic components to be included, offering stiffer resistance to electronic countermeasures and enabling targets to be engaged over con siderably longer range and at higher and lower altitudes. Like Bloodhound 2, Thunderbird 2 is compatible with two CW radars: Ferranti's Firelight and AEFs Scorpion. The latter is hardly for mobile wars, but may still be broken down into portions which can be airlifted should the need arise. The flight performance of the missile actually exceeds radar performance under certain conditions, but the usual Thunderbird set is Fire light. Again, the important improvements in the launchers are not visible externally, apart from the prominent extending aerial mast which rises vertically from behind the tail of the missile. As noted in the section on Bloodhound 2, this aerial conveys a signal from the target-illuminating radar to the missile on the launcher without the use of cables. This is important in view of the fact that—again like the RAF weapon—the missile is not locked-on to its target until after it is launched. The height of the aerial is dictated by the need to achieve line-of-sight to the TIR even with a launcher partially hidden by rising ground or vehicles. In last week's issue preliminary information was given on the Swiss-designed warhead for the British Aircraft Corporation's Vigilant anti-tank missile. Unlike the entirely new head of British design, which is protected by British and NATO Government security, the Swiss head is available for export, and is already in full production. The firm responsible is Constructions Mecan- iques du Leman SA. Like all heads for infantry weapons in this category, it is of the hollow-charge type which projects a jet of molten metal moving at such high velocity (16,500 to 33,000ft/sec) that it can penetrate the thickest armour, and, by a combination of blast pressure and heat, create havoc inside the armoured vehicle. Weight of the warhead and fuze is given as 11.51b, equivalent to no less than 37 per cent of the total weight of the missile at launching. "Together with other factors," say BAC, "it is this weight which gives the CML-head Vigilant its very high lethality." Initial trials against offset Ni-Cr-Mo tank armour resulted in penetrations of up to 424mm (17in), with exit holes larger than 20mm (0.787in) in diameter. The warhead has also penetrated a pair of plates respectively 50 and lOOmm thick, separated by a 150mm gap, at strike angles as high as 60°. In fact, the CML fuze will operate at strike angles 70° from the normal, and functions when any part of the ogival head contacts the target. The hardened- steel ring around the head bites into the target at high angles of impact, providing a pivot about which the head can rotate to bring the nose against the armour to trigger the fuze. Incidentally, British Aircraft Corporation have produced a convincing booklet entitled Vigilant— Value for Money, in which a Vigilant, complete with operational equipment, is assessed econ omically against an acceleration-controlled "Missile Z." The latter, although costing only one-third as much as Vigilant, is shown on BAC's reckoning—which appears to be heavily weighted in favour of the rival weapon system—to be an enormously better prop osition. A number of actual tactical cases is examined in detail. It would be interesting to see further competitive trials of available weapons in this category. Supplementing Firestreak in service with the RAF (Lighting F.3) and Royal Navy (improved mark of Sea Vixen), de Havilland's Red Top air-to-air missile not only has increased flight performance but is also very much more flexible in operation. Firestreak is a heat-homing pursuit-course missile, which must be fired from astern of its target in order for it to home on to the IR radiation from the target's engines. The launching aircraft must therefore catch the target, and this imposes operational limitations; at a guess, a Lightning could not engage a target flying faster than Mach 2, nor a Sea Vixen or Javelin one flying much above Mach 1. Red Top, on the other hand, can be fired from any direction, from pure pursuit through lead pursuit to a collision course from dead ahead. There is thus no real limitation upon the type of target which Red Top may engage, the governing factors being the accuracy of the GCI and the lock-on range of the fighter's AI radar. Collision- course attacks could be made against targets travelling at over Mach 3, and there seems no reason to doubt that the new missile could successfully intercept any winged weapon or stand-off bomb. It is logical to expect the 1R guidance system to follow the Short Brothers & Harland's Tigercat fire-control trailer has four trans mitter panels, three controlling the launcher and one the director bin Full-scale Tigercat hardwear was visible for the first time at Farnborough. This three-round mobile launcher mock-up is part of the equipment proposed for close-range anti-aircraft use by a field army in place of 40mm guns
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