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Aviation History
1989
1989 - 1128.PDF
After the Phoenix falls In the mid to late 1990s, the Soviet Air Force is likely to deploy stealthy strike aircraft and bombers equipped with long-range air-to-surface weapons, including cruise missiles. Defence against such advanced threats will be difficult, but the US Navy already has a weapon on the drawing board for use in what it terms the "Outer Air Battle". This is a missile with about twice the range of the AIM-54 Phoenix, better high- altitude capability, and dual-mode radar/ electro-optical (EO) guidance. If the advanced medium-range air-to-air missile (AMRAAM) could be defined as an attempt to pack Phoenix performance into a missile of Sparrow size, the Advanced Air to Air Missile (AAAM or "A cubed M") can be considered as a plan to cram Phoenix-plus performance into a missile even lighter than Sparrow. That reduction in size and weight is important, because it will allow US Navy F-14 Tomcats to land on a carrier while carrying eight long-range missiles, rather than the Phoenix. In October 1988 the US Navy's Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) awarded contracts to two industrial teams for a four- year technology-validation phase of the AAAM. One team was a combination of Hughes and Raytheon, two rival companies which have come to dominate the US market for medium/long-range air-to-air missiles. The other links General Dynamics with Westinghouse. Under a programme known as the The Hughes Phoenix long-range, air-to-air fleet-defence missile system is the most complex and capable in service. Hughes has teamed up with Raytheon to bid for its successor. These compa nies are pre-eminent in the air-to- air missile business, but a "dark horse" team of General Dynamics and Westinghouse could give them a good run for their money, with an innovative design which owes much to GD's surface-to-air experience. Doug Richardson reports. Advanced Missile System (AMS), GD has studied technology for long range air-to-air missiles for more than a decade. The first practical results to emerge, in the late 1970s, Range were a new five-cavity klystron microwave tube, the construction of a demonstration integrated-guidance section and integrated- missile receiver, and the testing of an experi mental Interrupted Continuous Wave (ICW) transmitter. The latter was strictly lab-test hardware —it filled a two-bay electronics rack—but provided the experience needed to propose ICW technology for the AAAM semi-active radar seeker. Using ICW technology, the launch aircraft can "time manage" its radar, switching the beam from one target to another in rapid succession so that this single illuminator can handle a multiple engage ment. By the end of the decade a full-scale airframe had been built. Looking rather like a stretched Standard surface-to-air missile (SAM), this featured long-chord cruciform wings and narrow-chord cruciform tail fins, plus a short tandem-rocket booster. The missile is 12ft long (3-65m), 5- 5in (140mm) in diameter, and weighs 3861b (175kg). A first-generation seeker gimbal and a second-generation control section were tested in the early 1980s, while 1983 saw trials on a ground test stand of a heavy-walled prototype of the proposed rocket motor and thrust-vector control (TVC) system. Other tests checked the performance of the pro posed warhead against what were described as "RA-5-size targets". A second series of windtunnel tests on the missile airframe began in 1983. The EO guidance mode was The advanced air-to-air missile (AAAM) will have a considerably greater range than the Phoenix, which is thought to be able to engage targets at more than 50 miles. The General Dynamics/Westinghouse AAAM contender (below) uses a unique semi-active guidance sequence Engagement sequence Target acquisition via • < W™*tl avMnica iSpf i|jjp«jj|ij§ Fire control ,'aaar iFCHj tracks targetsand assigns pnc«'t.i"s it '.lien illuminates Israels 01 hands over to airhole track illuminator (ATI I KCR. Dt ATI compotes engaaerneriT envelopes lor targets Aircrew select desires targets;IfSjp«fe. i^jf missiles then manoeuvre to decrease closure Missiles fly optimum Inajectoty via inertia! mid course guidance i'ri:e.viii5l?i.v>tinvjixia;.?s...i.:, in terminal purse missiles MHNPNUMIPI! in '• ', 30 FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL, 22 April 1989
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