Air-to-Air Missile

1. INTRODUCTION

At the time of the outbreak of world war, electronics was going momentum.
Its role in World War II ended as radio equipment for communication and radar, sonar
equipment for detection of hostile forces in a particular topography.

The use of electronics in combat technologies increased only after World War
II. Today the military has electronics surveillance equipment like unmanned
reconnaissance aircrafts, anti-surveillance equipment like radar jamming devices,
hand held navigational systems like global positioning systems (GPS), and precision
weapons like guided missiles and smart bombs that are far more accurate than any
other weapon in attacking their targets.

This article elucidates the technology behind air-launched anti-air crafts

guided missiles with infrared guidance systems and their basics design concepts.

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An air-to-air missile (AAM) is a guided missile fired from an aircraft for the
purpose of destroying another aircraft. It is typically powered by one or more rocket
motors, usually solid fuelled but sometimes liquid fueled. Ramjet engines, as used on
the MBDA Meteor (currently in development), are emerging as propulsion that will
enable future medium-range missiles to maintain higher average speed across their
engagement envelope.

Missiles: An Introduction
Guided missiles are self-propelled air-borne projectiles carrying an explosive
charge and guided in flight towards a target. The propulsion system, guidance system
and warhead system are the three separate systems used in guided missiles regardless
of their types.

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Air-to-Air Missile

Fig. 1. Air-to-air missile block diagram

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2. CLASSIFICATION

Missiles are broadly classified based on the launch environment and the type
of guidance used.
Depending upon the launch environment, missiles are classifued into air
launched missiles and surface launched missiles.
Air-launched missiles are missiles launched from aircrafts. These are further
classified into air-to-air missiles and air-to-ground missiles, which are launched
against air borne targets (like planes and helicopters) and ground targets (like antiaircraft guns and infrastructures), respectively.

Surface launched missiles are missiles launched from surface launchers. These
sub-classified into surface-to-air and surface-to-surface missiles (ballistic missiles).
Surface-to-air missiles (like akash missiles) are used to protect territories from hostile
air attack. Ballistic missiles (like agni and prithvi) are targeted against surface targets,
launched well in to the space and then allowed to follow a ballistic trajectory over the
target at the speed of approximately 20 machs.(1 mach=330 meters/second)

Some of the classification based on the type of guidance used are radar command
guidance, radio command guidance, wire guidance, inertial guidance, astro guidance,
terrain comparision (TERCOM) guidance.

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Air-to-Air Missile

3. AIR-LAUNCHED ANTI-AIRCRAFT MISSILES

The air launched anti-aircraft missiles is launched from an air-borne aircraft to

wipe out an enemy aircraft. Its various parts are shown in fig.1.

The rocket motor provides thrust to propel the missile through air. The wings
provide the necessary lift to keep the missile aloft. The target seeker searches for the
target. The electronic guidance control system is a computer that processes the
information from the seeker, calculates the proper course and guides the missile. The
control actuation section adjusts flight fins near the nose of the missile based on the
instructions from the guidance control system. The flight fins ateer the missile
through the air when required. The warhead system is a explosive device that actually
destroys the enemy aircraft.

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A battery provides power to the on board electronics. An umbilical cable is

used to connect the onboard electronic guidance control system of the missile with the
aircrafts computer system called avionics.

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4. WORKING OF THE MISSILE SYSTEM

A typical attack sequence has the following steps. Before launch, the missile is
fixed to launcher mounted in a hanger in one of the aircrafts wings. When the pilot
has positioned the aircraft ideally behind the enemy, he activates the fire controller to
fire the missile. The avionics of the aircraft sends a command to the missile control
system to activate the rocket motor. The rocket motor burns up a solid propellant
material to generate a high pressure gas that streams out of the back of the missile.
This provides the necessary thrust to the missile to get off the launcher and fly
through the air at supersonic speeds.
Once the propellent has burnt up, the missile glides the rest of the way towards
its target. The wings provide the necessary lift to keep the missile flying. The onboard
electronic guidance control system controls the missiles course.
Three different types of guidance systems are used in general, namely, semiactive radar homing guidance system, active radar homing guidance system and
infrared homing guidance system.
In the active radar homing guidance system, the target has to be illuminated by
a radar transmitter from a parent plane for the radar receiver in the nose of the missile
since the radar transmitter will not be present in the missile (see fig-2). The missile
will home on (also called as lock on) the reflected radar signal with the help of the
inbuilt radar receiver.

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Air-to-Air Missile
After firing the missile, the pilot has to keep his aircraft at a vulnerable
position for a possible enemy fire and cant perform any evasive manoeuvre to defend
him from that fire since his manoeuvres will release the missile from the radar lock to
loose the target.

Fig-3 shows the active radar homing guidance system. In this system, the missile
carries its own target-seeking radar (both the transmitter and receiver ). The inbuilt
radar hunts for the target and locks on the target. This missile system is used only for
long-range missiles called as beyond-visual-ranging air-to-air missiles and is costlier
and bulkier.

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The infrared homing guidance system is mainly designed to destroy aircraft

using infrared homing. Every hot body emits electromagnetic radiations and
depending upon the temperature of the hot body, the domination of the particular
frequency in the radiation varies. Due to the higher temperature of the engine of the
air-craft, electromagnetic signals are emitted. These radiations fall in the wavelength
regions of red and infrared in the electromagnetic spectrum. Infrared radiations are
also possible from various regions of the aircraft due to factors like friction due to the
air and refraction of sunlight. The various sections of the airframe of an aircraft that
may lead to infrared emission are shown in the fig.4.

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The infrared homing guidance system seeks for infrared radiations available
mainly from the exhaust of the target aircraft due to

higher engine

heat and

consequently these missiles are called IR missiles or heat seeking missiles. An

infrared missile in pursuit of the target is shown in fig.5.

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Air-to-Air Missile

5. INFRARED TRACKING

To sense IR emissions from the plane, the infrared seeker is fixed at the nose
of the missile. The target aircrafts exhausts appear as bright shining spots with a dark
background in the aircrafts infrared signature, which will be seen by the IR seeker.
The infrared signature of an aircraft along with its visual signature is shown in fig.6.

The infrared signature consists of hot and not hot regions. The hot regions
appear as bright spots in a dark background of not hot regions in the infrared
signature contrasting the visual signature, which have black and white spots. The
missiles guidance system uses the data from the infrared sensor to decide the course.

The seeker resembles the charge coupled device (CCD) system used for
acquiring the visual image in a video camera matrix of IR sensors that generates an
electrical signal when exposed to the infrared light given off by hot objects.

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Air-to-Air Missile
In the current missile systems, the infrared sensor array is coupled with a
mechanical scanning system. The mechanical scanning system scans a larger section
of the sky which continuously moves an optical arrangement of lens and reflectors to
feed light to the sensor.

The guidance control system figures out the position of the target based on the
fluctuations in the detected infrared light. For example, if the target is to the left of the
missile, greater infrared light will be detected by the sensor when the optical
arrangement is aimed to the left than the right.

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Air-to-Air Missile

6. HOW THE GUIDANCE SYSTEM WORKS

When the missile is fired, the autopilot system is engaged, whose job is to
keep the infrared image of the target aircraft roughly centred on the seeker so that the
missile nose continues to point toward the target. While flying, if the image of the
target becomes off centred on the seeker, the signals from the sensor indicate that the
missile is off-course, and the guidance control system has to decide the new course
and that is done using the proportional navigation technique.
The guidance control system looks at the angle of off-centredness and changes
its angle of flight proportionally. In other words it uses a multiplication factor. If it is
2 and if the missile is 10 degrees off course, it will alter the course by 20 degrees. A
tenth of a second later it will look at the angle and correct.
The course of the missile is corrected with the help of the servo arrangement
that includes a gas generator that feeds high pressure gas to pneumatic pistons. The
pistons can be connected to the fins, that can be tilted.
The command signal from guidance control activates the electric solenoids,
which open and close valves leading to these pistons in order to tilt the fins to steer
the missile towards the direction of the movement of the target. The working of the
control system is intelligent in that anticipating the position of the target and guiding
the missile to the point of interception are similar to a player throwing a ball to a point
where the running catcher will be arriving.

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Air-to-Air Missile

7. SIMPLIFIED GUIDANCE SYSTEM

Guidance system can be designed for a simple mode of operation and one such
system is shown in fig.7. These systems are not in practice since they include lot of
other parameters apart from the given ones. The rocket motor management and
warhead managements are not included in this discussion.

The target seeker: The infrared sensor that will respond to the wavelength of IR
radiations from the aircraft are to be placed in the noise of the missile in a circular
matrix arrangement as a target seeker and grouped in to four arrays. An array is one
quarter of the circle and this possible arrangement is shown in fig.8. From this

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Air-to-Air Missile
arrangement, positional information of target, distance of the target from the missile
and the speed of the movement of the target could be derived.

Positional information:
In an instant if the infrared image falls exactly on the center of the nose of the
missile, all the arrays will get IR radiations with equal intensity and produce an equal
amount of signal.

When the signal from any one of the arrays is stronger, the difference in the
signal strength indicates that the infrared image has moved. For example, when array1 produces a signal that is stronger than the signals from the other arrays, it indicates
that the target is increasing its altitude. Similarly, if array-3 is getting a stronger

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Air-to-Air Missile
signal, it indicates that the target is moving to the right of the missile. If the signal
from array-1 and array-3 is stronger, it specifies that the target is moving to the right
of the missile at a higher altitude.

More accurate positional information could be acquired by escalating the number of

arrays in the design of the target seeker. Instead of designating an array as a quarter of
the circle designating it as a sector of a circle will give more arrays.

Speed information: when the missile is in pursuit of a target from the side of
the target, the speed of the movement of target can also be calculated.

For example, when the missile is traveling perpendicular to the targets left
and the target is moving from right to left of the missile, arrays 3 and 4 will get
stronger signals (see fig.9). As the target travels, the image will be on array-3 for
some time leading to generation pulse from array-3. Then the image moves to array-4
and produces a pulse from array-4. The time interval between these pulse depends on
the speed of the movement of the target. Measuring the time interval between these
pulse and comparing it with precalibrated standard values will give the actual speed of
the target and the direction of the movement the target.

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Air-to-Air Missile

Distance information: The strength of the signal diminishes as the distance between
the missile and the target increases due to smaller infrared image. So measuring the
signal strength and comparing it with the precalibrated values will give the distance
of the target from the missile.

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Air-to-Air Missile

8. WORKING OF SIMPLIFIED GUIDANCE SYSTEM

The signals from the individual sensors of the array are added to form a single
signal from the array. Four such blocks for the four arrays are used to feed the signal
from the seeker to the guidance controller, which could be a microprocessor.

After calculating the positional, speed and distance factors for the signal from
the four arrays, the microprocessor designates control signals to the fin actuators. Fin
actuators are used to actuate the fins to steer the missile. Fin positional sensors are
used to indicate fin positions to the guidance controller and a closed loop of control is
established to actuate the fins to the correct positions by the referring to the signals
from fin positional sensors.

A set of the fin actuator and a fin positional sensor is needed for one fin and
hence four sets are required for four fins. In real time, the guidance controller gets the
data from the target seeker and steers the missile until interception

is achieved.

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Air-to-Air Missile

10. APPLICATIONS

AIM-9 Sidewinder
Python 4
Helmet Mounted Sights
High Off-Boresight Missiles (HOBSM)
Missile Links

AIM-9 Sidewinder
The Sidewinder Story
The Evolution of the AIM-9 Missile

by Carlo Kopp
Published in Australian Aviation, April, 1994
1994, 1997 Carlo Kopp

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Air-to-Air Missile

Python 4

Fourth Generation AAMs - The Rafael Python 4

by Carlo Kopp
Published in Australian Aviation, April, 1997
1997 Carlo Kopp

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Air-to-Air Missile

Helmet Mounted Sights:

Joint

Helmet

Mounted

Cueing

System

(JHMCS)

Joint Helmet Mounted Cueing System

(JHMCS)

Joint Helmet Mounted Cueing System

(VSI)

JHMCS (GlobalSecurity.org)

JHMCS/AIM-9X images from Elmendorf

The JHMCS Operational Flight Program

JHMCS Canadian Update

Elbit DASH Series:

Elbit Systems Ltd.

General Helmet Mounted Sights Info:

Helmet-Mounted Displays and Sights

FLUG REVUE March 1997: Helmet displays for fighter pilots

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Air-to-Air Missile
Air-to-air Missile Links:
AIM-132 ASRAAM

AIM-132 ASRAAM (FAS)

AIM-132 ASRAAM - Wikipedia

ASRAAM (RAF)

ASRAAM (UK MoD)

ASRAAM enters RAAF

EADS ASRAAM

MBDA ASRAAM

MBDA ASRAAM

MBDA ASRAAM

AIM-7 SPARROW

AIM-7 Sparrow (USAF)

AIM-7 Sparrow

AIM-7 Sparrow - Wikipedia

The Sparrow Missile (FAS)

AIM-9 SIDEWINDER

Sidewinder Story (On our site)

Navy Fact File: AIM-9 Sidewinder

Missile

AIM-9 Sidewinder (USAF)

AIM-9X (Raytheon)

AIM-9X (GlobalSecurity.org)

AIM-9X ahieves IOC

AIM-9X makes operational debut

F-16's first AIM-9X launch

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Air-to-Air Missile
IRIS-T

BGT IRIS-T

BGT/SAAB/Alenia IRIS-T

Matra Magic

Matra R.550 Magic

(GlobalSecurit.org)

Matra 550 Magic 2

METEOR

MBDA Meteor

Meteor BVRAAM (GlobalSecurity.org)

MICA

EADS MICA

MBDA MICA

MICA RF/IR

Missile MICA

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Air-to-Air Missile

9. MERITS OF IR MISSILES

Unquestionably, IR missiles are highly decisive and the latest system used
some UV sensing along with IR sensing to ignore flares. Man portable air defence
systems (MANPAD) also used these IR missiles, which are shoulder- launched by the
user from any kind of terrain.examples of the kind are STINGER missiles of
American origin, and IGLA and STERLA missile of Russian origin.

These missiles are used by the terrorist organizations and pose a serious threat to
the commercial airlines, which are more vulnerable due to the absence of any flare
dispensing systems to protect themselves from the attacking missiles.

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Air-to-Air Missile

10. DEMERITS OF IR MISSILES

IR missiles are highly efficient but can be easily evade by flares. Flares
generate extreme heat away from the aircraft to divert the IR missile. These flares
emit IR radiations of the same wavelength as the aircraft engines and hence a cluster
of flares released from the target aircraft can easily confuse these missiles. Fig.10
shows an airplane releasing flares for evading the IR missile.

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Air-to-Air Missile

11. CONCLUSION
More modern infra-red guided missiles can detect the heat of an aircraft's skin,
warmed by the friction of airflow, in addition to the fainter heat signature of the
engine when the aircraft is seen from the side or head-on. This, combined with greater
maneuverability, gives them an "all-aspect" capability, and an attacking aircraft no
longer had to be behind its target to fire. Although launching from behind the target
increases the probability of a hit, the launching aircraft usually has to be closer to the
target in a tail-chase engagement.
An aircraft can defend against infra-red missiles by dropping flares that are
hotter than the aircraft, so the missile homes in on the brighter, hotter target. Towed
decoys and infra-red jammers can also be used. Some large aircraft and many combat
helicopters make use of so called "hot brick" infra-red jammers, typically mounted
near the engines. Current research is developing laser devices which can spoof or
destroy the guidance systems of infra-redguided missiles.

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Air-to-Air Missile

REFERENCES

1. Air to Air Missiles Author- James vol-6

2. Grinning Rhino and was make availably by Mark @
http://www.militaryid.com/
3. WWW.guided\Air-to-Air Missiles.com
4. WWW.Efymag.com

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Air-to-Air Missile

CONTENTS

SL.
NO.

PARTICULARS

PAGE
NO.

1.

INTRODUCTION

01

2.

CLASSIFICATION

04

3.

AIR-LAUNCHED ANTI-AIRCRAFT MISSILES

05

4.

WORKING OF THE MISSILE SYSTEM

07

5.

INFRARED TRACKING

11

6.

HOW THE GUIDANCE SYSTEM WORKS

13

7.

SIMPLIFIED GUIDANCE SYSTEM

14

8.

WORKING OF SIMPLIFIED GUIDANCE SYSTEM

18

9.

APPLICATIONS

19

10.

MERITS OF IR MISSILES

24

11.

DEMERITS OF IR MISSILES

25

12.

CONCLUSION

26

REFERENCES

27

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