Why can't A2A missiles have both?

Indianfighter said:

but I am refering to missiles like the P-6D and P-500, where an operator guides the missile to the source aircraft.

Click to expand...

Yes, and once it flies close enough to use its own radar seeker, it uses its own radar seeker. That's the exact same method used on modern active homing missiles like AMRAAM. It's a matter of how good the seeker of the missile is, but the METHOD of homing is still the same and that METHOD is not obsolete as it is still in use today.

A lot of people tend to think that AMRAAM's seeker has infinite range or something and it can lock on to the target from 50km away using its own seeker and guide itself the whole way from launch platform to target. THAT IS NOT TRUE, from long range it still needs guidance from the parent aircraft, it only uses its own seeker until in range, which is the same method used on P-500

What Crobato mentioned is that instead of using a radar seeker for TERMINAL guidance, which most modern missiles use, we instead use an IR seeker, because radar seekers make the target's RWR go off and the pilot will know a missile is coming. IR does not emit radar waves and so the pilot wouldn't know.

btw it's important to differentiate between mid-course guidance and terminal guidance as it's a major source of misconception about missiles

Deino said:

Maybe a design similar to the German ARMIGER under development could work !?

[qimg]http://www.airpower.at/news02/1103_eu-missiles/armiger-missiles.jpg[/qimg]

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Deino

Click to expand...

ARMIGER works on the same principles everyones been talking about, IR plus INS.

Yes I agree. That would be the best type for no-warning engagement. And you won't run into the problem of having to put both a radar receiver and IR seeker in the same missile. I believe there are also some missiles with command guidance modes where you don't have to lock on to the target at all, just designate it. With that combination, the target will receive no warning at all. However, INS may be a bit inaccurate especially for fast and manoeuvrable A2A missiles...

Click to expand...

See this quote by wingman, deino. For the purposes of an anti-radiation missle such as ARMIGER, INS will do fien for midcourse guidance. But out thread was originally about how to put dual guidance on an A2A missle.

Wingman said:

What Crobato mentioned is that instead of using a radar seeker for TERMINAL guidance, which most modern missiles use, we instead use an IR seeker, because radar seekers make the target's RWR go off and the pilot will know a missile is coming. IR does not emit radar waves and so the pilot wouldn't know.

Click to expand...

I'm afraid you misunderstood my response to crobato's post.

crobato mentioned command guidance. By that it is meant operator guidance as in the examples of P-6D or P-500.
Today does the pilot guide the Aim-120 to the target ? No. Does the sailor guide a Brahmos to its target ? No. (Moskit still uses it). Does a soldier guide the Mica to the incoming aircraft or helicopter ? No.

Such techniques are no longer in use. One would need one controller per enemy target.

I have already discussed UAV and LEO satelite datalink for the Brahmos in another thread. These are the upcoming systems and not command guidance.

As far as using IR seeker or radar seeker for terminal guidance is concerned, I have given the examples of Tomahawk and Brahmos respectively.
The Brahmos' AI will be able to judge the target's location with radar data much better rather than using IR data.

I am glad that I could carry out a purely technical discussion with Wingman.

Indianfighter said:

crobato mentioned command guidance. By that it is meant operator guidance as in the examples of P-6D or P-500.
Today does the pilot guide the Aim-120 to the target ? No. Does the sailor guide a Brahmos to its target ? No. (Moskit still uses it). Does a soldier guide the Mica to the incoming aircraft or helicopter ? No.

Click to expand...

But that is exactly what all these people here are trying to tell you. YES, pilots do aid in guiding aim120 and mica and so on to their targets. Even though 120 can be fired at its max range and used as fire and forget missile - that is seldomly done as its just not as effective that way. Small, fast and agile targets likefighters can move too quickly for the missile to find them, once it gets in range where its own radar can be useful.

Which is why, alongside with INS, the airplane does send guidance corrections to the missile. And for that you need to keep monitoring the plane youre attacking, meaning you need to keep it on your radar screen.

MIGleader said:

ARMIGER works on the same principles everyones been talking about, IR plus INS.



See this quote by wingman, deino. For the purposes of an anti-radiation missle such as ARMIGER, INS will do fien for midcourse guidance. But out thread was originally about how to put dual guidance on an A2A missle.

Click to expand...

Yes, but maybe I misunderstod the last posts. The principles we are takling about are clear to me, but I thought the biggest problem would be the integration of two seekers into one single airframe !

Cheers, Deino

Indianfighter said:

crobato mentioned command guidance. By that it is meant operator guidance as in the examples of P-6D or P-500.
Today does the pilot guide the Aim-120 to the target ? No. Does the sailor guide a Brahmos to its target ? No. (Moskit still uses it). Does a soldier guide the Mica to the incoming aircraft or helicopter ? No.

Click to expand...

Command guidance does not mean the pilot, sailor, or soldier guides the missile. The computer does it.

Another thing, like I said before it's important to differentiate between MID-COURSE guidance and TERMINAL guidance. Does the AIM-120 and Mica need mid-course guidance? YES, and YES > For MID-COURSE guidance. Once the missile is close enough to target to use its own seeker, that's TERMINAL guidance and that's when the missile starts using its own seeker and becomes completely autonomous. The missile Crobato mentioned is the same thing, except for TERMINAL guidance it uses an IR seeker instead of a radar seeker.

Edit: oh maybe I should explain what mid-course and terminal means. Mid-course is the distance a missile must travel BEFORE it gets close enough to the target to use its own seeker. Terminal is when the missile is close enough to use its own seeker. Missiles like AMRAAM uses SARH for mid-course guidance (same as AIM-7), it uses active radar homing only for TERMINAL guidance

[YOU]|--------------------------MIDCOURSE------------------------->|----TERMINAL--->[ENEMY]

Indianfighter said:

That is incorrect. The land-attack version of the Tomahawk uses a radar altimeter (for TERCOM ), and the anti-ship version uses IR seeker for ships (during terminal phase).
The DSMAC is not a seeker, but a different guidance technology.

This is from your own source:

All versions have 250 nm+ class range, the land attack versions using TERCOM/INS/DSMAC guidance, the antiship version using datalink midcourse and Imaging Infra-Red (IIR) terminal guidance.

Click to expand...

First off you totally ignored the picture that i posted from the same source that clearly shows Tercom/DSMAC/infrared imaging seeker all together.

Second off, Tercom is a technology that uses radar to correct Inertial guidance cumultaive error oncourse (by matching various terrain features with on board database).

Then comes DSMAC. I never said it's a seeker. Show me where i said it's a seeker. What i say and i said it even in my very first post was cruise missiles use various guidance techniques (and you came up with your radar versus infrared seeker argument for some reason).

Now if you would read up about DSMAC it basically works in terminal phase and tries to locate the target. It can use infrared image seeker or some other optical device.

In both cases you have a radar that guides through the terrain until the missile reaches the terminal phase where it has to find the target. Thats when DSMAC opens up and it can either use an optical seeker or IR seeker.

That pretty much rebuts your argument that you cannot have anyother seeker combined with radar seeker on the same missile.(just because barhmos doesnt have it doesnt mean every other missile would work that way).

The AGM-109L is the USN's air launched weapon and is configured in two basic versions. The land attack version uses the same TERCOM/inertial/DSMAC guidance as TLAM/C and also the standard warhead, the mission profile and type of target are also identical. The anti-shipping version uses a data-link for midcourse guidance and an IIR seeker, modified from the AGM 65D Maverick missile, for terminal guidance.

Click to expand...

Look at the last entry in the chart it mentions IIR/FLIR/DSMAC combined with your very own optical correlator.
However this missile is not operational but proves the point that you can have more than one kind of seekers for different phases. Even if infrared seeker is not there Tomahawk DOES use an optical image seeker to feed into it's DSMAC to identify it's target.

Now repeat after me,
ALL tomahawk missiles use a radar for terrain mapping and in terminal phase use ANOTHER seeker to find their target.

vincelee said:

I've already shoved that fact in his face about a month ago Maglomaniac. Go read the Indian Army/Navy thread.

Is it likely to correct his view? Probably not, since you need two braincells to rub together for that.

Click to expand...

I know dude thats pretty furstrating and counter intuitive.

IndianFighter:

I found some more stuff for you to read up before we go on about this unproductive discussion.



Now go down to the very latest BLOCK IV version tomahawk series. Another picture for you right there.

guys, just keep it on the low a little bit. There is really no need to be so harsh on IndianFighter. We are just having a discussion here.

Since the main problem with ARH missile is that they can be picked up by RWR or MAW, what if some future seeker for ARH missile has LPI property? I know, it would be one expensive missile, but some AF like USAF might be willing to put up with the additional cost.

maglomanic said:

First off you totally ignored the picture that i posted from the same source that clearly shows Tercom/DSMAC/infrared imaging seeker all together.

Click to expand...

The picture is not a schematic of both the versions. It shows the radar as well as IIR seeker in one picture; else they would have to draw 2 near-identical pictures to show slight changes.

In both cases you have a radar that guides through the terrain until the missile reaches the terminal phase where it has to find the target. Thats when DSMAC opens up and it can either use an optical seeker or IR seeker.

Click to expand...

No. As mentioned by your own site, the anti-ship version uses IR seeker(for terminal guidance) and the terrain version uses DSMAC for terminal guidance and radar altimeter for TERCOM. The anti-ship version does not use TERCOM because it has to cruise over the sea and hence does not use a radar altimeter either.

Look at the last entry in the chart it mentions IIR/FLIR/DSMAC combined with your very own optical correlator.

Click to expand...

It means that the Optical correlator is DSMAC II (version), the EO seeker is FLIR/IIR and the datalink is Walleye.

However this missile is not operational but proves the point that you can have more than one kind of seekers for different phases. Even if infrared seeker is not there Tomahawk DOES use an optical image seeker to feed into it's DSMAC to identify it's target.

Click to expand...

DSMAC is not a seeker; at least not in the sense of IR or radar seeker. It is another technology altogether just like GPS/INS guidance or guidance from accessing waypoints from memory (go 5 kms north at x kms/hour etc.).

GPS/INS, DSMAC, wire-guidance (for anti-tank missiles) are not seeker technologies, but different technologies altogether, because they involve comparisons from a pre-recorded memory. In case of GPS, the waypoints have to be calculated and stored before launch, in DSMAC the image of the target must be known and stored prior to launch, and wire-guidance for anti-tank missiles is not a seeker technology.

Command guidance does not mean the pilot, sailor, or soldier guides the missile. The computer does it.

Click to expand...

I'm afraid that is debatable. Launch-platform guidance (like AMRAAM) is not 'command' guidance. The target is NOT changed mid-way or the missile's direction changed abruptly. Command guidance can do all that. It is a system in which a personnel who guides the missile to the target, till the missile is close enough to seek its own target by using its own seeker (IR or radar) i.e. by active guidance.

The P-6 and P-35 missiles, which differ only in minor ways, were fitted with the same guidance system and warhead. After launch, the missile climbed to a high altitude, accelerated to Mach 1.5, and started searching the front area with its radar seeker. The resulting picture was transmitted to the launching ship via a TV channel. When a target was acquired, the operator on the ship verified whether it was the desired target (e.g., the aircraft carrier in the group). If so, the operator designated it as such and turned the missile's seeker on automatic-track mode.
Source:


One can refer to ANY site that discusses AIM-120 AMRAAM. None mention "command guidance".
Examples of command guided missiles are the P-6D, P-500, Moskit, and other out-dated Soviet missiles.

However, the Arrow 2 BMD also uses command guidance in which an operator points the fast moving ballistic missile to the Arrow literraly like controlling a character in a video-game.
Anyway even this is getting obsolete as US endeavours in this direction eliminate this need.

Another thing, like I said before it's important to differentiate between MID-COURSE guidance and TERMINAL guidance.

Click to expand...

I know that. I've had heated discussions with vincelee regarding the Brahmos in the Indian Army and Navy News thread.
As an example, I've told him that the Brahmos will have a datalink to a UAV/helicopter or LEO satellite to be guided to the target, while it is in mid-course.....as compared to the Moskit's guidance where a sailor on the launch-ship guides the moskit to the target.

Wingman said:

That would be the best type for no-warning engagement. And you won't run into the problem of having to put both a radar receiver and IR seeker in the same missile. I believe there are also some missiles with command guidance modes where you don't have to lock on to the target at all, just designate it. With that combination, the target will receive no warning at all.

Click to expand...

I disagree. A warning will be recieved, because the target has to be illuminated by the source-aircraft or AWACs anyway.