AIM-7 Sparrow

Dilandu said:
You could fit a small IR seeker on her - presumably, some derivative of Stinger's one - much easier than on AMRAAM.
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Back in the 1960s and 1970s at China Lake NOTS experimented with something called the Sparrowinder (It's mentioned in Ron Westrum's book on the Sidewinder) where basically the seeker from an AIM-9D was mounted in the body of an AIM-7E.

Dilandu said:
They may even go as simple as adding a small, narrow-angle IR sensor to radar fairing
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It was called the AIM-7R.
 
timmymagic said:
The UK was looking to add Amraam to Nimrod MRA.4 as well...
Wonder what the weirdest installation woul have been for Sparrow, Sky Flash, Aspide or Amraam..?
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How about an F6F Hellcat with Sparrow...? I'm sure it would have been a surprise to Japanese pilots... :D

F6F+2.jpg
 
Does anybody have drawings or even official ones regarding the Mark 29 Sea Sparrow launcher?
 
Maybe some members, who know less about the AIM-7 Sparrow, might be interested in this video:
View: https://youtu.be/99h6Xn0Q3p4?si=HGwXcbSF_u7W2G7C
Edit:
The Youtuber "Not A Pound For Air To Ground" prohibits, that this video is played on other websites like this forum.
Just click on the link to watch this video at Youtube.
 
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How was this missile guided, was the AIM-7E/F supposed to acquire the target before launch, under the wing of the fighter? Did the AIM-7M do it after launch?
 
Lans said:
How was this missile guided
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The AIM-7A Sparrow I used beam-rider guidance (It was an extremely limited missile with a short service life).
The stillborn AIM-7B Sparrow II used active radar-homing.
The AIM-7C/D/E/F/M/P Sparrow III used semi-active radar-homing.

Lans said:
was the AIM-7E/F supposed to acquire the target before launch,
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Yes, IIRC it took about four seconds to acquire its target before the seeker's speed-gate settled before it could be launched (After the pilot pulled the trigger there was another 1.5 seconds before the missile was fired).

Lans said:
Did the AIM-7M do it after launch?
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I'm not certain but I think that the AIM-7M might've had a limited inertial midcourse guidance phase before switching to SARH mode.
 
NMaude said:
Yes, IIRC it took about four seconds to acquire its target before the seeker's speed-gate settled before it could be launched (After the pilot pulled the trigger there was another 1.5 seconds before the missile was fired).
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There was a psuedo-tuning signal that would simulate a target and provide information to determine if the missile was "good" or not. If it passed tuning, as soon as the target was acquired, the rear antenna would begin receiving a CW signal identical to the one being emitted by the launching aircraft, and the simulated doppler signal would be fed into the missile as a voltage signal through the umbilical for speedgate positioning.
On lock, once the speedgate had been identified and stabilized enough to provide a pseudo doppler signal (~2 seconds for pulse radars, ~.5 seconds for AWG-10 in PD mode), the missile began tuning on the simulated doppler. I'm unsure about the time between the trigger pull and launch. The F-4B/J/N Tac Manual (01-245FDB-1T) seems to imply that there is no delay and that the launch occurs upon trigger pull no matter the tuning status (except for sets that have had the pseudo tuning signal removed, where they cannot be launched without a simulated doppler lock). However, I was just sent a picture of a book that mentions a 1.25s delay between squeeze and launch on the F-4E.

In short, the lock conditions were set before launch, and the target would be acquired upon launch.
 
And how long was the time from activation to trigger pull? Every missile has it's activation time, to warm up or to cool down IR-sensor and so on.
 
NMaude said:
How on earth were you able to get hold of an AIM-7F GCU?
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Northrop Grumman warehouse sale, National Electronics Museum was offloading a bunch of stuff in Baltimore and I had to go. Didn't buy the ALQ-184, couldn't justify 5K or much less fit it in my sedan. The APG-68s (in the bg of the photo in my car) were $5 each tho LOL
 
MissileMan said:
Didn't buy the ALQ-184, couldn't justify 5K or much less fit it in my sedan.
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You could've rented a van and five grand for an ECM pod is a bargain.

It's a pity you couldn't get an AIM-7E GCU also were Sidewinder stuff on sale?
 
NMaude said:
You could've rented a van and five grand for an ECM pod is a bargain.

It's a pity you couldn't get an AIM-7E GCU also were Sidewinder stuff on sale?
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I am still building savings, 5K was more than I was willing to swing around and the Sparrow was $20...
No Sidey stuff, looked to be mostly westinghouse and northrop family products.
 
Bruno Anthony said:
Any way to find the AIM-7 pre Vietnam War test firing results? I mean someone must have known this anti bomber missile might have a hard time against maneuvering fighters.
The books I’ve read on the air war over N. Vietnam all seem to say that it’s failures in air to air combat were surprising. I doubt that.
Only Marshall L. Michell in Clashes: Air Combat over North Vietnam questions the pre war kill probabilities testing of the missile.
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I had hoped this would merge with the last sorry
 
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Paper on PL-11/Aspide, seems enormously formidable in terms of speed and maneuverability.
 

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