Taildog / SRAAM / ASRAAM family

[Antonio]

Aviation Magazine No.545 September 1970
Attached pic from Farnborough 1970.

Additional info: Illustrated Encyclopedia of the World's Rockets&Missiles. By Bill Gunston. Ed Salamander. ISBN 0-571-26870. Pg 221

The Vietnam War experience warn about the need for short range air to air weapons to be developed. Hawker Siddeley started design of a new AAM for visual range engagements named Taildog in 1970. The same year, the MoD awarded the company with funds to go ahead with the weapon under the designation SRAAM-100 (later changed to SRAAM). The contract was cancelled in 1974, but retained as a technology demonstration program. The final evolution of this design is the AIM-132 ASRAAM

http://www.skomer.u-net.com/projects/asraam.htm
http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/missile/aim-132.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASRAAM

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

Re: Taildog AAM

Thanks for that.

Here's an image of an SRAAM firing and the proposed launch tube. The first image is from Modern Airborne Missiles by Bill Gunston, the other image comes from the RAF Cosford website. I was very disappointed to find they didn't actually have the launcher there when I visited!

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

Length: 2.724m
Diameter: 165mm
Speed: Mach 3

IMI Summerfield produced the solid motor with control actuation by Sperry Gyroscope.

Used a lightweight twin-tube launcher whose adaptor shoe housed the fire control system. The missile tube had nose doors, which opened during firing then closed immediately to reduce drag.

Off boresight capability of 90 degrees.

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

There's a good picture of Taildog in Jane's Weapons Systems 1970-1.

I might buy this volume when I have £10 spare

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

http://sistemadearmas.sites.uol.com.br/aam/sraam.html

 

[Oli]

I did my apprenticeship for a Hawker Siddeley subsidiary in the seventies and I remember an in-house competition to name the missile. I don't think I've ever seen the chosen name published anywhere other than company internal newspaper, but as far as we were concerned it was going to be called"Mongoose".
OTOH the competition result was announced, IIRC, sometime in 1974....

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

Excellent info. I don't suppose you recall anything else of interest about the program?

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

Here's a pic of a test installation of SRAAM on a Hunter in 1978. It has a recording camera and lacks the nose doors of the production launcher.

Janes gives 2.73m length and 0.168mm diameter.

Source:

Jane's All The World's Aircraft 1980-1981

 

[TinWing]

It has a recording camera and lacks the nose doors of the production launcher.

I do have to wonder about the mechanical complexity and weight penalties of encapsulating a small air-to-air missile like SRAAM?

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

SRAAM

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

SRAAM TVC controls

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

Twin tube launcher

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

Just noticed that in 1995, BAe proposed a TVC ASRAAM using thrust vector vanes for the AIM-9X program. Son of Taildog?

Source:
Flight International, 22-28 November 1995

 

[Archibald]

Hmmm in the apendix of British secret projects (bombers) T.Buttler mention the Blackburn P.146 light fighter of 1969 and precise that the plane was to be armed only with taildogs, and guided by the P.139 (the odd AEW aircraft planned for the RN, not sure of its name)

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

SRARM was a anti-radar-homing derivative of SRAAM. A model is displayed at Bristol Aero Collection (http://www.bristolaero.com)

SRARM Missile

This exhibit is a design model for an SRARM (Short Range Anti-Radar Missile) that only ever existed on paper. It has a place in the Collection to remind us that in spite of the fact that not all projects come to fruition, people expended time and effort to progress as far as the proposal stage.

 

[elmayerle]

So was SRARM something equivalent to an advanced Sidearm (ARM derivative of AIM-9C) for air-to-ground use or was it intended for air-to-air use to make BVR-capable adversaries keep their radars off and cut any advantages their radar would give them?

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

Air-to-ground as I recall. I think it had an odd "offset" nose design. Would like to photogaph the model one day.

 

[TinWing]

So was SRARM something equivalent to an advanced Sidearm (ARM derivative of AIM-9C) for air-to-ground use or was it intended for air-to-air use to make BVR-capable adversaries keep their radars off and cut any advantages their radar would give them?

Wasn't the intended target of Sidearm the radar on the ZSU 23-4 Shilka self-propelled antiaircraft gun? The intended platform for Sidearm was apparently the Marine AH-1W Cobra.

 

[JAZZ]

SRARM photo

 

[TinWing]

SRARM photo

Hmmm....

I seem to see what appears to be a very normal conical nose.

 

[Mike Pryce]

Air-to-ground as I recall. I think it had an odd "offset" nose design. Would like to photogaph the model one day.

SRARM photo

Hmmm....

I seem to see what appears to be a very normal conical nose.

Well, two versions of one project would be unsurprising. I assume the 'offset' nose version ( I have seen a pic) used a dual sensor system - RF and IR I guess. This has been proposed for other ARMs.

On a related note, in 1995 BAe proposed the Typhoon missile, based on ASRAAM with a shortened rocket motor and Trigat tandem warhead. This lost out to Brimstone, although it was supposed to have AAM capability as it kept the ASRAAM IR sensor.

 

[TinWing]

I have seen a picture of the confusingly name Typhoon missile on a triple launcher at an airshow. (I can only assume that BAe named this AMRAAM derivative before the Eurofighter gained the "Typhoon" moniker.)

It is interesting to note that the Typhoon gained two long strakes that ran around half the length on the airframe - perhaps to increase the range? Otherwise this proposal looked similar to ASRAAM.

I can only assume that the IR seeker had been reprogramed for ground based targets, although it is an open question whether an adapted IR anti-aircraft missile seeker would be as effective against ground targets as a purpose built MMW radar seeker?

I would assume that an ASRAAM based airframe would have had dynamic and range advantages over a Hellfire based airframe that weights only have as much.

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

Some clarification on designations. The original manufacturer project was Taildog. This was followed by SRAAM-100, which was aimed at ASR.1222, a requirement for a new short range AAM to replace AIM-9D in RAF service.

The problem with SRAAM-100 was it was considered too ambitious to meet ASR.1222 which specified a 1975 in service date. This was then replaced by SRAAM-75, which basically went with less ambitious components including less advanced seeker in order to meet the 1975 in service date.

Possible mixed buys of AIM-9L and SRAAM-75 was considered, but in the end, AIM-9L was procured, with SRAAM proceeding as a technology demonstrator.

 

[Mercurius Cantabrigiensis]

The early-1970s Taildog missile project gave way to the version known as SRAAM. Around eight guided launches of the latter missile were carried out under a technology-demonstration programme, proving its then-novel vectored thrust control system.

SRAAM formed the basis of the Future Air-to-Air Missile which was rejected in August 1977 by the Government of the time in favour of the AIM-9L version of Sidewinder. FAAM would have used a three-nozzle thrust vectoring control system, plus some aerodynamic control.

In retrospect, the rejection of SRAAM was a wise decision, an engineer associated with the programme told me about a decade later. The weapon had been based an analogue electronics, so offered little potential for further development. The changes needed to create a digital equivalent would have been so drastic that the end result would have been for all practical purposes and all-new missile.

By the early 1980s, engineers decided that thrust vectoring was both costly and heavy, so adopted a wingless missile combining aerodynamic tail control and body lift for the ASRAAM programme.

Mercurius Cantabrigiensis

 

[zen]

No ASRAAM would've been a right decision in the early 70's even if it meant the development of a new digital missile later on in the 80's.

 

[bristolfighter]

A picture showing forty years of missile designs.

This is the UK's most succesful missile family. See other posts on this forum, and BSP missiles, for more.

 

[red admiral]

I went over to the Bristol Aero Collection on Monday. I didn't see SRARM anywhere (I think they might mean S225X) but did find the twin box launcher for SRAAM. There are a few other gems there as well.

 

[overscan (PaulMM)]

Nice! Missed those pics somehow.


Here's a shot of a Hunter with the twin launcher.
http://forums.airshows.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=40&t=25060&p=265201&hilit=hatfield+1979#p256641


Also a shot of SRAAM.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:SRAAM_missile.jpg

 

[Hobbes]

That pic of the Hunter probably shows the same launcher that's now in the Bristol Aero collection. I'm not sure if it's a genuine article or a mockup.

The missile photo posted by Overscan was taken (by me) at Cosford. That one I'm quite sure is a mockup: the fins are fixed (they would have been hinged on the real missile), and the nose dome looks like it's painted on the inside.

 

[Avimimus]

So, based upon this post:

http://www.secretprojects.co.uk/forum/index.php/topic,9360.msg101807.html#msg101807

Was it considered as a rear firing defensive weapon? Did thrust vectoring make this a possibility? Any more information on this idea?

 

[Hobbes]

According to British Secret Projects 4: Missiles and hypersonics, yes. The Air Staff expressed interest in rear-firing missiles around 1969, with the HS. 1184-16 as one possible implementation. No additional information though.

 

[Avimimus]

Thanks Hobbes,

 

[Kiltonge]

I do have to wonder about the mechanical complexity and weight penalties of encapsulating a small air-to-air missile like SRAAM?

It probably wasn't about the missile itself.

Even today, when carrying an AAM the drag index of the pylon + launcher is much greater than that of the missiles itself. For AIM-9 on an LAU-7 the ratio is roughly 1:2.5.

So anything that can reduce the drag of the carriage and launcher is a certain win.

 

[flateric]

Advanced Short Range Air to Air Missile (ASRAAM) - Think Defence

The AIM-132 ASRAAM is a high-speed, highly manoeuvrable, heat-seeking, air-to-air missile.

www.thinkdefence.co.uk

 

[flateric]

Advanced Short Range Air to Air Missile (ASRAAM) - Think Defence

The AIM-132 ASRAAM is a high-speed, highly manoeuvrable, heat-seeking, air-to-air missile.

www.thinkdefence.co.uk

 

[AN/AWW-14(V)]

The ASRAAM Block 6 seeker underperformed in testing and remedial work is expected to delay the missile’s in-service date until 2021. Life extension of Block 4 missiles beyond their current out-of-service date of 2022 will mitigate the risk of further delay. Block 6 missiles incorporate a UK-manufactured seeker and will progressively replace Block 4 as part of routine stockpile management.

http://data.parliament.uk/DepositedPapers/Files/DEP2020-0104/The_Defence_Equipment_Plan_2019.pdf

 

[Ronny]

Interesting

 

[timmymagic]

Life extension of Block 4 missiles beyond their current out-of-service date of 2022 will mitigate the risk of further delay.

I know we'll never know...but I wonder how long that Lifex will give the Block 4 Asraam. Be nice if we retained them in the stockpile as a war reserve. It's not as if they're not one of the worlds best WVR missiles still..

 

[aonestudio]

New Block 6 ASRAAM is ITAR-free – Alert 5

 

[helmutkohl]

New Block 6 ASRAAM is ITAR-free – Alert 5

great!
out of curiosity, is IRIS-T also ITAR free?