06-23-2004, 16:44 PM
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#8 (permalink)
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Senior Contributor
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About "Vandals" and so on:
Quote:
The AQM-37 fills a valuable "niche" as a training target, since it can simulate high-speed threats, such as long-range missiles. However, there are some specialized threats that it does not simulate well, such as fast sea-skimming antiship missiles.
The US Navy has gone through a succession of programs in an attempt to obtain such a target. An initial investigation was conducted in the early 1970s for a target designated the "BQM-90", but lack of funds led to the cancellation of the program in 1973 even before a contractor was selected.
As an interim measure, the Navy then decided to convert some old "RIM-8 Talos" shipboard antiaircraft missiles to targets, giving them the designation "MQM-8G Vandal". The Talos targets were not entirely satisfactory for the job, and so in 1977 the Navy awarded a contract to Teledyne Ryan for a purpose-designed target, the "Model 258 / BQM-111A Firebrand".
The Firebrand was a neat dart with small delta wings, a conventional tail arrangement, and a Marquardt ramjet mounted at each end of the horizontal tailplane. It was to be launched from a DC-130, boosted up to Mach 1.2 by a solid-fuel booster, and cruise towards its objective at Mach 2.2, dropping to low level during the terminal "attack" phase. However, the Firebrand began to seem a bit too heavy for its role, and funding was tight again, so the Navy axed the program in 1982.
That meant keeping the Vandal targets in service, while the Navy went through another iteration to obtain an antiship missile simulator target, awarding a contract to Martin Marietta for the "AQM-127A Supersonic Low-Altitude Target (SLAT)" in 1984. The SLAT was a "flying stovepipe", little more than a cylinder powered a hybrid boost-rocket / ramjet engine with an intake under the nose, and no flight surfaces except for cruciform tailfins. The program was killed off in 1991 without flying a prototype.
As a result, the Vandal had to soldier on into the 1990s, but its numbers were dwindling. Later in the decade, as an interim solution, the Navy acquired a handful of Soviet-built "Kh-31A" ramjet-powered anti-ship missiles, modified to "MA-31" targets by Boeing, as an interim solution.
In the summer of 2000, in a fourth attempt to acquire an antiship missile simulator target, the US Navy signed a contract with Orbital Sciences Corporation (OSC) to build the "GQM-163 Supersonic Sea-Skimming Target (SSST)".
http://www.vectorsite.net/twuav1.html
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That means SM-2 and SeaSpearow were developed NOT having a useful targets to test on.
p.s. ESSM does not exist yes as a production weapon, and we are talking about things that are at least 15-20 years in service already.
Last edited by lurker : 06-23-2004 at 16:55 PM.
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