Thursday, September 10, 2009

Russian AAMs. Part 1

In general, the serial Russian air-to-air missiles are divided into 4 families: short-range R-73 (AA-11 'Archer'), median range R-77 (RVV-AE) and R-27 (AA-10 'Alamo') and long range R-33 modifications. All these weapons were developed by the missile design house 'Vympel' and now are manufactured by relative new corporation 'Tactical Missiles Weapon', where 'Vympel' was merged. The upgraded variant of R-33 missile is the 300 km range AA-13 'Arrow' (R-37, K-37, Izdeliye 610 or R-VD), but the fighters with needed radar capability (Su-35) is only entering a serial production.  The same is about 'Novator's KS-172 (RVV-L) missile wich extramally long range (400 km) demand according radar capability. The anti-radiation Kh-31 missile previously has only a limited AWACS-kill capability due to the lack of an active radar. The other kinds of new generation missiles are in active development process in Russia and used to be installed on 5th gen PAK-FA/FGFA fighter. They are yet to be de-classified.

The long range  R-33E missile is an export variant of the main MiG-31 interceptor weapon (R-33, K-33, 'izdelie 410, AA-9 'Amos'), which is the backbone of the Russian anti-aircraft\anti-cruise missiles system. Having high velocity, 'Agat' 9B-1388 active seeker combined with the semiactive radar midcourse guidance and inertial support, this missile can effectively destroy the incoming 'Tomahawks'. Other fair targets for this class of missiles are enemy bombers. According to the developer information its range is 120 km, target's altitude 0.05 – 25 km, warhead mass 47 kg, launch weight 490 kg, overall dimension 4.15 x 0.9 x 1.1 m.

21 comments:

  1. is there kh31 air to air anti radiation missile?

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  3. to anon September 10, 2009 11:28 PM:

    Initially was not, but some reports say about the efforts to transform it into the AWACS-killer.

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  4. Thank you Igor very interesting news about rockets.

    Did you have information about new rocket with infrared homing

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  5. to Zoki:

    Yes, I have a bit... Hopefully I'll follow the Part Two this weekend.

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  6. Igor what is the status of KS-172 Long Range Missile , are they still in development or the project is shelved ?

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  7. to Austin:
    The project is on the way. THe most convincing proof for this is the missile I saw two years ago on MAKS-2007. It was a KS-172-like misile with some differences. I'll show the photos in the Part 2.

    The problem with the ultra-long range AAMs was the deficiency of the radars. There is no rational if a plane with 140 km radar detection range would be equipped with 300-400 km missiles. So, this weapon is obviously for Su- 35 and PAK-FA\FGFA and for the recently upgraded MiG-31M.

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  8. to igorr

    the recently upgraded MiG-31M.
    --------------------------------
    can you post something about the mig31m i think its multirole

    and how the the radar of mig31m compares to bars?

    and why bars isn't able to fire ultra long range missiles

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  9. please,tell something about the seekers active,semi active,IR,mid course guidance

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  10. Hi Igorr,

    is India involved in the KS-172 development?
    I heard some news about the Indian involvment in this missile development. Is that true? if it is how much work as been completed? any idea? Also, Any new AAM codeveloped by India and Russia?

    Thanx in advance.

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  11. to anon September 12, 2009 3:19 AM:

    There was a number of reports about Indian interest in KS-172 co-development. No confirming report was from Delhi or Moscow. I think we would know already if a BrahMos-style cooperation were on the way. Hovewer let's hope it can be in the future.

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  12. to anon September 11, 2009 6:11 PM:

    BARS can fire ULAAMs if the software is upgraded, but no much sence in that while its range is limited relatively to 300-400 km VLAAMs range. ABout MiG-31 wait please to Part 2 report.

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  13. I am pretty sure the Bars can use the KS-172, provided it can provide midcourse updates beyond 100-200 Km. The Bars itself is a very capable system and clearly, the range numbers mentioned in the press and on NIIP website, are clearly very heavily sanitized and censored.

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  14. Wouldn't it make sense to have 300 km missiles right now if ground radar, AWACS, or another aircraft were providing the targeting information via data-link?

    Pavel

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  15. to Pavel:

    ARE they providing now? I think no, at least until 'Falcon' achieves its full capability. And till they do, 'Bars' will be upgraded to almost 'Irbis' level, and Su-30MKI will (hopely) be equipped with VLRAAMs. The profile of the upgrade is on conversation now.

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  16. Isn't "Falcon" the Israeli electronics suite for Indian Il-76 AWACS? Does the Russian Air Force plan to add similar capability to its A-50s?

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  17. to anon October 19, 2009 6:16 PM:

    Indeed, the Russian AF uses its own indigeneous Il-76 based AWAC&S system called A-50. It's started upgrade but only few known about this in open sources. In a holistic estimation they have do it since the net-centricitysation of whole AF is their openly declared aim.

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  18. ULAAMs are not just for ultra long range engagements of course.
    A target 100kms away that is heading away from the interceptor is an example of a use for ULRAAMs.
    Another example would be targets that can be detected at very long ranges like large cargo aircraft, or AWACS aircraft emitting signals that give away their position.
    There is also the issue of low flying targets where all missiles have greatly reduced range due to thicker air to travel through. ULAAMs could reach further without the launch aircraft having to climb to gain speed and altitude to give his medium range missiles more energy than the other guys medium range missiles.

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  19. comparison of russian air to air missiles :
    http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u225/adux21/russian-aams.png

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  20. comparison of russian air to air missiles :
    http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u225/adux21/russian-aams.png

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