Speed Kills: The Case For Hypersonic Weapons

[popcorn]

Well, there is an o erlap between ramjet and scramjet performance envelopes. Scramjets will power the hypersonic paeadigm.

[popcorn]

Well, there is an overlap between ramjet and scramjet performance envelopes. Scramjets will power the hypersonic paradigm.

[sferrin]

Which strongly suggests there's more to this story than provided specs capture.

Yeah, like the ATACMs booster accelerated the X-51 to Mach 4.8 and the thing barely had enough net thrust to accelerate to Mach 5.1. ASALM had a much smaller, integral booster, that got it to about Mach 2 where it accelerated at multiple Gs up to Mach 5.4.

Have you considered the Mach=5.1 is the average flight speed, not a peak speed?

No, because it wasn't.

An ASALM's 300 miles would make it look like a slacker for range compared to an X-51 doing that, I reckon.

Unlikely given that ASALM was faster than X-51.

[element1loop]

ASALM had a much smaller, integral booster, that got it to about Mach 2 where it accelerated at multiple Gs up to Mach 5.4.

I acknowledge your points, especially the booster size, but there are avenues to get beyond that. But also miniaturization will come as the tech matures. So I'm not so sure the booster size is a prohibitive factor (I'll clarify below), especially if a boost staged surface to air system like an SM6 replacement were desired. But there's still another way to get there.

The engine type is observed to work at almost twice the X-51's reported speed to date. And more practical fuel's combustion is currently being studied/experimented on. Apparently not going too well yet. The engine snuffed sooner than it ran out of fuel in test #4.

But if it had continued to burn as long as expected it could have gone much further than it did. Even so, Boeing puts range @ ~460 miles (740 km - not too shabby) for a test just under 70K feet. Apparently it's a pretty good glider even if it only reached max speed of M=5.1.

But if the the engine had run as long as expected, even at only Mach 5.1 it would have gone out to much higher radius.

And if you put it into a shallow climb as it accelerates, even if just to prevent it over-speeding (and over heating) in follow on tests, it will go out much further again. Looking at the X-51 it has a lot of leading edge features that suggest they're expecting it to go a lot faster at some point, if they can crack the use of a practical operational fuel, and maintain combustion until it's all used up.

So to my mind there's clear potential here from that alone, let alone if they can make it go much faster than Mach 5.1. I also wouldn't discount practicality of hypersonic tech by a long way yet, or view it as comparable or inferior to a ramjet missile's performance, let alone consider it's potential sub-par, in a practical weapon design.

Has a ramjet ever done Mach ~9.7? But the first X scramjet vehicle did.

And ASALM's propulsion had how many prior decades developing its tech, operating it and miniaturizing it to present-day AAM scale proportions?

Regarding that large booster issue, an SR-71's jet engines mechanically convert to ramjet operation, at speed and altitude, so can a single-use ramjet also convert cheaply and simply into a scramjet engine at Mach ~5, in a similar way?

I don't see why not, they are related, and very similar - far more so than a jet and ramjet transition.

If that can be done how big does a practical weapon's booster stage have to be, for a practical SAM or AAM? And how much can the whole thing be miniaturized?

Quite a lot more than an ASALM, I expect.

I don't see anything prohibitive here, if a common fuel for both RAM and SCRAM operation can be identified and combustion conditions mastered.

[eloise]

They can probably just put radar seeker on Blue/silver sparrow and you got yourself a hypersonic weapon

[garrya]

Did you know in the early 1970s, the USAF tested air-launching a Minuteman 1b ICBM from a C-5A Galaxy transport aircraft

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[castlebravo]

US DoD has done all kinds of crazy things with missiles, and some of the more impressive stuff happened as early as the 60's. My favorite is the Sprint ABM. Zero to Mach 10 in 5 seconds! The missile was supersonic before it left the launch silo, and it pulled 100g of acceleration.

I wonder if modern guidance systems could be accurate and compact enough to allow for something like a mini-Sprint with either a small frag warhead, or hit-to-kill capability for terminal defense against air-breathing hypersonic weapons.

[eloise]

Did you know in the early 1970s, the USAF tested air-launching a Minuteman 1b ICBM from a C-5A Galaxy transport aircraft

The attachment MMIII_C5_airdrop(Oct_1974).jpg is no longer available

That impressive but not as impressive as GAM-87 Skybolt

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China is currently testing ALBM too. The new missile is CH-AS-X-13

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[eloise]

New missiles:

[eloise]

[spazsinbad]

Raytheon, Northrop Partner To Co-develop Scramjet Missile [best read at source for more details]
18 Jun 2019 Steve Trimble

"Raytheon Missile Systems and Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems announced a partnership at the Paris Air Show on June 18 to co-develop a scramjet-powered hypersonic missile.

Though presented as a newly-signed partnership, the announcement in reality lifts the veil on a secret, multi-year collaboration between the two companies to develop an advanced new high-speed weapon system as one of two competitors for the High-speed Air-breathing Weapon Concept (HAWC) funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

The partnership is so advanced that the Raytheon/Northrop HAWC design is ready to enter flight testing “very soon,” said Tom Bussing, vice president of Raytheon Advanced Missile Systems. “This weapon is fundamentally game-changing. There’s nothing like it,” Bussing said.

Lockheed Martin also is developing a scramjet-powered missile for the HAWC program….

...The new scramjet propulsion system for the Raytheon/Northrop HAWC is designed exclusively with an additive manufacturing process, he said. That approach helped significantly reduce the weight of the scramjet, which amounts to about half the mass of the engine aboard the Boeing X-51 a decade ago, Wilcox said.

Raytheon is contributing to the design of the HAWC missile, which was revealed by Aviation Week ShowNews on Monday. It features a contoured nose and standard body, although the released image masks the shape of the classified inlet design.

The Raytheon/Northrop team are developing the HAWC initially for an air-launched application, but there are plans to develop versions that can be launched from ground vehicles and ships."

Graphic: https://aviationweek.com/site-files/avi ... ax-43a.jpg



Source: https://aviationweek.com/space/raytheon ... et-missile

[citanon]

This theDrive article tries to add some "color" to the Raytheon, NG collaboration story.

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/2 ... ic-missile

[eloise]

China develope their hypersonic weapons so quick

[sferrin]

China is currently testing ALBM too. The new missile is CH-AS-X-13

1.PNG

2.PNG

Why would a Chinese missile be dropped out of the back of a C-17 or displayed under a C-5?

[eloise]

China is currently testing ALBM too. The new missile is CH-AS-X-13

The attachment 1.PNG is no longer available

The attachment 1.PNG is no longer available

Why would a Chinese missile be dropped out of the back of a C-17 or displayed under a C-5?

That the Y-20