|
Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile F-16 Airforces main menu Introduction The AIM-120 AMRAAM (Advanced Medium Range Air to Air Missile) is a high-supersonic, day/night/all weather Beyond Visual Range (BVR), fire-and-forget air-to-air missile. It has a high-explosive warhead and relies on active radar homing for the final stages of flight, being launched on inertial mid-course guidance without the need for the fighter to keep the target illuminated. Its capabilities include look-down, shoot-down, multiple launches against multiple targets, and intercepts at very short range in dogfight situations. Construction The AMRAAM is housed in a light-weight structure of steel and titanium. The airframe is divided into four major sections: guidance, warhead, propulsion and control. The four wings and fins are detachable. The guidance section features an active X-band radar terminal seeker using a highpower solid-state transmitter with a low-sidelobe, wide-gimbal antenna, and a built-in radio-frequency processor. Navigation, autopilot, radar, datalink, fuzing, sequencing, and self-test functions are allhandled by a single 30MHz microprocessor. The propulsion section consists of an advanced solid-fuel rocket motor to achieve a speed of Mach 4 and a range in excess of 30 miles. |