054/A FFG Thread II

H

hmmwv

Junior Member
stardave said:
I think the electronics are the easiest to change, but the missile body is not, for example there is only so much fuel you can fit in a medium range SAM, so I doubt you can make HQ-16 to go 100km.
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The similarly sized RIM-66 Standard can go up to 170km.
 
Mysterre

Mysterre

Banned Idiot
Totoro said:
i dont know about hhq16 on ships, but the land version, hq16, is refered to having composite guidance: inertial guidance coupled with intermittent SARH guidance up until SARH lock for terminal engagement. I never found any good sources saying it had telemetry datalink. Now, that seems very queer, as it shouldnt be too hard to implement it, but it could very well explain the relatively short ranges of hq16.

The way i see it, missile gets programmed before launch. It gets launched, it knows where to turn after launch. Its inertial guidance keeps it more or less in the direction it needs to go, inside the illuminator cone. The illuminator then paints the target, missile corrects itself if needed. Illuminator is then redirected, perhaps busy painting another target for another missile. First missile, again using its INS, flies towards target. Illuminator, if needed, again periodically paints the target, all up until the last few seconds of flight, when it stays on target so the missile could do its interception.

This sort of guidance isnt new, as far as i know, USN used intermittent guidance on (some?) SM-1 missiles.

With it, one gets ability to do concurrent engagements, or relatively decent antisaturation abilities, but the missile still has to fly the straight path and there are no parabollic trajectories and ranges suffer. That is of course not a problem for antimissile tasks nor engagement of low flying planes, but it does offer the enemy the chance to go high up and still stay relatively close to the ship.

Now, why on earth would one choose such a system in this day and age - i have no idea. Sure, it must be a bit cheaper. But can it really be that much cheaper to justify the loss of potential capability? Only reason I can think of so far is the doctrine. Perhaps PLAN absolutely does not intend to use 054a on their own. Maybe they intend to use them either as part of larger task force where other ships would carry hhq9, or they intend to use them relatively close to china's shores so the ships would enjoy PLAAF's protection or they intend to use them in low intensity missions, antipiracy missions etc.
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You are referring to Interrupted Continuous Wave Illumination (ICWI). AFAIK the MR-90 Front Dome and probably its Chinese equivalent can illuminate a maximum of two targets nearly simultaneously if they are very close together.

And I'm certain the PLAN intends to use the HHQ-16 alongside HHQ-9 as part of its air defence screen in any carrier group. Long range missiles typically have minimum ranges that need to be covered by medium or short range missiles whose flight profile is not as high and ballistic initially. This is the reason there is an Aster-15 and Aster-30 combo in the first place.
 
T

Totoro

Major
VIP Professional
I guess that could be it, though I also read about ICWI being touted as something "newly installed" on de zeevan frigates and various new japanese ships. But why use that technique if one already has midcourse corrections via datalink? Does it offer greater precision? Maybe the datalink updates arent that frequent. (Though i also remember reading that some PAAMs test intercepts were done by just datalink updates, meaning the updates are frequent enough and precise enough for some interceptions on their own, without missile's self-guidance)

I guess all that matters less. What matters is that hq16 has a fairly small range for a missile of its size which, when we take into account it is a new missile with new rocket fuel (other chinese missiles like pl-12 dont seem to be lagging that much range wise) it makes it quite likely the culprit to the short range is guidance. Why is there only a simple autopilot relying on INS, and not a reprogrammable autopilot with datalinked updates - we don't know. But that seems to be the case. Even that new NORINCO sam, sky dragon, which is in some pamphlets touted as being active guided, seems to be of similar size and range, meaning it too may have a simple autopilot and no datalink corrections. And at the same time, smaller missile like pl-12 seems to be equipped with such subsystems. Strange...
 
Mysterre

Mysterre

Banned Idiot
Totoro said:
I guess that could be it, though I also read about ICWI being touted as something "newly installed" on de zeevan frigates and various new japanese ships. But why use that technique if one already has midcourse corrections via datalink? Does it offer greater precision? Maybe the datalink updates arent that frequent. (Though i also remember reading that some PAAMs test intercepts were done by just datalink updates, meaning the updates are frequent enough and precise enough for some interceptions on their own, without missile's self-guidance)

I guess all that matters less. What matters is that hq16 has a fairly small range for a missile of its size which, when we take into account it is a new missile with new rocket fuel (other chinese missiles like pl-12 dont seem to be lagging that much range wise) it makes it quite likely the culprit to the short range is guidance. Why is there only a simple autopilot relying on INS, and not a reprogrammable autopilot with datalinked updates - we don't know. But that seems to be the case. Even that new NORINCO sam, sky dragon, which is in some pamphlets touted as being active guided, seems to be of similar size and range, meaning it too may have a simple autopilot and no datalink corrections. And at the same time, smaller missile like pl-12 seems to be equipped with such subsystems. Strange...
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ICWI is possible with phased array radars, either active or passive. Mechanically steered radars are incapable of ICWI. It also has to be X or C band; anything else does not have enough resolution. S band radars like SPY-1 can provide mid-course updates, but lack the precision to provide terminal illumination, which is why they have to hand off targeting to the SPG illuminators, which are X band. The APAR on the zeven Provincien class is X band, which is ideal for terminal illumination.

I think the lack of range of the HHQ-16 could be due to several factors, and I'm not sure we'll ever have definitive answers. The missile may be limited by its Front Dome Chinese equivalent, which means as soon as they upgrade the radar you would see an increase in range (but of course they would never tell us the range had increased). The missile could be limited by its flight profile, such as if it receives frequent course updates and/or makes frequent corrections based on its own homing algorithms (continuous SARH), which would waste fuel. The SM-2 avoids this by receiving just a few updates from the AN/SPY-1 en route and launching mostly ballistically into a "target basket" where it acquires the final terminal illumination from the AN/SPG-62 and only really becomes SARH at that point. The flight profile is thus as energetically efficient as possible. The missile could also be limited by less advanced and less energetic fuel. IMO the seeker on the missile is not the problem; it is more likely one or a combination of these other factors.
 
A

A.Man

Major
Hudong 7th 054A (15th of Total) Launched July 9, 2012

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Huangpu: The 13th 054A, 572 gone; The 14th 054A with 1st 056

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Huangpu 2nd 056 with a ship unknown (in the left hall)

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Jeff Head

Jeff Head

General
Registered Member
joshuatree said:
Hi Jeff Head, sorry, I only saw this pic on another forum and it was actually A.Man who posted it here. Maybe he might have a link?
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Thanks.

Well, it is surely a nice pic and if A.Man reads this and has a link to a higher res version I hope we can get it.
 
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