Why British Reluctance For Sidewinder

Thanks fr that Ken, I was hoping you knew.

p01: timing. RAF/FAA was not second best because Sea Hawk/guns were replaced by Scimitar/Sidewinder, F- Hunters by Javelin/Lightning/Firestreak from 1958. Dutch Navy Sidewinder/Sea Hawk and Swiss Sidewinder/Hunter came later. AIM-9B was in US Service from 1956; if UK had tried to integrate it on Sea Hawk/Hunter that would not have been deployed before our 1958 new types and the effort would have further delayed Firestreak Release to Service.

I was under the impression that the FAA’s Scimitars carried Sidewinders back in the 1960s.

Thanks for all the answers and info so far, all very useful.

However in regard to the early period….

Re Hunter / Sea Hawk (and that period) it struck me we were behind as we were arming the aircraft with essentialy war-time cannon and rockets, when they could have had a modern and relatively uncomplicated and lightish missile, while both these types abroad had this armament, sort of placing us second best?

….any further insight into this?

RAAF used AIM-9B on Sabres/Mirage 111O then later model ‘winders on F-111/F/A-18. Also used Matra Magic on Mirage for a bit too.

I think first ‘kill’ by AIM-9 was by Chinese Nationalist AF F-86 vs. PRCAF Mig…

This website tells the story… and shows the involvement of VMF-323 in providing personnel to install the Sidewinders on the RCAF Sabres, and in training the Chinese personnel in their use: http://home.inreach.com/tc/page7.html

RAAF used AIM-9B on Sabres/Mirage 111O then later model ‘winders on F-111/F/A-18. Also used Matra Magic on Mirage for a bit too.

I think first ‘kill’ by AIM-9 was by Chinese Nationalist AF F-86 vs. PRCAF Mig…

Thanks for the info, the Harrier did have the 9L though.

What I’m more getting at is the previous generations, we were producing fighters armed with guns and rockets, the Hunter, Sea Hawk, Gnat, Venom etc which could have easily had Sidewinder (the Hunter and Sea Hawk did in foreign market Sweden, Holland, Germany etc) armament, which would surely have made them more potent.
Sea Vixens and Javelins, and to a lesser extent the Lightning, had to carry very heavy radar systems and their missile armaments were results of 50s experiments, bulky and by some accounts not particularly reliable,
In hindsight it looks like we turned down a good defensive missile?

Early generations of Sidewinder were not notorious for being reliable either. IIRC anything up to and including the J model were lucky to have anything from a 45 to 55% failure rate depending on the batch in use. Mostly failing to guide problems I think.

On another point, did Firestreak / Red Top have a better advantage against bombers than the Sidewinder, ie is one considered offensive and the other purely defensive?

I’m not so sure about that. On April 7 1961 an F100 inadvertently fired a single live ‘winder at a B52. Tragically it made short work of the B52…. one missile ……..one big bomber kill.

When one sets about designing a AAM the first question is how much is the guidance technology likely to miss by? The answer sets the size of the warhead i.e. you compensate the bigger the miss distance by adding a bigger warhead. But the downside is that the bigger the warhead the larger the motor, the larger the steering actuators, the higher the loads hence heavier the airframe structure. Firestreak/Red Top were approx half the mass again of the winder (150/160 Kg compared to 86Kg) for a similar performance (note the US & UK use different criteria to classify range, but nominally all are 2-10km systems) and had approx two to two an half times the warhead size (20/32Kg compared to 9.5Kg). True the Red Top did give some additional capability (greater seeker aspect, radar slave) approx 5-10 years before winder could offer it but most operators preferred to carry winder plus the additional fuel rather than Firestreak/Red Top.

The lack of initial support for the winder was to protect what was seen as a home strategic & vital defence industry.

Why few, late UK AIM-9s

Money. Best source is S.R.Twigge, Early Devt.of GW in UK,Harwood,’93. In 1948 UK had 20 GW projects, all paper, all under-resourced. AAM was generically Red Hawk, active at Folland (to be passed to Vickers-Armstrongs) as Red Dean, passive at Fairey as Blue Sky (to be Fireflash). Drift – electronics firms were assigned to exporting radiograms.
In January,’49 ex-MoS Controller(R&D)AM Sir R.Sorley became DH Props’. MD and won MoS research funds on German IR-sensors; in Feb.1950 under US/UK Burns/Templer Agreement, GW data was “exchanged”; MoS in Jan.1951 funded DH for (to be) Firestreak, entering service August,58. Throughout the glacial gestation of UK devices US offered GW off-the-shelf and under licence; UK accepted all data, but declined most hardware, to create and sustain indigenous capability because “you never can tell”. However the priority that the DH Enterprise would clearly devote to integrating Firestreak/Sea Vixen was an acceptable excuse to accept for Scimitar part-US MSP-funded procurement of Philco AIM-9B, in US Service 1956. Some hundreds of Firestreaks (plus later Red Top) were built; >200,000 Sidewinders, inc. >15,000 by a NATO consortium led by BGT, which UK joined in 1979, BAe. licencing AIM-9L/M guidance system in 1985.

AIM-9B was a pipe: Philco, radiograms and other domestic appliances, could make pipes and bolt things into them; all the ‘innards clutter was co-ordinated in US by a well-funded team, academic, arsenal, electronic and hydro-mechanical industries. Always a Prime was in charge to kick and cajole: France, same; in UK we thought that as this ordnance “flew” it should be managed by Aero. But in GW, what you see is not what you get: success, and the money, lie inside: in 2000, Improved AMRAAM’s civil-derived PowerPC chip, cost £0.5Mn. I know of not one penny ever “invested” by UK GW – we paid for the lot. CD’s #2, prepared to part-fund development of missiles in the hope of export sales, happened, if at all, only inadvertently in overruns on fixed prices. The attitude of all UK Aero to GW was as Special Director/Weybridge G.Edwards: “wasn’t particularly interested in GW” A.R.Adams,Good Company,BAC,76,P142.

I can only find aWiki reference to cost of sidewinder per missile $85,000 each.
But it certainly confirms my idea that cost has a bearing !

Thanks for all extra info, it does help clarify a few things.
Teej thanks for your links forgot that the Scimitar and Bucc were Sidewinder capable, seems quite limited service on the former.

Re Hunter / Sea Hawk (and that period) it struck me we were behind as we were arming the aircraft with essentialy war-time cannon and rockets, when they could have had a modern and relatively uncomplicated and lightish missile, while both these types abroad had this armament, sort of placing us second best?

On another point, did Firestreak / Red Top have a better advantage against bombers than the Sidewinder, ie is one considered offensive and the other purely defensive?

The AIM-9L versions were rushed in from the US for the Falklands conflict and the UK had them before most USAF units?

Also i remember the Nirmrod had them as well forthe conflict but i am not sure if that was a long term thing though would not have thought so.

Also did they trial sidewinder on the Vulcan?

curlyboy

Nice thought, but capability must have been a strong factor when it came to defence even then, look at the American kit we were using, AI radar, tactical nuclear weapons etc.

The Harrier GR.3 I find interesting as I have seen it somewhere that it was Sidewinder capable just prior to the Falklands, but it was that conflict that made it AIM-9L capable, does anyone know precise details on this?

True, Britain used (and uses) a lot of US kit but then even a government that appreciates the benefit of indigenous design and production cannot usually fund everything.

It was just a question of ‘wiring’ as I think the USMC Harriers carried Sidewinder from day one; the RAF Harriers could have carried Sidewinder if the RAF had wanted that option but apparently they didn’t.

Maybe it is not always the case that US kit is better; I seem to remember that Skyflash, a re-working of Sparrow, was widely regarded to be superior in many respects and was even exported to Sweden.

Also don’t forget the US is rather good at ‘pushing’ their own kit (and there’s nothing wrong with that).

On the face of it the AIM-P Sidewinder seemed a capable missile but the RAF and FAA didn’t use it until much later than other countries.

The AIM-9B was used in the 1960s by the FAA.

http://www.abpic.co.uk/photo/1055799/

AIM-9Bs on Scimitars

http://www.thunder-and-lightnings.co.uk/scimitar/pictures.php

The stockpiles of AIM-9Bs were passed onto the FAA Buccaneers.

http://www.blackburn-buccaneer.co.uk/Pages1_files/Self-Defence_Index.html

TJ

Nice thought, but capability must have been a strong factor when it came to defence even then, look at the American kit we were using, AI radar, tactical nuclear weapons etc.

The Harrier GR.3 I find interesting as I have seen it somewhere that it was Sidewinder capable just prior to the Falklands, but it was that conflict that made it AIM-9L capable, does anyone know precise details on this?

The Harrier GR.3s were modified to carry AIM-9Gs while the Sea Harriers received the AIM-9L stocks.

http://harrier.hyperlinx.cz/FAQ-falklandwar.htm

http://www.raf.mod.uk/falklands/1sqn_1.html

TJ

Ok I am going to mention cost, surely this had an influence on the systems deployed? If MOD paid to develop Firestreak and Red Top then I would have thought it was cheaper to use them as they had the licence. Missile cost seems to be overlooked and I would like to see what figures are published, I seem to recall that the Sidewinder is very expensive.

The early versions of Sidewinder were comparable in performance with Firestreak therefore there wasn’t a need to buy it until the F-4 was in RAF service. I think also that Firestreak had a longer range (but not sure) so it was a better bet against bombers. Later the Sidewinder was very much better that Firestreak and so replaced it in British service.

Regards

As far as I remember, we only acquired it when we purchased the F-4K/M, and only as the AIM-9P which went on to be used by the Harrier Jaguar and eventually Tornado GRs as a last line of defence, prior to that we had Lightnings with Firestreak and Red Top only!!

Tim S

Don’t ever remember the AIM-9P in service! My recollections start with the 9B, thro’ 9G to 9L only. Loaded and stored enough of them to remember quite well! I also seem to recall that the UK 9L was “altered” by the UK to improve it. Also remember seeing an GCS working at Boscombe Down in the early 60’s.

Ok I am going to mention cost, surely this had an influence on the systems deployed? If MOD paid to develop Firestreak and Red Top then I would have thought it was cheaper to use them as they had the licence. Missile cost seems to be overlooked and I would like to see what figures are published, I seem to recall that the Sidewinder is very expensive.

Thanks for the info, the Harrier did have the 9L though.

What I’m more getting at is the previous generations, we were producing fighters armed with guns and rockets, the Hunter, Sea Hawk, Gnat, Venom etc which could have easily had Sidewinder (the Hunter and Sea Hawk did in foreign market Sweden, Holland, Germany etc) armament, which would surely have made them more potent.
Sea Vixens and Javelins, and to a lesser extent the Lightning, had to carry very heavy radar systems and their missile armaments were results of 50s experiments, bulky and by some accounts not particularly reliable,
In hindsight it looks like we turned down a good defensive missile?

Don’t forget Hawks were modded to carry Sidewinders. They were to be used as point defence fighters in the event of a war.