ATI's Modern Missile Analysis course

This 4-day course presents a broad introduction to major missile subsystems and their integrated performance, explained in practical terms, but including relevant analytical methods. While emphasis is on today’s homing missiles and future trends, the course includes a historical perspective of relevant older missiles. Both endoatmospheric and exoatmospheric missiles (missiles that operate in the atmosphere and in space) are addressed. Missile propulsion, guidance, control, and seekers are covered, and their roles and interactions in integrated missile operation are explained. The types and applications of missile simulation and testing are presented. Comparisons of autopilot designs, guidance approaches, seeker alternatives, and instrumentation for various purposes are presented. The course is recommended for analysts, engineers, and technical managers who want to broaden their understanding of modern missiles and missile systems. The analytical descriptions require some technical or mathematical background, but practical explanations can be appreciated by students without this background.

What you will learn:

You will gain an understanding of the design and analysis of homing missiles and the integrated performance of their subsystems.

• Missile propulsion and control in the atmosphere and in space.
• Clear explanation of homing guidance.
• Types of missile seekers and how they work.
• Missile testing and simulation.
• Latest developments and future trends.

Course Outline:

1. Introduction. Brief history of missiles. Types of guided missiles. Introduction to ballistic missile defense. Endoatmospheric and exoatmospheric missile operation. Missile basing. Missile subsystems overview. Warheads, lethality and hit-to-kill. Power and power conditioning.

    

2. Missile Propulsion. The rocket equation. Solid and liquid propulsion. Single stage and multistage boosters. Ramjets and scramjets. Axial propulsion. Divert and attitude control systems. Effects of gravity and atmospheric drag.

    

3. Missile Airframes, Autopilots and Control. Phases of missile flight. Purpose and functions of autopilots. Missile control configurations. Autopilot design. Open-loop autopilots. Inertial instruments and feedback. Autopilot response, stability, and agility. Body modes and rate saturation. Roll control and induced roll in high performance missiles. Radomes and their effects on missile control. Adaptive autopilots. Rolling airframe missiles

    

4. Exoatmospheric Missiles for Ballistic Missile Defense. Exoatmospheric missile autopilots, propulsion and attitude control. Pulse width modulation. Exo-atmospheric missile autopilots. Limit cycles.

    

5. Missile Seekers. Seeker types and operation for endo- and exo-atmospheric missiles. Passive, active and semi active missile guidance. Radar basics and radar seekers. Passive sensing basics and passive seekers. Scanning seekers and focal plane arrays. Seeker comparisons and tradeoffs for different missions. Signal processing and noise reduction.

    

6. Missile Guidance. Boost and midcourse guidance. Zero effort miss. Proportional navigation and augmented proportional navigation. Biased proportional navigation. Predictive guidance. Optimum homing guidance. Guidance filters. Homing guidance examples and simulation results. Miss distance comparisons with different homing guidance laws. Sources of miss and miss reduction. Beam rider, pure pursuit, and deviated pursuit guidance.

    

7. Simulation and its applications. Current simulation capabilities and future trends. Hardware in the loop. Types of missile testing and their uses, advantages and disadvantages of testing alternatives.