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ST
Mostly aviation special interest in Chinese and Eastern aerospace, just an #AvGeek. Occasionally other stuff.

Aug 26, 2020, 8 tweets

R-77 #Adder & PL-12 #Thunderbolt

China’s quest for indigenous active radar MRAAM started in late 80s task given to 607 Institute (LETRI). PL-12 seeker development took help from Russian company AGAT which developed seekers for R-27/77 MRAAMs & data link from Vympel. 1/8

PL-12 development took place parallel to R-77 which had advantage of USSR industrial capacity with far more experience & sophisticated tech. Collapse of USSR plummeted many of these companies into debt & out of volume production leading to all sorts of funds related issues. 2/8

R-77 didn’t finish its full development, testing & serial production due to collapse of USSR/funding issues. Ukraine inherited much of R&D of R-77 (Izdeliye-170) which is what Chinese probably managed to capitalise. Below is R-77 (Izdeliye-190) 3/8

R-77 (80km) went in serial production by start of 2000s with improved seeker exported to many countries including India with export name RVV-AE. PL-12 (70km) went in serial production after 2002 once LETRI institution achieved breakthrough in seeker & all weather launch. 4/8

There are reportedly 15 versions of R-77, 12 belonging to Izdeliye-190 & 3 to newer R-77-1 (Izdeliye-170-1) export name RVV-SD recently ordered by India. R-77-1 (110km) is still in early years not produced in large numbers as Russian AF/Navy still using older R-27 variants. 5/8

PL-12 has four engagement modes with dual mode (active/passive) seeker
1. On short ranges: Fire & forget mode using its own active seeker from launch
2. Launch to preset point with Inertial guidance system followed by active radar in terminal stage. 6/8

3. It can be launched with mix of command guidance (via datalink), its own inertial guidance before entering the active radar at terminal guidance phase
4. It has a ‘home-on-jam’ mode that allows it to passively track & engage an emitting target. (e.g. Anti-radiation LD-10) 7/8

SD-10 is export name of earlier PL-12 with SD-10A being improved version. PL-12 (SD-10A) doesn’t have range of 100kms rather more like 70-80km with improved seeker & guidance via data link. Its performance is comparable to AIM-120B with some putting it early AIM-120C. Thanks 8/8

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