Sidewinder - The Weapon That Changed Air Combat
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- Опубліковано 9 тра 2021
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Sometimes the origins of the most successful inventions belie the life they go on to have and this was the same for the weapon that changed aerial combat, the Sidewinder AIM-9.
This is the story of the project that was killed off once by the infighting within the US Navy and kept alive by the engineers that created it until it proved itself against the competition.
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Written, Researched and Presented by Paul Shillito
Images and Footage : US DoD, USAF, US Navy
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The Sidewinder is a 'grandpa's axe' type weapon. in that almost everything on it has been upgraded or altered since the beginning. 'It's had 5 new handles and 2 new heads, but it's still Grandpa's axe.'
Also known as the ship of Theseus :-)
Or Trigger's Broom
@@MattFenlon or my 1200 bandit. Thinking about it, there is the frame that is original and that's been cut and welded.
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What piece of modern war tech isn’t though? Consider every longstanding vehicle, weapon, gear, etc. Almost all of them which aren’t immediately replaced and enjoys even the slightest longevity will be incrementally upgraded continually until obsolescence. At this point, I would be more interested in seeing a reliable piece of military hardware that *isn’t* more or less ‘grandpa’s axe’.
When I was in the Army in the sixties, we had the Sergeant Missile System. The crews referred to it as the “Civil Servant” missile. It wouldn’t work and you couldn’t fire it.
That’s funny
That is the military that I know. I worked on F106 delta darts that had the inferior missile system referred to in this document. The saving grace is it also had an 8 foot long, 10 inch diameter nuclear Armed ballistic rocket to lob at enemy aircraft. Like horseshoes, all it had to do is get close enough to score points.
Ah yes, the shitting on government institutions and those who work there (except the military, OF COURSE) is long lived - and not less stupid today than it was "in the sixties".
@@xBINARYGODx As someone who worked as a civilian employee under DON for 45 years, I appreciate your comment. All of the people that I knew were hardworking, well educated, and conscientious. And I did know of some people who were fired for various reasons. For what its worth, I respect and admire the US military.
@@xBINARYGODx I served from 1977 until 1985. Onbase civil employees were great. I have friends who still work for the Government and in DC. Our last visit there was great! I'm sure some suck but the ones I met did their Job and did it with a smile. Hell, even the Coffee and Burger none Gov workers were cool! Go to Paris if you want to meet employees who suck!
When your missile only needs a flashlight and a meter stick to do a function check, I'd say it's pretty damn simple, and along with being intended to be in service for likely 100+ years, pretty damn reliable.
It's gone through quite a bit of upgrades and tunes, but the principle has stayed the same ever sense inseption.
This reminds of a land speed record holding pickup, incidentally called Sidewinder.
All the other vehicles going for the record were towed in on a trailer.
The Sidewinder, a Dodge Dakota with a Cummins Diesel hot rodded by Banks, showed up pulling a trailer.
They unhooked the trailer, swapped the street tires for racing slicks and were ready to go.
the m1911 of the missiles
The Russian MiG pilot who got a sidewinder stuck in its fuselage without exploding was a lucky SOB. Due to its relative simplicity it was fairly easy to reverse engineer it by the Russians, talk about a rare find. ;)
Not to mention a right squirrelly nut... The antics at the end there were impressive
What's super cool about the Sidewinder is you can slap it onto almost anything. Super Tucanos can carry the Sidewinder. That's a single turboprop counter insurgency aircraft. The idea of a propeller plane armed with heat seeking missiles is pretty neat.
@@fella704 what kind of ducks are you hunting?
@@MastaChiefa99 All of them.
It can also be carried by attack helicopters such as the Apache and Viper.
It can also be mounted on M113 for self defense.
Ya it slammed into a MIG in the Korean war and failed to detonate. Just imagine the luck of that MIG pilot. lol
Being the first practical self-guided "fire & forget" missile, the Sidewinder inadvertently became the first robotic system to contravene all three of Isaac Asimov's Laws of Robotics.
Asimov's rules were meant to be breaken in his books
@@Fede_uyz seems like most people watched that awful film "I, robot" instead of actually reading the book.
@@switchtheflip9422 no, the rules were meant for asimov to break them later
@@Fede_uyz My point is that the current heated debate over the dangers of AI and robot drones is human society's appallingly slow reaction to the reality that robots have been tasked to kill people since at least the 1950s.
@@Fede_uyz no, the book shows that the rules were flawed.
It always amazes me - these guys often accomplished these engineering marvels with slide rules and similar technology
One thing people often don't realise is that engineering teams are much much smaller today than they used to be. 100 people's work is now often done by 15 people today.
One side effect of this is how the core deliverables always get done. But all those extra brains aren't available to solve things.
@@TerryTerius lmfao funny enough i got personal experience. Our group in our robotics shop class litterally suffered the same shit.
We had a simple goal of just having our robot do the most tasks in the play field. But our team was massive, and everyone wanted to do the same thing. As a result no one changed the base lego robot, and had to face off with one of the most limited robots in our school competition.
Meanwhile, a group from another school just had 2 people in it, and ended up winning and had the most versatile robot.
All you need is a very intelligent creative mind. Not computers.
@@kiuk_kiks Yup. The Computer or the slide rule and paper are just tools to enable the creative mind to work.
Dont forget calculators
The most interesting aspect of the Sidewinder is IMHO the seeker algorithm. The control surfaces actuate to undo any movement of the target location measured on the seeker head. This results in the missile maintaining a constant bearing to the target which, as any navy man would know, guarantees an eventual collision. This is called Proportional Navigation. Very simple, very effective.
Yes. But since the initial version of the AIM -9 had no computer onboard, the control is better described as a negative feedback system, which use the gyro as a reference and compare the seeker output while zeroing it by adjusting the trajectory controlling the rocket vanes at the back...
All early versions, through at least the G model as I recall, were proportional guidance only which does NOT result in a constant bearing solution. It results, instead, in constant corrections to offset error and resulting overcorrection, then correction, etc, etc, giving the missile flight a snaking path and resulting in it's name "Sidewinder".
I know because I'm an F-4 era USMC fighter pilot with an AIM-9 drone kill (also an AIM-7 Sparrow drone kill). Both good enough to reward myself with a beer at a following happy hour.😁
@@rayoflight62 The guidance for every 'Winder from day one was by a computer, however rudimentary it would be considered today. There is no gyro in the seeker, merely a measurement of the seeker off-boresight angle generating a proportional error signal to that 'computer'. That signal was processed to drive the canards for guidance, no rocket vanes or any other control at the aft end of the missile.
You should not post what you can't verify as fact.
@@tedhammond3631 There was actually a gyro of sorts: a Cassegrain telescopic mirror system rotated initially about the centreline of the missile airframe. In early prototypes it used a unique spherical bearing system to allow full pitch & yaw movement of the scan head without need for traditional gimbals.
So what you’re saying the missile knows where it is because it knows where it isn’t
Despite all the changes made in it - The Sidewinder is still basically the same as it was it began: a 5 inch diameter tube stuffed with best available technology. The one big advantage of The Sidewinder - it basically carries its’ own Fire Control with it. When the seeker head acquires the target - it sends a signal to the pilot’s headphones in the form of a growling noise - which turned into a high pitched whine when locked on.
The missile letting the pilot know that the enemy won’t escape alive lol
If I understand you correctly, the seeker head already actively sought for a suitable target when the missile was still attached to the aircraft? Where did it get its power in that environment, as the gas generator wouldn't be running, yet? Are there power lines/connectors in the attachment of the missile so it can be powered by the aircraft?
I worked on the AIM-9 for 23 years. When I retired in 1996, the L and M were the newest. Personally, I think it's a piece of military art and will be around for years ahead. It's compact and deadly.
Great video, thanks.
awesome
I think a German company still makes the L version. My country bought some as we only had the B versions.
How about an ai version ? It needs a Npu to distinguish the difference between flare and the plane engine.
@@ps3301 AIM-9X is plenty advanced. Look into 'HOBS', and extrapolate a little about what that requires, how you would have to target lock with a missile which is inside an internal weapons bay, and what it means capability-wise. High+low wavelength IR helps differentiate planes from flares, and inertial modeling helps really zero things in.
@@shaider1982 Only upgrade and support of the L-1 variant which is used also in Hungary.
Kudos to the original engineers who didn't let the project go to waste. This kind of thinking is what distinguishes great thinkers from the rest.
Yup, they are long gone, never to be seen again! Our current crop of smart phone engineers couldn't engineer themselves out of a wet bag, NASA engineers aside. However NASA is busily diluting their engineering pool with PC liberal studies engineers who will use their pronouns correctly but little else!
@Will.J Doubtful. Along with a list of continuing atrocities a mile long, and probably continued world war in conflict with their former allies, Japan. They had fundimentally different idealogies, and mainly had an alliance out of convenience.
... I dont think that world would be as positive as you seem to think.
LOL. How romantic you make it sound. Engineers, just like everyone else, are just trying to keep their jobs, so you fight on proposals to win. You put in long hours to put out a better product, or simply meet schedule. It was nothing more than economics, not great thinking and not letting it go to waste.
@@peterhaan9068 The most unfortunate part about the current crop that I've seen is that the companies laid off the experienced engineers before they could pass along their corporate memories and lessons learned. The young ones I saw "don't even know what they don't know", and I've seen them proudly publicize "solutions" to problems they've solved that I would have been embarrassed to admit I made in the first place! Very sad, but that's what happens when Finance starts running Engineering companies.
@@peterhaan9068 Yup all the engineers now suck. Oh except the ones working for Rocketlab, SpaceX, and Lockheed Martin (who recently flew a scram jet for darpa that actually worked finally), the people making the most advanced processor architectures of all time making all of this possible. Just because it wasn't developed using a slide rule doesn't mean it isn't good.
We got teams half the size doing things that NASA couldn't dream of. Go watch a video of the two space x rockets landing at the same time from orbit, on what is essentially a helicopter pad. You got no clue what our engineers are capable of.
The prosthetics Neuralink enables, the advancements from Google Deep Mind and Open Ai that are making things smarter than we are currently. Unless you don't consider software engineers as engineers.
In that case check out the quantum computers we made, or the st40 tokamak experimental fusion reactor. Things that you couldn't imagine in the past. We got significantly better, you just closed your eyes and remembered the worst examples of today and compared them to the best of the past.
I heard an interesting story about the missile Soviets got their hands on. That particular Sidewinder was filled with epoxy resin and engineers have trouble with disassembling it without damaging it, so they gathered talented bone carvers across the country to painstakingly clean all inner components from resin.
The inert space around the electronics was filled with a product called "ecojell". Similar to silicon rubber.
Classic communists lol. Would rather painstakingly steal equipment to copy than just make their own damn missiles
As a young chemical engineer, my father worked on refining the propellant for both the Sidewinder and the Sparrow in the 1960s. He was a civilian employee of the United States Navy, and was working for NAVSTIC (Naval Scientific and Technical Intelligence Center).
What incredible work! I'm very envious of your father and we could only hope to be spending time participating in something so revolutionary. Was he educated at a big uni?
It really goes to show how effective the design was that the Sidewinder still has a strong presence today.
It's weird, but a lot of good projects start like this, underrated.
Yeah. We know. Thanks for stating the obvious.
@@Kabup2 So true. But that can help because no ones expecting to much from you. And it can make the big reveal more spectacular.
A case of Keep It Simple Stupid basically
Even the name's on point
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Yes, an awesome shirt here!
He arose early in the morning to pick it out
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You're not alone my friend
Yeah, iirc Madcap used to actually sponsor him. I'm not sure what he wears in between videos, but I wish I could dress like his videos ever day.
The sidewinder is such an elegantly simple yet effective killing machine. The way it frags is one of my favorite pieces of engineering. While other missile designers were mucking about with traditional frag - ball bearings, shrapnel, etc - which is surprisingly difficult to implement in a way where the target would actually be hit instead of flying through a "gap" in the frag, the sidewinder uses an elegantly simple design - a "cylinder" of steel rods that are welded together at alternating ends (so 1 rod would have it's tail connected to another rod's tail, and that other rod would have it's nose connected to the next rod's nose, which has it's tail connected to the next rod's tail, and so on), with an explosive charge running down the center. So when the missile proximity fuses, those rods "scissor" out and create a large, expanding circle 360 degrees around the missile which slices through the target aircraft, and doesn't break apart/have "gaps" in it until it has reached it's maximum diameter.
That's really cool.
Sounds kinda spooky !!
Used. Past tense. Only the very first generation used rods. All other later variations used conventional abs traditional frag. :)
You won't find his name in any annals, but my grandfather, Ralph Hough, managed the developmental machine shop on the base at China Lake, working with engineers to develop prototypes that worked with the technology of the day -- including the Sidewinder. When he retired they made a detailed scale model for him. No idea what happened to it.
Look for that as hard as you can. Your grandad sounds great.
do a spell check please.
They have a cut-away of a sidewinder at the Air Force Armament Museum in Florida, where you can see the internal parts and physically move the front sensor like it is tracking something, and see how it is connected to the ailerons and moves them as it is tracking. It is such a clean simple design that worked!
Love that museum
Did they remove the fuse?
@@archae108
I would imagine the fuse and explosives would be replaced by inert components instead.
@@merlinious01 Good
@@archae108 No, It stayed in to kill anyone who's stupid enough to bump it.
I read the guiding maxim for the design of the Sidewinder was something like: The electrical complexity of a refrigerator and the mechnical complexity of a sliderule.
"... and the mechanical complexity of a sliderule ...". And they actually used sliderules while doing the work!
@@GraemePayne1967Marine I used my slide rule (Post Versalog) professionally for a number of years. If you know what you're doing, they are quite useful.
@@charlessmith6412 My grandfather could work out a delta-V on his slide rule faster than I can punch the formula into a calculator.
@@muninrob Before graduating in 1970 (BSEE), I was fairly proficient with a slide rule. But now I barely know how to use one. I blame my own laziness and reliance on calculators.
In the corner of the China Lake museum is a seeker with Cryllic on it. The NOTS team got a Soviet copy of the Sidewinder, reversed engineered that, and improved on their own design based on the Soviet's improvements.
Is it public what the improvements were? That is fascinating.
@@airthrowDBT it is now. They are moving the museum off the base and have half of if completed. I was there in the summer. It's in Ridgecrest, CA. It's a small museum, but there's lots of need stuff in it.
Yep. Grew up there. 100% correct. There's lots more about it of course.
I was stationed there over 40 years ago. Saw things I could never tell anyone. To this day I see "new" weapons that are the product of our efforts
As you walk down the 2nd floor hallway of our hanger where the offices were I saw wonderful historical photos. Most people just walked past but I stopped and read them all. there is no way to describe the awe I felt of how incredible it all was. We were building the future.
My dad dedicated his life to this missile. Unfortunately he's no longer with us, but I know he really enjoyed "blowing shit up" as he would say lol! because he worked in the warhead department lol. Good old Ridgecrest and China Lake... This is a great video with the actual facts about the creators of the missile with footage to back it up. Teamwork and being the best is what these guys did!! Excellent video!
I grew up in Ridgecrest! Well, till I was seven, then we moved to southern Utah. It's great to read your story! Have a great day!
A childhood friend of mine worked for NavAir China Lake as an engineer for a few years. She eventually left the job because she couldn't stand the geographic isolation. But it sounded like she did get her share of "blowing shit up" while there.
I was a Physicist in the Sensors and Platforms branch (code 3941) in the 80's and early 90's at China Lake. I still love "blowing shit up"!
Too bad he didn't know about islam.
The anti-radiation variant is called the SideARM or “Sidewinder Anti-Radiation Missile.” Thus, this is one of the only examples where a dad joke became an official military designation
I speculate that the XP-55 Ascender is also an... ascended dad joke.
(It was called the “ass ender” because of the pusher design.)
@@Justanotherconsumer Wait until you hear about the Type 57 Su Gon
The dad joke has hit the big time.
Actually I did read a couple of weeks ago that, though the dad joke has a certain groan factor to it, it has been shown that it helps children understand how words work
Hahaha. I didn't know the ARM standed for something. Very good.
Don't know if this is in the same category, but another classic is on MRE heaters, where you're instructed to lean it against a "rock or something". When they were coming up with the instructions and were wondering what to put in the diagram someone said "I don't know, let's make it a rock or something". So they wrote down "rock or something" and it stuck :)
one thing that bugs me about Top Gun is that when they were locking onto other aircraft with a sidewinder they made a ' beep beep beep ' noise , in fact the real noise a sidewinder made when locking on was a growl that got louder
i love the sidewinder growl lmao. i used to play ace combat 4 a lot as a kid and loved using them
The newest version drones out a really loud, stereotypically gay, "Yoooooohoooooo!"
@@rafetizer I heard this in Slim Pickens then a seductive "Yoooooooo-hooooo~"
@@phantomaviator1318 LOL!! 👍
@@soulsphere9242 no, the growl is when it detects a heat source and the stronger the source louder the growl. I spent 20 years of my life maintaining the Weapons Control System of F4 aircraft. That's radar, Missile firing, weapons release, gun sight. It's a 11 month tech school. I have ran hundreds of Sparrow, Falcon and Sidewinder tests. Falcon firing system had about 40 relays for each station that had to energize in a specific order. And had 2 test sets MITS and MATS. I have used a flashlight to test a sidewinder.
Many years ago, a Swiss high-technology and precision mechanics company was the only 3rd-party in the world that was licensed to build the sidewinder seeker heads for the OEM, and it built hundreds of them. They were a fabulous piece of precision engineering, especially the motorized sun shield inside the glas dome that would search for and block the sun, so the seeker head IR sensor could focus on detecting the infrared signature of the engine of the aircraft it was designed to destroy.
How does it work when the sun, the enemy aircraft and the sidewinder are all aligned on the same straight?
My step dad (rip) worked on this program and many others at China Lake. He had several patents on some of the items on the sidewinder. He also came up with the ASROC and a submarine launching system for the Harpoon. As a kid growing up with him as my dad, I never knew any of this till he passed away in 1994.
are u guys rich ? ahhah
"Generates it's own power" - i never really thought about it, i would've guessed it just having some sort of battery, and those fin stabilisers - very neat!
Yeah, loved that fin stabilisation. Gyroscopic effect done so cheaply.
Guess they should have had a 'failsafe' sytem installed, to auto-detonate after launch after so many seconds, then the 'capture by stuck in plane' episode would never have happened and given them a longer time with an edge on the 'enemy'. But, what were the odds? As it was, the 'enemy' would have eventually collected enough debris pieces to come up with their own design. Just not so swiftly.
They’re not quite so simple anymore. I’ve spoken with some engineers working on the X series and the inertial sensing equipment used now is quite complex and expensive. The lack of simplicity caused some problems with implementation onto the F22. The missile swings out after arming and prior to deployment on the F22, but this caused a lot of error in the internal measurement unit which was designed for straight launch. It actually took several design changes and a whole new variant for the AIM 9x to be able to be fired off of the moving launch system. Prior to the updates, only an older and simpler version could be used.
@@David-yo5ws Sure I read / saw somewhere that the soviets stole one from an airbase and drove out with it in a car before posting it back to the motherland. A quick google search and here you go en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manfred_Ramminger
@@adamhale6672 this is also one of the big reasons they opted out if carrying the 9x internally on the F-35.
Pretty sure he said "generated its own power", not "generated it's own power".
AIM-9: service to the 2050's
B-52: welcome to the club!
All I can think of when I saw that was a B-52 dogfighting and using AIM-9's
@@Someguy0013 AIM-9s on the wings and in the belly. Try dodge them all.
@@Joshua_N-A Laughs in Old Dog.
Get in Muck, we're bombing Russian Space lasers.
@@Joshua_N-A lmao that would be insane
@@jacobblair6181 the sound of beeping alarm will give them PTSD.
Imagine today telling your boss you are gonna use company equipment and time for the next 5 years working on something they told you not to, you would fly out of the window in the next 5 secs. People just had good quality of life and work back in those days that is increasingly rare to find nowadays.
China Lake, CA: A thousand mad geniuses surrounded by 5000 methheads.
If the team really was thrown out the window and still succeeded with the project, they would probably call it The Defenestrator.
You didnt get it right : the time they took was from their FREE TIME. Not from "company time". What employee would stay at work for 4 hours overtime just to work on a side-project now? And they dont for a good point : there is barely any (real) recognition of your (hard) work anymore, any incentive, any bonus, and anything you might come up with will be "stolen" by the company which will take all benefit from your ideas and work.
The guy at least received 25.000$ - with the value it meant back then.
@@justalonesoul5825 Yes,, but at a time when the idea of noncompat agreements or nondisclosure agreements meant noting. They were ALL working for AMERICA and the possiblity of that not being the case didn't even enter into it. They KNEW 100% that the "free time" was still well spent that it was helping the USA.
@@justalonesoul5825 i'd like to add to that that back then people usualy didnt work a 40+ week. at least if my local old people are to be believed
I'm a USMC vet, aviation ordinance. I've loaded tons of sidewinders back during the gulf war. They are light enough they can be loaded on as "just in case" weapons on AV-8B's. Pretty easy to load and low maintenance. Although the bottle of nitrogen to cool the seeker head can be a tad unnerving to use the fire time.
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I know right, 1 minute 55 in and the content is just beginning, wowwwwww ...
This is a story I never would have heard of anywhere else, thank you for doing this research and producing this video
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I'll always remember doing '20 flight' maintenance on the AIM-9. I used to remember all the bolt torque specs and the psi for the argon cans, but that was 20 years ago.
Back in the late '80s, Hill AFB wanted a dummy Sidewinder to use as practice on the F-16, as the actual Sidewinders have a limited flight hour window use. The company I worked for managed to get the contract to make the first ones for the AF. Over the course of the program, my name appeared on many of the ECOs that we had to generate to improve the dummy. Fun project - learned tons back then.
My father went to China lake many times in the 60s. It was much later that I learned he was working on the sidewinder.
In the words of Ron Burgundy, “I don’t believe you.”
I was wondering if anyone was really inside the red striped airplanes.
Our father worked on the sidewinder and our family lived in wherry housing just off base. That place was full of secrecy and lore like area 51.
Always wanted to connect with school friends but left and joined the navy. So many of my crazy friends did crazy things out there making me feel that area (NOTS) China lake was jinksed and seldom returned to visit my past on relatives.
My father went to get smokes in the 80's. He's likely working on something super top secret because no one has heard from him.
My father was a model maker machinist at Aims lab. Most families never knew what their parents were making. Such pride and patriotism. I can remember when pres Kennedy came to visit the base...what a parade and sensation that day.
The growl of the sidewinder is simply Iconic.
"I don't got tone!!!!!!"
Interesting fact from the development of the sidewinder. Originally, the missile had a gauge, a simple amp meter that showed how good of a signal the missile was getting. It was the test pilot of the program that suggested they rig it to a sound instead, so the pilot didn't have to look inside the cockpit to see if the missile was locked on or not. That pilot was Wally Schirra, better known for being a Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo Astronaut.
I grew up right across the street from China Lake NOTS. Ridgecrest, California to be precise. The family moved to southern Utah in 1970. I've known for a long time that the AIM-9 missile was developed and made operational on base. We weren't a military family, it just so happened that my parents chose that place for their early days. Mom was born in LA at Orange County General Hospital. I was born in Lonepine, CA. Just some useless trivia. Have a great day everyone. Always, Andy
As a kid growing up in the 60's a few miles from NAS Point Mugu we always went to the big "Space Fair" air shows they had and one of the many highlights was watching the Sidewinder live firings that would streak down the flight line in front of the grandstands and impacting a flare that was floating down by parachute near the beach at the end of the runway!
You know someone is about to make history, when cut out of money, he continue the project on their own free time and resources.
Or when the project hasn't even been approved...but is started anyway by a company with a good grasp on reality..as with the Hawker company developing the Hurricane BEFORE getting an Air Ministry contract for it...
He must have had considerable pull with the right peope. Doing a side project against the direction of your supervisors is a great way to lose a job.
You only hear about the good ones. I’m sure more than a few have resulted in bankruptcy and heaps of trash.
The Falcon missile is an interesting animal. According to F-106 pilot Bruce Gordon (check out his channel), the Falcon is a fine enough weapon when paired up with the correct radar and fire control system on the F-106. The missile and aircraft were specifically designed to work together. Putting the missile on an F-4 Phantom sets it up for failure since the F-4's avionics was built more for the Sparrow. Since the F-106 never saw combat, we'll never know if the Falcon was actually a good missile or not. Similar tale for the Falcon's successor, the Phoenix, which was specifically built to work with the F-14. Only a small number of those were known to been fired in combat and their record was not good, but with a sample size of 2 or 3 it's hard to draw a conclusion. Both the Falcon and the Phoenix performed very well in training shots with their complimentary aircraft. Gordon shot down a BOMARC missile in a head-on supersonic pass with his F-106/Falcon.
The Pheonix was an excellent, battle tested weapon. While we did not do much with it, The Iranians devastated Iraq with it. It's believed they killed as many as 160 aircraft with the F-14 and Pheonix. In fact, it is believed that the Iraqi experience fighting against Iranian F-14's are why they ran for the hills during Desert Storm every time an F-14 lit up it's radar.
The AIM-47 version kinda removed any & all "hit probability" concerns ;)
@@Elthenar Honestly they ran for the hills vs any US aircraft. The amount of ECM over Iraq in DS was such that they rarely had any functional sensors (apart from fuzz busters which were in a constant state of going off).
The sparrow was just as bad on the F4 during Vietnam...
@@kathrynck They ran from muuuuuuuuuuch further distance when they detected F14 radars..
What a great engineering the Sidewinder is, simply because its so simple! And the hardest thing in engineering is to make something simple
I remember my dad worked on the Sidewinder project in the early 60's. Trips to China Lake. One of his favorite projects. Great air-air missile with a long legacy.
I get a nostalgic feeling by looking at these photos and videos from 60s an 80s. I don't know why ... I was born in 1999...
Probably the cultural setting and the pure strength of aesthetics of the photos
@@blinimationstudios1717 yes
Dang... really hope you can re-uploaded the top fuel dragster video with the copyright stuff removed or changed. That was one of your most fascinating yet.
Waiting on the complainant to reply to sort it out but it will be back one way or another.
@@CuriousDroid oh yes... im not even really into that stuff and i loved it. I am so glad i watched it before it was blocked. Really love this channel Droid. Amazing work. :D.
It was blocked? I'm getting very upset with this policy.
@@CuriousDroid ehh Mr. Shillito! A heads up my friend, a typo in the description... something like "killed off by the US navy, kept alive but (instead of "by") the engineers" or something of the sort. Just trying to help man. =)
@@Kabup2 I'm just hearing form this too. They need to quit pandering to big corporations who flag anything in their sights, and boost channels like CD that are a value adder, not another mind numbing ticktock'er zombie.
Many years ago I assisted in the conversion of some aircraft to carry this missile. I am proud to say it made a major difference!
Hey Curious, where did you get the footage at 5:18 Our museum has two inert falcons one in remarkable condition the other was quite corroded, on disassembly, we found some of the components still inside. The board that is being panned at that time stamp, is incomplete and Id like to see the full footage and compare it to whats missing in ours.
Did he ever get back to you?
@@Shinzon23 If he did it would have shown right here. He doesn't have time to respond, he's got a million followers.
I had no idea the sidewinder was as old as it is. The fact that it's still in use today by the U.S. must be a testament to it's design.
Seems that the secret to its success was the engineers following the KISS principle relentlessly.
Sadly, that principle seems lost on modern engineers, who seem bound and determined to make everything as complex as possible. I was a Marine Corps aircraft mechanic and loved working on the A-4 Skyhawk, Ed Heinemann's real-life demonstration of the KISS principle.
The F-35 follows the opposite principle. A trillion bucks for a plane that can barely fly - sometimes.
@@cybervigilante it certainly does seem that way. Part of it is the multi-service aspect with the A B C variants that were supposed to save on development and support costs. I suspect the other aspect is a certain amount of scope creep and possibly specifications that work against each other.
I mean it was still incredibly advanced, especially some of the gyro-based systems it used - they just chose the right path and compared to the other programs, seemed incredibly basic but also logical. Like why wouldn't you just "do it this way" automatically?
@@cybervigilante This is where people don't understand what the hell they're talking about. The F-35 is literally the KISS version of the JSF competition. Look at the X-32 for comparison. Boeing didn't care how complex the X-32 was, just so long as they could offer it cheaper than the competition. The F-35 looks the way it does because it specifically chose a conservative, simpler design.
Also the F-35 has a high MCR than the F-16 right now, so uh... barely fly is a bit off the mark.
My great grandfather worked on this project held the patent for the timer and others for the military during the war,went back to work for Baldwin Piano after war ended.I heard all kinds of stories growing up.He flew himself everywhere till his 80s,great video.
This video really opened my eyes. My father, after serving in the US Navy from 1946 to 1948 worked on a ship as an electronics engineer. After the service, he went to Lockheed where he worked on missile guidance systems. From there he worked for Sanders Assoc, in the 60's and early 70s, and then back to Lockheed when they bought Sanders out.
Maybe this is common knowledge... but I was surprised that you never mentioned what a "sidewinder" is. It's a colloquial name for horned rattlesnakes (venomous pit vipers) in the southwestern US. They evolved a curious sideways locomotion for traversing sand and are quite fast, up to 18 mph (29 kph).
I was told it was because pit vipers hunt in the dark by detecting heat with those pits.
Yep. You are correct on both accounts. The mojave green species is specific to the valley there
It's a rare case of a perfect name. A heat-seeking missile known for taking a snaky trajectory is named after a heat-sensing predatory snake that gyrates along the sand.
I loved working with the Sidewinder, when I was in the Navy. Great video!
Me too, but in the air force.
I was a weapons loader on F16s in the Air Force. This is definitely a great weapon, especially with the X's out now.
IYAAYAS
Amazing!!! As I say at some point, either during, or after, almost EVERY single new Curious Droid video I watch, “Well, I didn’t know that/I had no idea.......” etc., came out again at one or more points today. Fantastic work, Sir!!!
This is one of the best Docuseries going, thanks for all you put in matey, it's appreciated!
"damn it, we need $300,000 more to complete the testing...."
"all that's left is the academic scholarships, oh there's an educator fund for $500,000 if it can teach other countries about our culture"
"well, the missile checks out on all those eligibility"
If memory serves, one of the principal objections to the early Sidewinder was that it required liquid nitrogen to operate the target heat detector system which meant it was very time limited beyond a quick up and shoot, then back down mission like defending Taiwan back in the day. Some time later a solid state module was apparently created that overcame this problem.
IIRC they needed coolant gas to cool the seeker head, making heat stand out more and allowing them to lock/track the source. There's different ways it was done, and one is the coolant was stored in the aircraft in individual tanks/canisters that were connected to each missile. This meant once you went "hot" to attempt a lock, you only had about 10s before the coolant ran out and that missile was dead, so you had to switch to another one.
The AF and Navy used different coolant systems, and different AIM-9 models until they standardized later. So they're not all the same, and they got rid of the need for coolant at different times. This is why not all the older AIM-9s after the "B" can be used universally, they use different systems depending on whether they're "Air Force" or "Navy" configured missiles. For instance the AIM-9C, 9D, and 9G are US Navy missiles, while the AIM-9E and 9J are US Air Force missiles. The AF really tried to make the AIM-4 "Falcon" a thing but it just couldn't compare, because of that just like when they made it most breakthroughs upgrading the AIM-9 came from the Navy.
(Also the AIM-9C is a pretty unique Sidewinder as its the only one that's not an IR missile (Heat Seeker). They're actually modified to be SARH (RADAR Guided) missiles like the AIM-7 Sparrow, because the Sparrow was too big for the Navys F-8 fighter but they still wanted a Radar missile).
The FIM-92 "Stinger" MANPAD, also has this problem for those that didn't know. There's a coolant cartridge in the grip needed to cool the seeker, and once you go hot you've only got 7-10s before it runs out and you need a new one.
This was never really fixed because new ones haven't been made since the early 2000's and they were supposed to be replaced by a new system soon anyways, however the war in Ukraine forced them to start assembling more from remaining parts and keep it in service. For context, the missile is so old and close to being phased out that some components literally don't exist anymore. So once existing stock runs out more can't be made, which is why they're currently redesigning the Stinger so they can switch to new parts that're still made.
Last fact: Modern IR missiles like the AIM-9L, 9X, R-60M, and later Stingers are all-aspect meaning they can lock, launch, and track from any angle of the target, yet they're still Heat Seekers. How then you might ask, if they can't see the hot engine or exhaust? Modern seekers are so sensitive, they can lock on to the heat created by the friction of the plane moving through the air.
I was in aviation ordinance school in the Navy in 1964 and learned how the Sidewinder worked. We were amazed how sensitive the sensor in the nose was. You could activate the missles guidance system by holding a flashlight in front of it.
This is a truly one of the greatest visual representations you can get in a history report
Great work Curious Driod
We used to strap these on our bikes when we were kids and take out all the other rival kids with them it was a total hoot. Even took out some of the neighbors cars. But I guess with the nanny state now kids can't have fun like that anymore so I just count my blessings I wasn't born too late to have some good old fashioned fun & therefore a decent childhood.
comment etiqute
Yeah, the good old days.
Yeah, right. This is the problem with anyone with a phone being able to comment. Just strap close to a couple hundred pounds to each handlebar eh? How's that singe on your face from the rocket motor blasting you?
@@climberbob1 You're probably too young to know about this but bicycles were built far sturdier in my day. Entirely unlike the paper-thin dreck they pump out now. Sure, they were heavier but they could handle a bit of extra weight too!
I worked for John M owner of Chappell Ind. He innovated the fin and nozzle assembly as well as contributing to the design of the guidance system 7:38 for the sidewinder. At 7:48 John was a major contributar to the design. I think he said they made the nozzle for $3.75. In his later years we only made one component.
He also made the Chappell land to air system. He said that he never got a contract. He did make several working prototypes to demonstrate the system.
Amazing guy to work for, he finally retired at 82.
AIM-9 X has a crazy engagement angle, its almost 90 degrees and is very agile. You can try it in DCS World in the F-18 for example and you can compare it with the AIM-9 B which is mostly used in the F-5, which has only a 15 - 20 degrees engagement angle, less range and less agile.
A great video, and the right length!
I don't need an hour long documentary on a Sidewinder, I also don't want 3 minutes of nothing, this was the perfect length.
'Bout damn time someone celebrated the AIM-9!
That was a fascinating story, I honestly learned a lot.
Never spent much time thinking/learning about missiles, but now I'm diving down that rabbit hole, big time.
(Also, this video came up as a random suggestion. I enjoyed it, subbed to Droid and went looking for more to learn. The algorithm scares the hell out of me some times...)
Thank you for this documentary, sir.
Fascinating story. A good David vs Goliath tale never gets old! Awesome video a usual Paul!
These videos have the best production and are insanely interesting. My only gripe is that they aren't long enough and we need more of them lol... Great content guys!!! 🤘🏻🙃🙂🤘🏻
An amazingly simple and effective weapon. In the late 60's I worked on developing the Chapparal, which was a ground based system which utilized the sidewinder for defense against low flying ground attack aircraft.
An excellent presentation. I have two stories.
1. A friend who was a Navy avionics technician was climbing the ladder to the cockpit of an A-7 when he noticed a movement in the corner of an eye. It was the uncovered head of a Sidewinder, tracking sunlight reflected from his tool belt! He froze and started hollering for an ordnance person to get there and safe that @$&#?! weapon!
2. When I was in the Air Force heard about a B-52 that retuned from a mission over North Vietnam with an unexploded missile sticking through it's vertical tail. It looked very much like a Sidewinder but all of the markings were in Russian After it was safely removed, the missile techs put the seeker head on their Sidewinder test bench and ran it through all the tests. It Passed!
Always a good day when there’s some new content from this channel
NAVAIRSYSCOM CHLK WEAPONS DIVISION REPRESENT!!
Thank you Curious Droid for doing this video! It literally hits home for me!
I love that in this super digitalized era there's still a relic from the 60's in service today with plans for another 35yrs.
K.I.S.S. at its finest. No matter how technical your new gadgets are, you can't beat something that just WORKS.
(And yes, I AM aware that the sidewinder of today probably has very little in common with the original design aside from it's core functionality and name. But iterative improvements are inevitable and absolutely necessary as long as they actually work.)
Jolly good overview, mate! Thanks!
This video should really get more praise, it is very well done and interesting
stuff like this makes me think of one of those sci fi stories where some super advanced space civilization looks at our stuff and scoffs at them for being "primitive tools" but we turn around and blast them with it anyway
Thank you for this. Well done.
Recently, I've been watching the UA-cam channel, "Not A Pound For Air To Ground". He goes into detail about how difficult it was to actually get a hit with a Falcon missile from early in the Cold War, right into the Vietnam War. It's really quite fascinating.
The problem with the Falcon, so they said, was that it just didn't want to hurt anybody.
This is the first breakdown I've ever seen of this iconic weapon. Thanks for putting this together!
There’s a pretty good channel called military history in a minute that does just what it says on the tin, and they’ve done a minute and a half video on it to give you an overview of it :)
Had no idea its roots were that old, certainly helped us out in the Falklands a few years back great design KISS principle in action.
By few years back do you mean 40 years?
@@tarunbasra8230 More like 39 but who's counting 😉.
The US Army also used the Sidewinder missile as a part of its air defense by launching it from its Chaparral Air Defense System. It was used as a surface-to-air configuration defensive sytem in coordination with the Vulcan and Redeye systems.
I never leave home without having some of those under my wings - Paul, thank you, very interesting topic and brilliantly presented!
Terrific video on an outstanding weapon. Great stuff!
Never boring, always entertaining and love the shirts!!!
My Dad worked at China Lake beginning in 52’. We used to read the Rocketeer all the time. When I grew up I got a job there in 1980 as a draftsman. I’ve walked in front of an AIM-9M seeker head with a flashlight, and I’ve heard the growl up close!
Although we use mostly AIM-120's now, the Navy does keep a stockpile of the older AIM-9's in reserve. I saw a few of them aboard the carrier Harry S. Truman during our combat deployment in support of operations Inherent Resolve and Trident Juncture in 2018.
Aren't AIM-9s still super light weapons of last resort? The newer ones are way more agile than the AMRAAM.
@@fim-43redeye31 They do work, absolutely. They just don't have as advanced onboard systems as the 120.
@@jebbroham1776 Definitely true. I heard the 9X upgrades are supposed to give it similar capability to a 120, apart from range. The 9X Block II has datalink, and the Block III *was* going to have 60% more range in comparison, but they canceled it.
Really one of the few UA-cam content creators I truly click on asap. Love the uploads man!
Millennium 7, Curious Droid, and Dark Skies are the best (in order, based on my own opinion).
My Dad worked on this project. The story goes they decided to go with the project when an Admiral walked into the demo room with a lit cigar and the heat seeking guidance system locked in on him.
Thank you for the history of the Sidewinder keep the work up
Very informative. Thank you!
Great video! I’d love to see a follow up video that delves more into the details of how the sidewinder works.
There are a few vids on here. It is called 'expanding rod' Fascinating how it works.
This shows that military leadership does not always know what the best systems to invest in are to meet their needs. The wrong choices are sometimes made and better options are sometimes suppressed.
Consider our missile capability before WW2. Our military simply never considered a need for a missile program, and only came to realize just how far both Germany and Russia were ahead since their own governments had supported rocketry starting in the schools and going onward since after WW1. Oddly the single most important part of rocketry, liquid fueled and controllable engines, was developed in the US by Robert Goddard, and the military didn't see a need for it. His research was very welcome by foreigners.
Another example is the US Navy's repeated attempts to stop Rickover's research and development of nuclear power for submarines.
The usual, self justification, internal politics and egos. Every arm of the military needs to justify its continued funding and expansion, so it will do whatever it takes to accomplish that, even if it means getting in the way of something that is actually good for the overall military or defence of the country. That’s the fucking stupidity of it. Especially when you’re dealing with men and women who claim that such a thing is their highest priority.
@@stupidburp The US Navy also delayed von Braun because their rocket should be the first and then the Soviets launched Sputnik.
Von Braun was reportedly irate at the time this happened.
@@conors4430 It’s not as bad as it use to be. Pre and Post WW2 the Army and Navy tried to stop the development of an Airforce because they didn’t want resources taken away from them and where in constant rivalry with each other.
Today the branches are much more integrated with each other and a joint force doctrine is now the standard. It along with a continued large standing military no longer has each of them having limited funding as they all need each other to operate.
Interesting video. Thanks for making it!
Nice info and story! Thanks
fascinating topic and great narration as always. nice shirt, too
The Occam’s razor of inflight combat. Simplicity trumps all..
So simple it costs a mere $262.000 per unit
@@NuclearTopSpot
I don't know how the defence industry get away with it! They seem to charge whatever they want (and I'm sure that the politicians don't get anything out of it!😂😂)
The Falcon proves you should always remember Sod Law. If it can go wrong it will go wrong. Especially if there is more that can go wrong.
@@NuclearTopSpot if they didn't let congressmen embezzle money, they'd get shut down and get blacklisted from ever holding a job in the defense industry again
@@oxcart4172 politicians do get things out of it. they give money to contractors to build things in their state
Dude, your videos are awesome!
Keep'em coming.
Very factual and authoritative. Thanks!
The Sidewinder only failed once in this video and it was a massively epic fail because the Soviets got all its tech for free.
But who profited more off the Sidewinder than the Soviets and even the Americans? Nerf.
And, it's actually quite an accomplishment to directly hit the target, as I believe they're normally not that accurate, but use a proximity fuse to detonate the shrapnel- laden warhead when close to the target, which isn't designed to detonate on impact.
It didnt failed... succesfully tracked the mig and stay with him until the MIG landed
Wow that's amazing that the soviets were able to get their hands on a sidewinder missile by one getting stuck in a plane and not detonating
Imagine having to fly an enemy missle back to base. I'd need my brown pants on for the landing.
@@doggo6517 or ditch the plane in a lake with a missile reading "made in china lake"
@@doggo6517 I wanna know who had to remove it 🤣
Always great quality videos, great job man
Superb video. Thank you.