GRAHAM WARWICK / WASHINGTON DC
Raytheon team locks horns with Boeing/Lockheed
Increment 2 of the US Small Diameter Bomb (SDB) programme could produce an all-new weapon after risk-reduction contracts were awarded to a Boeing/Lockheed Martin team and Raytheon.
Boeing produces the fixed-target Increment 1 SDB, and late last year teamed with Lockheed to propose a derivative of the GPS-guided weapon able to attack moving targets in poor weather conditions at stand-off range. But Raytheon plans to offer a new weapon compatible with the four-round carriage system developed for the 115kg (250lb)-class bomb.
Both bidders have received contracts worth around $145 million for a 42-month risk-reduction phase, which will include flight tests and lead to the selection of one contractor to develop the SDB 2 for fielding, beginning in 2014. The US Air Force and Navy plan to buy up to 12,000 of the weapons at an average cost of $87,000, compared with $30,000 for the SDB 1.
SDB 2 will have a multi-mode seeker allowing classification of its target as a tracked or wheeled vehicle or boat, and a two-way datalink for in-flight target updates and transmission of bomb damage assessment data before impact.
Boeing will modify the SDB 1 airframe and warhead to accommodate a datalink and Lockheed seeker based on tri-mode sensors developed for the Joint Common Missile and SMACM surveilling miniature attack cruise missile demonstrator, says programme manager Dan Jaspering.
Raytheon is designing a new airframe, but basing the seeker on the semi-active laser/uncooled infrared/Ka-band radar sensor in its IPAM loitering munition demonstrator.
“We will have to do tests that Boeing will not necessarily do, and it is a bit of a pacing item, but our airframe will be optimised to attack moving targets,” says the company’s SDB 2 programme manager, Rich Roellig.
The teams will next year select datalinks able to communicate with the aircraft via Link 16 and the ground via UHF. The SDB 2 will initially arm USAF Boeing F-15Es and navy Lockheed F-35C Joint Strike Fighters. “The [Lockheed] F-22 is an objective, not a threshold,” says Jaspering.
Source: Flight International
