Talk:Starstreak missile

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1 1000 mm penetration claim
2 Seastreak
3 Image
4 distances and super L
5 Disadvantages section

[edit] 1000 mm penetration claim

I have removed this from the article. It's clearly nonsense. If a 5 kg tungsten rod APFSDS round can only penetrate 500 mm of RHA - despite travelling at the same speed. There is no way, that a 1.5 kg STEEL dart (with an explosive component as well as tracking electronics) can penetrate twice as much. Also the explosive content would only contribute trivially to any penetration, since the diameter of the dart limits any shaped charge to trivial effects

An optimisitic estimate would be in the region of 100 mm of RHA - but realistically more like 60 mm.

If you want to reinstate this claim please at least WP:CITE sources. Megapixie 05:11, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

On Discovery Channel TV (Weapons of the Future series) the british soldiers and test engineers openly bragged about the high penetration capabilities of Starstreak submunitions. They held up a badly holed plate of rolled steel armour 30 (thirty) millimeters thick. It may be good against helicopters, but even a T-34 tank will laugh it off. 81.0.68.145 19:46, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Seastreak

would this of been like the american RIM-116 Rolling Airframe Missile (RAM) ive been trying to find out information about this system even looking on Hansard were its mentioned but there seems to be very little information about the system.Where is it best to find information about seastreak or has it now been cancelled.Corustar 15:45, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Image

Glad you like my amateurish photo, but the other one wasn't that bad we can probably have both? I'm just so dang upset I didn't snap more pics of the various launcher configurations: a man portable one (two-missiles) as well as others mounted on vehicles... also a video simulator that looked good. --Deon Steyn 13:25, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

The other picture was pretty bad - ISO 3200 in a dark dark room. Plus the missile was a really rough mockup that had one of the submunitions cable tied onto the main body. Your image conveys exactly the same information - with your permission - I might rotate and crop your image. Let me know what you think. Megapixie 13:32, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, go ahead and tweak the picture, I'm not sure what the restriction and methods are for Wikipedia (new file name?). I should actually have take a close up of the nose area with the 3 smaller projectiles. --Deon Steyn 06:41, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

I did the rotation (new image at Image:Starstreak missile- rotated.jpg but to be honest I prefer the diagonal version better. So I've left it as is. Megapixie 23:03, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] distances and super L

The system's maximum range is 5.5K not 7, after that it self destructs.

Super elevation is not used to "push" the system further but used to raise the AU with out losing target. The reason being the missile comes out of the tube and dips. If you don't super L the missile will pile into the ground.

The darts seperate from the "bus" of the missile at 1.5k which is its minimum engagment range.

This system would never be able to engage a side profile fighter jet. As you swing the system to track the aircraft the aiming ring would never keep up. Straight on low flying aircraft and popup heli.

Its also attached in both the LML and the SP role with the ADAD system.

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.211.82.16 (talk • contribs)

Hi, can you provide some sources for the above. The article is currently largely based on information in Jane's Land Based Air Defence. The minimum range is certainly interesting - it seems kind of long for dealing with a hovering helicopter target - you'd probably have trouble spotting a helicopter popping up > 1.5 km away. Also 5.5 km self destruct distance seems short given that it still has a substantial amount of kinetic energy left at that distance. Megapixie 12:57, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Hi megapixie, I fired it in the LML and SP role for 7 years! :-) The sight unit has 4x mag, hence the distance. further than that and you can't see the target. As for the popup heli at 1.5k thats why you have an ADAD and a tactical control with optics along with the operator. The EPRDU gives the DC/tac controller a guide as to where the target is. Trust me those stats are right. The 1.5k is because of the following. The first stage motor ejects the missile and starts to spin the bus, at 110m the first stage motor falls away, a few things happen :-), and the second stage motor is engaged which starts to turn the "bus" at a larger number of Hertz, eventually the darts sheer off the bus because of the energy created by the spinning at about 1.5k. hence the minimum distance. 1 the laser grid only controls the darts, 2 the bus is not explosive. Oh and while i'm at it, the LML is hardly ever carried in the Land Rover, the Army have fitted Pinzgauer FFR's, due to all the kit. We tried it in Land rovers but it was nasty. Javelin was, HVM ain't.

[edit] Disadvantages section

I just removed some of the commentry. The missiles proximity fuze is neither advantage nor disadvantage. A bad triggering of a proximity fuze that detonates a missile out of range of the target is just as bad as a near miss. Additionally there are times that a proximity fuze would detonate a missile further from the target than a contact fuze would turning it into an expensive firework (thus all the interest in doppler proximity fuzes).

The problem with the battlefield smoke, hills, barns, etc. is that with an IR guided missile, you only need to see the target when you launch the missile. The missile then rapidly climbs to gain a panoramic view of the target, any smoke, barns, hills, etc will be far below, and not about to cut the missile's line of sight. With Starstreak, Blowpipe, Javelin if the target moves behind something that blocks the operator's line of sight (hill, barn, plume of smoke from a Challenger's air raid triggered smoke grenade barrage), then it's over. Megapixie (talk) 07:01, 26 December 2007 (UTC)