Tactical and Strategic Missile Guidance

This three day course will help you understand and appreciate the unique challenges of both tactical and strategic missile guidance. So everyone can clearly understand the principles of missile guidance, concepts are derived mathematically, explained from a heuristic perspective, and illustrated with numerical examples and computer animations. Course mathematics and examples are non-intimidating. Computer source code is included so interested participants and duplicate the examples presented and explore issues beyond the scope of the course. The instructor’s textbook, Tactical and Strategic Missile Guidance, Fifth Edition, is strongly recomened for all attendees. You will receive a comprehensive set of course notes.

• Interceptor guidance system technology.
• How subsystems influence total system performance.
• Useful design relationships for rapid guidance system sizing.
• Using adjoints to analyze missile guidance systems.

This course will benefit managers, engineers, and programmers at all levels who work with or need to learn about interceptor guidance system technology. The heuristic arguments and numerous examples will give managers an appreciation for guidance so that they can interact effectively with specialists. Engineers and programmers will find the detailed course material and many source code listings (in FORTRAN, MATLAB, TrueBASIC and C) invaluable for both learning and reference. Attendees will receive a complete set of course notes as well as the textbook, Tactical and Strategic Missile Guidance, Fifth Edition.

 Numerical Techniques (Vol. 1 C1L1.m,C1L2.m)

–         Laplace Transform Notation, Numerical Integration, State Space Notation, Fundamental Matrix

Fundamentals of Tactical Missile Guidance (Vol. 1 C2L1.m, C2L2.m)

–         How Proportional Navigation Works and Why it is Effective

Method of Adjoints and the Homing Loop (Vol. 1 C3L1.m)

–         How to Construct an Adjoint

–         How Adjoints are Used for Homing Loop Analysis

Noise Analysis (Vol. 1 C4L1.m – C4L6.m)

–         Homing Loop Examples of Monte Carlo Technique

–         How Adjoints Can Get Performance Projections in One Run

Proportional Navigation and Miss Distance (Vol.1 C6L2.m)

-          How System Dynamics, Acceleration Saturation and Radome Effects

Digital Noise Filters in the Homing Loop (Vol. 1, C7L1.m-C7L3.m)

–         How Digital Filters Work in the Homing Loop

–         Estimating Target Maneuver With Range and LOS Information

Advanced Guidance Laws (Vol. 1, C8L1.m)

–         Deriving Optimal Guidance Laws That Relax Acceleration Requirements and Improve Performance

Kalman Filters and the Homing Loop (Vol. 1, C9L2.m)

–         How to Build Simple Kalman Filters That Work With Advanced Guidance Laws

Endoatmospheric Ballistic Targets (Vol. 1, C11L1.m)

–         Importance of Speed, Re-entry Angle and Ballistic Coefficient

–         Why Decelerating Targets are Difficult to Hit

 Extended Kalman Filtering (Vol. 1 C12L1.m, C12L2.m)

–         Filter Comparison For Estimating Target Ballistic Coefficient

    Tactical Zones (Vol. 1 C10L1.m)

–         Introduction to Rocket Equation and How Drag Limits System                  Performance

 Radome Considerations (Vol. 1  C13L1.m)

–         How Radome Effects Can Destabilize a Missile Guidance System

Strategic Considerations (Vol. 1 C15L1.m- C15L6.m)

–         Why Flat-Earth Approximation is Not Appropriate

–         Useful Closed-Form Solutions For Velocity and Flight Time

 Boosters Vol. 1 C16L1.m – C16L2.m)

–         Rocket Equation and Gravity Turn

 Lambert Guidance

–         Why Solving Lambert’s Problem is Required For Booster Steering

–         Comparison of Lambert and GEM Guidance For Booster Steering

Strategic Intercepts

–         Using Classical Guidance Concepts to Explain Strategic Performance

Radome Slope Estimation

–         Using Dither Signals and Bandpass Filters to Estimate Radome Slope

Multiple Target Problem (Vol. 1 C20L1.m-C20L7.m)

–         How Two Targets Within Seeker Field of View Can Cause Large Miss Distances

Weaving Targets and Proportional Navigation (Vol. 2 C6L1.m-C6L3-m)

–         Why Weaving Targets are Difficult to Hit

Optimal Guidance Against Weaving Targets

–         Deriving an Advanced Guidance Law to Reduce Miss and Acceleration Requirements

Filtering and Guidance For Weaving Targets (Vol. 2 C7L1.m-C7L3.m)

–         Possible Filtering Options

Filter Bank Approach – Multiple Model Adaptive Estimation (MMAE) (Vol. 2 C8L1.m)

–         Estimating Target Weave Frequency With Filter Bank

Interactive Multiple Model (IMM) Filter Bank Approach

–         Comparison With MMAE in Terms of Performance and Computation

Airframe Linearization (Vol. 1 C21L1.m)

–         Transfer Functions From Geometry of Airframe

Introduction to Flight Control System Design (Vol. 1 C22L1m-C22L3.m)

–         Influence of Flight Control Design on Performance

The Three Loop Autopilot (Vol. 1 C23L1.m, C23L2.m)

–         Using Time and Frequency Domain Analysis to Control Autopilot

Paul Zarchan has more than 40 years of experience designing, analyzing, and evaluating missile guidance systems. He has worked as Principal Engineer for Raytheon Missile Systems Division, has served as Senior Research Engineer with the Israel Ministry of Defense and was a Principal Member of the Technical Staff for C.S. Draper Laboratory. Mr. Zarchan is currently a Member of the Technical Staff at MIT Lincoln Laboratory and is working on problems related to missile defense. He is the author of Tactical and Strategic Missile Guidance, Fifth Edition and the co-author of Fundamentals of Kalman Filtering: A Practical Approach, Second Edition.