AIM-9 Sidewinder
AIM-9 Sidewinder
An AIM-9 is affixed to an F/A-18 Hornet on
board an aircraft carrier.
Type
Short-range air-to-air missile
Place of origin United States
Service history
In service
1956 (AIM-9B) - Present
Production history
Manufacturer Nammo
Raytheon Company
Ford Aerospace
Loral Corp.
Unit cost
US$85,000
Produced
September 1953
Specifications
Weight
190 lb (91 kg)
Length
9 ft 4.2 in (2.85 m)
Diameter
5 in (127 mm)
Warhead
20.8 lb (9.4 kg) annular blast-
frag
Detonation
mechanism
Magnetic influence (old
models)
Active infrared (AIM-9L
onwards)
Engine
Solid-fuel rocket
Wingspan
24.8 in (630 mm)
Operational
range
0.6–11.3 mi (1–18 km)
Speed
Mach 2.5
Guidance
system
Infrared homing
Launch
platform
Aircraft, helicopter gunships
The AIM-9 Sidewinder is a heat-seeking,
short-range, air-to-air missile carried by
fighter aircraft and recently, certain gunship
helicopters. It is named after the sidewinder
snake, which detects its prey via body heat
and also because of the peculiar snake-like
path of flight the early versions had when
launched. The Sidewinder was the first truly
effective air-to-air missile, widely imitated
and copied; yet its variants and upgrades re-
main in active service with many air forces
after five decades. When a Sidewinder mis-
sile is being launched, NATO pilots use the
brevity code Fox two in radio communica-
tion, as with all "heat-seeking" missiles.
About 110,000 Sidewinders have been
built, of which perhaps one percent have
been used in combat, resulting in some
250-300 kills world-wide to date. The missile
was designed to be simple to upgrade. [1]
Physics of infrared
detection
In the 1920s, it was discovered that exposing
lead sulfide to infrared rays (thermal radi-
ation) reduces the compound’s electrical res-
istance. This is an example of a property
called photoconductivity; photoconductivity
is also seen with illumination by other
wavelengths of light[2] (see Ron Westrum’s
book in reference section). One can measure
the resulting current and then link that result
to an a