Analysis of Missile Plume Impact Characteristics on Engine Intake and Neighboring Stores for a Fighter Aircraft

This paper deals with validation of predicted trajectory of a BVR missile launched from an Indian fighter aircraft with flight test results. The trajectory of the missile is predicted using an in-house code WISe (Weapon Integration and Separation). The code works based on decay factorization scheme, where the assumption is that the missile aerodynamic interactions with the parent aircraft during separation process is dependent on missile’s horizontal displacement. In the absence of quantitative flight test trajectory data, the images of trajectories of the missile captured at various instants from the chase aircraft during test are compared with the predicted trajectories (pictures) of missile at corresponding time steps. The paper also contains generation of static plume using a commercial code Fluent. The missile plume path along with its trajectory is modeled from the static plume using two different approaches (Gleissl and Deslandes in simulation of missile plumes for aircraft store compatibility assessments, [1])—(i) Flashlight method and (ii) Particle ejection method. An assessment of plume ingestion into the air intake has been carried out and compared with flight test data obtained from temperature sensor. After successful validation, the rigid plume obtained from flashlight method and flexible plume from particle ejection method is also used to predict the static temperature at defined section of a Laser Guided Bomb (LGB) seeker.