HQ-2 "Gin Sling"

The People's Republic of China has deployed a modified version of the V-75 under the designation HQ-2. The People's Republic of China developed its own modified version of the V-750 under the designation HQ-2 (Hong Qian = Red Leader), with the Western designation CSA-1.

At the end of the 1950s, the American government and the Taiwan authority continuously sent their high altitude reconnaissance aircraft to the mainland for reconnaissance and disturbance. From October 1959 to Jan. 1965, Chinese missile forces of air defence had shot down the intruded U-2 high altitude reconnaissance planes and RPVs many times with Hongqi-1 ground-to-air missile. Afterwards, the intruded plane adopted deceit interference, Hongqi-1 missile could no longer cope with the serious situation of electronic warfare and the development of the ground-to-air missile weapon system with strong anti-jamming capability was urgently needed.

The Second BA of the FRA MND, the Air Force and all relevant factories that undertook the tasks of the ground-to-air missile worked closely and carried out a lot of research and tests on improving anti-jamming performance, enlarging operation zone, improving operation performance and reliabilities of Hongqi-1 missile. The 2nd Division of Second BA had organized a large scale interference test with the participation of Institute No.23 and the ground-to-air missile testing division from 1964 to March 1965. This test mobilized an Air Force Squadron, used all kinds of noise interferences, passive interferences and transmission interference to conduct systematic anti-jamming tests for the guidance station and the illuminating system of Hongqi-1 missile. These tests had gained a lot of data, and laid down a preliminary foundation for working out the new concept of guidance station.

Designer Wang Jingtao of Factory No.l 12 which was responsible for missile final assembly, participated the modification program, proposed a updating design concept, which was to make use of the remaining space of compartment No.2 and increase the length of the fuel tank of compartment No.3, extending the engine operation time and enlarging the interception zone. If the volume of the fuel tank was to be enlarged, it was necessary to solve the following design and technical problems such as enlarging allopropylester tank of turbo-pump, increasing the front wing area and adjusting autopilot data etc. In order to realize the modification concept, designers had carried out more than 20 times of calculation in more than One year time. They finally worked out 378 particle trajectories, verified the modification concept and finalized the modification plan, to which Wang Jingtao, Qian Hongchang and Zeng Benii had made great contribution.

Institute No.23 raised and analysed 4 radar systems for selection and selected the illuminating radar system from them. Factory No.786 took only two months to complete the radar production and to install it on the truck.

In April 1965, the Office of Industry for National Defence (OIND) entrusted the 7th Ministry of Machine Building to organize all the relevant organizations to carry out analysis and studies on the modified medium-high altitude ground-to-air missile weapon system with high anti-jamming capability, the development plan was finalized, the sharing of development work was clarified as such: the No.2 RA of the 7th Ministry of Machine Building was responsible for the overall technical concept of the type and for the coordination of each sub-system; Factory No. 139 was responsible for the trial manufacture of the missile and Factory No.786 was responsible for the trial manufacture of the guidance station. At the same time, this type of missile was designated as Hongqi-2, Chen Huaijin was appointed Chief Designer and Li Bo Deputy Chief Designer.

More than several dozens of technical measures had been incorporated on Hongqi-2 missile in order to enlarge its operation zone, strengthen the anti-jamming capability and improve operational performance. In order to obtain fast and stable development, it was decided to have two conditions for both missile and guidance station. For the first condition, it was mainly to increase missile's shooting altitude and operational oblique distance. For the guidance, it was mainly to strengthen counter-reconnaissance, anti-jamming capability and guarantee the measuring accuracy. For the second condition, it was to adopt more anti-jamming methods and improve operational performance.

In May 1965, the CSC decided to speed up development of Hongqi-2 missile. Designers of No.2 RA went to Factory No.139 and Factory No.786 to help realizing the design plan and working out a working plan. The complete development and tast work were divided into two stages as well. The first stage was the basic development stage, using 11 operational missiles of two conditions to carry out the shooting of the simulated targets, parachute targets and medium speed-medium altitude aircraft targets at different altitudes and speeds. The second stage was the remote measuring missile and supplement test stage. It aimed at fully understanding the changes of control system performance and aerodynamic coefficient at high altitude and checking the correctness of mathematics model.

Factory No.786 completed the calibration flight test of the first condition guidance station in the same year, which was put into mass production and delivered for service after approval. The second condition guidance station had 28 calibration flights, the result of which had met the design requirement. Later, shooting tests against simulated target, parachute target and aircraft target were carried out by using missile in connection with control station. These tests were successfully conducted especially the three-point tail-tracing shooting against MiG-15 aircraft target and transferring the guidance radar working system after missile launching to simulate the operational condition under interference.

The development and flight test of the missile had experienced similar procedures. Both the first and the second conditions missiles had gone through the certification tests, which proved that the performance of Hongqi-2 weapon system was good and the design requirements were met.

The Hongqi-2 missile weapon system had successfully passed type certification test at the end of 1966. 14 operational missiles and 5 remote measuring missiles were used from development test to the certification flight test.

During the development of Hongqi-2 missile, the type general design organizations had organized personnel to conduct a lot of ballistics and aerodynamic calculations, system analyses and simulations of large loop circuit, and design of the missile borne miniature remote measuring system, to strictly evaluate the technical realization plan for all sub-systems from the angle of the general design, to integrate the individual technical improvements and the army technical innovation achivements into one completed and coordinated general plan and to work out the reasonable development procedures for the smooth flight test. During the flight test, the general system designer Li Yingquan worked at the test site together with the personnel concerned, analysed reasons that caused troubles, put forward improving measures, and created conditions for the smooth flight test.

The ground-to-air missile testing division had made serious preparations and careful planning for the test of Hongqi-2 missile. Tests of all items had been successfully completed. During the test of the remote measuring missile, it once appeared that the missile head was broken and the missile dropped down in the course of flying. Li Dezuo and others studied the wreckage of the missile, and found out that the failure was caused by the strengthening rib of the warhead chamber which hadn't met the design requirement. It was solved by the development organizations through modifying the design.

Zhou Yusheng studied the false signal acquisition by the missile at low altitude and designed a circuit of avoiding the false signal acquisition by the missile at low altitude. Shao Kuibao brought up methods of multi-circuit parallel for the slow-change remote measuring equipment, to check whether fuse was ignited by false and to measure the missile''s low frequency vibration data, which created conditions for the study of missile vibration. Qi Huaqin and Ren Chengxue together with the Shanghai No.2 Bureau of Mechanery and Electronics successfully developed optical simulator for fuse in connection with the warhead, which simulated the working conditions of the fuse and warhead when the missile hit the target in the air and provided new analyzing and certification measures for verifying the match between radio and warhead and checking damaging effectiveness of actual target hit by the explosive debris of the warhead. Liu Fangcheng put forward the idea of semi-actual object emulation, the actual concept was designed by Xu Zongchang. The emulator joined the guidance station of Hongqi-2 missile, which enabled the normal operation of the closed control loop of the system. The test showed the exact same result as the actual missile flight test. The problems such as guidance accuracy and low frequency swinging of control system of Hongqi-2 missile weapon system had been studied by using this semi-actual object emulator to emulate the target shooting, which acted as supplementary and auxiliary night tests.

According to the flight test results, the test division conducted a comprehensive evaluaton on Hongqi-2 missile weapon system and its sub-systems. The interception zone was determined, shooting regulation was compiled, theoretical trajectory, control trajectory, the maths model and calculation procedures for single missile killing probability were established, all these had laid down the foundations for the future system analysis of other missiles tests.

In July 1967, the Commission of Certification for Special Weapons of the State Council approved the certification of Hongqi-2 missile weapon system. On the 8th September 1967, U-2 aircraft intruded China's East-Central area again, although the aircraft adopted methods of transmission interference, it was shot down by Hongqi-2 missile, which proved the anti-jamming measure of the missile was effective. Hongqi-2 missile took only one year from concept determination to accomplishment of the certification test. The main cause, of the short development lead time was the early start of pre-study work, solid work of concept study, paying high attention to technical continuity, fully utilization of existing scientific and technological achievements and the close cooperation between design and production departments.

In order to know clearly the problems of Hongqi-2 missile in the operation, the ground-to-air missile test division conducted scientific test of shooting high altitude-high speed target by Hongqi-2 missile in Jan. 1968. The guidance station of Hongqi-2 missile was modified by using the new control loop data and the propellant charge of solid rocket engine was increased as well. The test result showed that these measures could increase the capability of Hongqi-2 missile against high altitude high speed target.

In 1984, under the organization and command of Zhang Dongsheng, the ground-to-air missile testing base commander, the interception test of air-to-ground missile was carried out by using Hongqi-2 missile against the Tuqiang-3 guided target. The distance between missile launching field and target launching field was more than 100 km. The advanced optical theodolite measuring system and precision measueing radar were equipped on the test corridor. 13 missiles were used for the test. Each time 2-3 missiles were launched simultaneously. Actually 4 of 5 guided target were shot down. Between June and July 1985, interception tests of "turning to fighting force" were carried out. 32 missiles were launched and 7 out of 11 guided targets were shot down. After the two stages tests, it proved that the application scope of Hongqi-2 missile weapon system could be expanded and the missile had the capability to intercept air-to-ground missile.