AA-2 ATOLL
K-13 (R-3 or Object 310)
PL-2 / PL-3 / PL-5
The AA-2 NATO Atoll was the oldest of the modern Soviet air-to-air missiles and may be carried by most aircraft in the Soviet inventory. The AA-2 has been widely exported and includes the semi-active (rear hemisphere only ) AA-2C variant and the infrared guided AA-2D variant. Both weapons are susceptible to infrared and electronic countermeasures.
The 24 September 1958 Chinese acquisition of an American AIM-9B Sidewinder missile marked the beginning of a breakthrough in the development of Soviet air-to-air missiles. The missile, fired from a Taiwanese F-86 Sabre aircraft, lodged without exploding in a Chinese MiG-17. The missile was sent to Toropov's engineering office to be copied, and the product the K-13, long the most popular Soviet air-to-air missile. The Sidewinder had a number of valuable features, not least of which was the modular construction that facilitated ease in production and operation.
The simplicity of the AIM-9 was in marked contrast to the complexity of contemporary Soviet missiles. The Sidewinder's infrared-guided homing head contained a free-running gyroscope and was much smaller than Soviet counterparts, and the steering and in-flight stabilization system were equally superior. Gennadiy Sokolovskiy, later chief engineer at the Vympel team, said that "the Sidewinder missile was to us a university offering a course in missile construction technology which has upgraded our engineering education and updated our approach to production of future missiles."
The Soviets soon made advances over the original Sidewinder model, making dozen of modifications to the initial design. In 1960 series-production of the K-13 missile (also called R-3 or Object 310) began. In 1962 the R-3S (K13A or Object 310) became the first version to be produced in large numbers, though its homing operation took much more time (22 seconds instead of 11 seconds). In 1961 development began of the high-altitude K-13R (R-3R or Object 320) with a semiactive radar head, which was entered service with combat aircraft in 1966. The training versions were the R-3U missiles ("uchebnaya", barrel with a homing set, not fired from an aircraft) and the R-3P ("prakticheskaya" differing from the combat version by absence of an explosive charge). The RM-3V (RM denoting "raketa-mishen" [target-missile] served as an aerial target.
Specific limitations of the Atoll were: At altitudes below 47,500 feet at launch, the aircraft must be in a maneuver of less than two Gs. At altitudes above 47,500 feet, the aircraft launch I maneuver limitation is 6 Gs. Minimum launch range is 3,280 feet; maximum range is dependent on launch aircraft speed and quantity of target radiation, The missile can make lOG maneuvers at sea level and I4G maneuvers at 50,000 feet. The missile cannot guide within 30 degrees of the sun and has great difficulty from 30 to 50 degrees. At altitude, launch mode is pursuit from 30 degrees above or below target and within an azimuth of 48 degrees. Missile can be launched in snap-up mode but mancuver Icapability is degraded above 50,000 feet. Ground clutter seriously degrades the ability of the missile to guide. At low level, the attacker therefore usually does not launch at a target below his altitude. During late 1960s the Vympel team began working on the K-13M (R-13M, Object 380) modification of the K-13 missile, which in 1973 was certified as an operational weapon. It has a cooled homing head, a radio rather than optical closing-in igniter, and a more potent warhead. Analogous modifications of the R-55 resulted in the R-55M missile. The last version of the K-13 is the R-13M1 with a modified steering apparatus.
The K-13 missile was produced in China as the PL-2 (updated versions PL-3 and PL-5) and also in Romania as the A-91.
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