Abstract:

Axial force aircraft can provide greater available overload, offering an effective technical method for intercepting maneuvering targets. When the target’s maneuvering form is unknown but its maneuvering capability is bounded, determining the required axial overload for the aircraft becomes a crucial issue in the aircraft overall design. Firstly, considering the aircraft’s attitude constraints, we derive the axial force aircraft’s modified proportional guidance law for intercepting maneuvering targets, demonstrating that line-of-sight rate converges within a finite time. Secondly, based on the obtained guidance law, an analytical solution for the aircraft’s axial overload requirement when the target’s maneuvering form is unknown and its maneuvering magnitude is bounded. By considering the target’s maneuvering capability, the remaining flight time during target maneuvering, and the miss distance, we can determine the aircraft’s axial overload requirement. Then, we derive an analytical expression for the aircraft’s axial overload requirement in the presence of system time delay. If the target performs evasive maneuvers with limited remaining flight time, system time delay significantly increases the aircraft’s axial overload requirement. Finally, numerical simulations demonstrate that the proposed guidance law can achieve target impact under direct collision conditions when the derived axial overload requirement is satisfied; however, this requirement increases significantly if the target executes an evasive maneuver with a short time-to-go.

Key words: axial force aircraft, modified proportional guidance, Lyapunov method, axial overload, system time delay