More details revealed about A-Darter cooperation project
Date: 24 March 2006
The $52-million that Brazil has released to invest in South Africa's A-Darter infrared homing air-to-air missile programme will amount to 50% of the total amount required to complete the development of the weapon, reports Brazilian defence news website Defesanet.
It seems that the finalisation of the A-Darter project will require $104-million - it is not known how much South Africa has already spent on the programme.
According to a senior officer in the Aerospace Technical Centre (Portuguese initials CTA) of the Brazilian Air Force's (FAB's) Department of Research and Development, South Africa and Brazil are seeking to partner each other in the development of the A-Darter because neither country has the necessary bugdet to develop such a weapon on its own.
The contract which will govern this cooperation has yet to be signed, but signature is expected before the end of April, and perhaps earlier.
Colonel Nélson Gomes da Silveira, manager of the systems and sensors project of the develop- ment and programmes subdirectorate of the CTA, has told the newspaper Vale Paraibano that, through this partnership, Brazil seeks to economise on costs and increase its access to certain key technologies.
"We have selected seven areas in which we want to increase or acquire knowledge, for example, infrared detector technology with image processing," he said.
The A-Darter project would give Brazil access to that advanced infrared (IR) technology.
(The other six technology areas are not necessarily connected to the A-Darter; some, at least, are the concern of other projects.) The Brazilians see the proposed cooperation being along the same lines as that which occurred between Israel and South Africa for the development of the R-Darter radar-homing beyond visual range air-to-air missile (BVRAAM).
According to the Brazilians, Israel had the technology, but not all the money needed to complete the development of their BVRAAM; South Africa joined the project, provided the extra finance needed to complete it and received considerable technology transfer in return, greatly developing the country's own missile-development capabilities.
Silveira also identified the Brazilian companies likely to be involved in the project.
"We have started negotiating with Mectron and Avibras about their possible participation in the project, along with Atech, of São Paulo, in the area of embarked software." These are all Brazilian private companies.
Interestingly, as long ago as October 18, 2002, Engineering News reported that Denel Aerospace Systems, then called Kentron, was holding talks with Avibras and Mectron over possible cooperation. Mectron was responsible for developing Brazil's own IR-homing missile, the MAA-1 Piranha, but that is a third-generation missile, whereas the A-Darter will be a fifth-generation weapon.
For example, the A-Darter will have a longer range than current IR-homing missiles (which are short-range weapons) and will, after launch, reportedlly be able to turn 180º and hit targets behind the launch aircraft.
The FAB plan is to use the A-Darter to replace the Piranha. Mectron is also working on the develop- ment of an antiradar missile for the FAB.
Avibras is best known for its ground-to-ground modular rocket-bombardment systems, although it has also designed a 300-odd-km-range ground-launched tactical cruise-missile system.
Atech is a specialist software company with considerable expertise in the integration of complex, geographically widely-spread strategic-level systems, such as Brazil's national air-traffic control and air-defence system.
The A-Darter has, to date, been a project of Denel Aerospace Systems, part of the State-owned Denel defence industrial group.
Meanwhile, the Brazilian aviation journal, Asas (wings), has reported that the South African Air Force (SAAF) sold a batch of ten Denel V4 BVRAAM missiles to the FAB for test purposes. The V4 is the original SAAF version of the R-Darter; the missiles were reportedly near their expiry date and would soon have had to be fired or scrapped - instead they were sold to Brazil for somewhere between $100 000 and $200 000 each, to support Denel's campaign to sell the R-Darter to the South Americans.
Reportedly, new R-Darters would cost around $1-million each.
The second-hand V4s will be used for test launches from the FAB's modernised F-5EM fighters. It is now looking almost certain that the FAB will adopt the R-Darter as its BVRAAM.
Engineering News
