Fairey Semi-Active Guided Weapon

Fairey proposed a semi-active air-to-air missile for F.155T fighters.

This picture from Flight's 1955 Farnborough coverage shows a model that was displayed without info that year, the front part of it is thought to show the configuration of the Fairey AAM.

Thanks for posting that Paul. It looks rather like a reconfigured Fireflash with the two boosters consolidated into single larger one and mounted at the base of the missile. It would be interesting to know if the missile's main body had a sustainer motor or whether it was meant to coast like Fireflash....?

I believe the idea is that the AAM shape being testing is the front (unpowered) part, and the rear is a standard off the shelf rocket booster, i.e. not part of the AAM. Compare the drawing in BSP: Hypersonics, Ramjets and Missiles - I don't think it had separate boosters.

Very true. That'll be a booster for ground-launched flight trials, far too draggy for air carriage.

Chris

I'm not convinced it isn't just a slightly inaccurate Fireflash without boosters attached, personally.

It does look very like the Fireflash dart...

PaulMM (Overscan) said:

Fairey proposed a semi-active air-to-air missile for F.155T fighters.

This picture from Flight's 1955 Farnborough coverage shows a model that was displayed without info that year, the front part of it is thought to show the configuration of the Fairey AAM.

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Could this be, and just bear with me a mo' here, but could this some sort of successor to Mopsy?
In essence fitting a new tandem booster to Fireflash's 'dart'.

It does have a "test vehicle" look about it. Then again, it wouldn't be out of order for the initial phase of a new project to incorporate some of the knowledge gleaned from the old, so scaling up Fireflash would be the first step on the evolutionary road. That's a long way from knowing what it would have looked like in service, though - compare Red Dean's configuration when Vickers inherited it from Folland (sharp nose, straight-leading-edged rectangular wings) with what it looked like just before cancellation (not much different from an oversized Red Top).

I wonder if this is one of the three proposals during 1954 for High Altitude Blue Sky?
Fairey was proposing a new vehicle with three guidance options; beam-riding, command guidance or semi-active homing.
It was cancelled around December 1954 though so might have been a little odd to reappear at Farnborough in 1955.

Hood said:

I wonder if this is one of the three proposals during 1954 for High Altitude Blue Sky?
Fairey was proposing a new vehicle with three guidance options; beam-riding, command guidance or semi-active homing.
It was cancelled around December 1954 though so might have been a little odd to reappear at Farnborough in 1955.

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Wow..
It literally takes 20 years of my life to hear what I've suspected all along.

This just ramms this home that Fairey had a handle on the topic.

zen said:

This just ramms this home that Fairey had a handle on the topic.

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Yeah, it goes to prove that for most of the 50s the UK was a rival to the US in guided-weapons development till things were derailed by that fool Duncan Sandys and his bullshit 1957 defence white-paper.

Hood said:

I wonder if this is one of the three proposals during 1954 for High Altitude Blue Sky?
Fairey was proposing a new vehicle with three guidance options; beam-riding, command guidance or semi-active homing.
It was cancelled around December 1954 though so might have been a little odd to reappear at Farnborough in 1955.

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High altitude Blue Sky.....any details other than what you have mentioned?

PMN1 said:

High altitude Blue Sky.....any details other than what you have mentioned?

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Sadly not, the only mention I've seen is in Tony Wilson's English Electric Lightning Genesis & Projects. He only mentions it briefly and it sounds like its lifespan was very short. It was definitely offered to EECo for P.1, and given the 1954 date was probably also intended for F.155. Ferranti and the RRE was also involved in the proposals. Wilson states that the missile would be carried in the same way as Fireflash. Wilson mentions difficulties with all three homing options, so its likely this is what killed off the attempt.

Given the enlarged booster in the Flight picture, it would seem logical that this is the High Altitude Blue Sky - both in terms of increased boost power and reduced drag for supersonic flight with the tandem body layout. In addition the forward section seems to have wider chord fins compared to a standard Fireflash. Overall length would have been a little larger I think judging it by eyeball.

Feeling some are building towers on a few grains of sand here.

What we have are disparate facts.
The Fairey SAGW. Sketch in BSP

A statement about three guidance options for a 'high altitude Blue Sky' in 1954....

And a picture.....

A picture which could just be of a test shape to be fired off to test who knows what.
Or it could be the High Altitude Blue Sky....
Or it could be a simple consolidation of Blue Sky boosters into a single tandem unit. A Fireflash II so to speak or maybe just what a properly operational Fireflash might look like.

Or it might even by my hypothetical Flopsy SAM.....

Or something else entirely. Unlabeled put up at an exhibition just to spoof the Soviets and have their analysts running in mental rings trying to figure it out....

I wouldn't say that I'm building sand castles, I'm just pointing out that the object in the photo bears several hallmarks of things that you would expect High Altitude Blue Sky to have.
I will admit that Tony Wilson states it was a "new vehicle" but that's an equally vague description, especially since Fireflash was a three-part missile to begin with. It could cover a new booster, a new dart section or an entirely new design and layout.
This model seems to be a mix of new and old and as others have pointed out above the large booster looks draggy and sub-optimal - but then the original Fireflash looks like something out of a Victorian ironmongers shop anyway!

Paul's original post sounds like the model was presented without any information or explanation what it was. Given it was within a year after cancellation, its possible a model of High Alt Blue Sky was simply put on the stand as window dressing. Its equally possible the model workshop was told to make a generic missile as eye candy for their stand.
The fact Fairey didn't attempt to explain what it was either indicates they didn't want to talk about it (former hush-hush project) or simply didn't care (it just looks 'cool').

BIS Spaceflight 1956:

What appeared to be a larger and cleaner version of the Fireflash was displayed on the Fairey Aviation stand at the 1955 S.B.A.C. Show. This was mounted on the front of an American - type tandem booster.

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Jane's All The World's Aircraft 1956:

Apparent larger and cleaner development of Fireflash. Model displayed at 1955 S.B.A.C. Display. Length without booster approx. 10 ft (3.05m).

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The reporting of a tandem booster, approximate length etc. could be entirely speculative and based on nothing more than a reporter eyeballing the display model. It looks very like a test vehicle (as @overscan (PaulMM) said in 2015) and is reminiscent of the Vickers Red Dean ground launched test vehicles (which used triple RPE Westcott Demon motors to boost the missile shape). The booster looks to be slightly conical rather than cylindrical and, without seeing an exhaust arrangement, suggests a single motor.

The passage in Tony Wilson's Lightning book confirms there was formal interest in a Fairey designed missile beyond Fireflash and that missile was appropriately sized for carriage on the Lightning, e.g. considerably smaller than Red Dean/Hebe but larger than the Blue Jay family. It is unlikely to be a coincidence that Vickers conceived it's VSW as a scaled down Red Hebe. Whether any MoS or Air Ministry documents recording the thinking behind the requirement and its subsequent fate survive is an open question.

Curious and interesting.

The booster does look more like it's to get the missile upto representative launch speed. Hence the conic section.

The nose is suggestive this is a Beam rider or Command Guidance.

Would be interesting to ponder whether AI.23 and AIRPASS is good enough for a collision course engagement. In theory the automatic nature of this system makes that possible.

Substantial wings and small tail controls. But logical perhaps for high altitude.