AIM-120A

Description

The AIM-120A is an American active radar-homing air-to-air missile. It was introduced in Update "Seek & Destroy".

Vehicles equipped with this weapon

• AV-8B Plus
• ▄AV-8B Plus
• Baz Meshupar
• ◄F-4F KWS LV
• F-15C MSIP II
• F-15J(M)
• ▄F-16AM
• F-16C
• F-16C Barak II
• ◔JAS39EBS HU C

General info

Tell us about the tactical and technical characteristics of the missile.

Missile characteristics
Mass	147.87 kg
Guidance	ARH+IOG+DL
Band	I
Lock range	16 km
Launch range	80 km
Maximum speed	4.0 M
Maximum overload	35 G
Missile guidance time	80 secs
Explosive mass	9.81 kg TNTeq

Effective damage

The warhead on the AIM-120A is similar to that of the AIM-7 Sparrow missiles, generally sufficient for destroying fighter aircraft with one hit.

Comparison with analogues

The AIM-120A has higher effective range when compared to other medium-range active radar missiles, due to its powerful boost-sustain motor, low drag, and low mass, but it cannot match the close-range manoeuvrability of missiles such as the MICA-EM, Derby, or R-77, lacking thrust vectoring or high angle control surfaces.

Usage in battles

The AIM-120A AMRAAM is a versatile missile, capable of filling both the role of a medium range BVR weapon and a dogfight missile. It can effectively out-range the AIM-7F/M missiles while also accelerating faster and having active radar guidance, similar to the AIM-54 Phoenix, allowing the launching aircraft to employ defensive manoeuvres once the missile has activated its own seeker at a distance of about 16 kilometres from the target.

Practical employment of the AIM-120 can be anywhere from 1-30 kilometres depending on the relative target aspect and altitude. The high 35G pull allows for effective employment at close ranges when paired with a HMD capable radar. This will be the main weapon for high tier American fighter jets.

Pros and cons

Pros:

• Good practical range when compared to other medium-range AAMs.
• High G pull allows for use in close combat over AIM-9M.
• Active radar homing increases launch platform survivability.
• Pulse-Doppler seeker allows the missile to track targets at low altitudes.

Cons:

• Less manoeuvrable than other medium-range AAMs.
• Low mass lead to suboptimal energy retention and wobbling in terminal flight phases.
• Still kinematically outmatched by missiles such as the R-27ER.

History

Examine the history of the creation and combat usage of the weapon in more detail than in the introduction. If the historical reference turns out to be too long, take it to a separate article, taking a link to the article about the weapon and adding a block "/History" (example: https://wiki.warthunder.com/(Weapon-name)/History) and add a link to it here using the main template. Be sure to reference text and sources by using <ref></ref>, as well as adding them at the end of the article with <references />.

Media

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See also

Links to the articles on the War Thunder Wiki that you think will be useful for the reader, for example:

• reference to the article about the variant of the weapon;
• references to approximate analogues by other nations and research trees.

External links

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• topic on the official game forum;
• other literature.