GDR 99 - Missile Systems

ARC Enjoys
Rocketing Growth


Section Articles
• Countering Proliferation • Oerlikon Aerospace • Hypersonics: a New Age Dawns • Hi-Tech, Low Cost • The Imperative of Interoperability • ARC Enjoys Rocketing Growth • Apaches Reach Out for Hydra • Aiming High: Raytheon's FMRAAM • Meteoric Rise: Matra BAe's Meteor
Top: ARC is the US leader in air-breathing rocket technology having successfully completed a 10-year, $50m variable flow-ducted rocket programme

Specialising in defence products, space-propulsion systems and advanced composite materials, diversification is the key to the Atlantic Research Corporation's success, says Bernard Catinat.

A unit of the New York-based Sequa Corporation, the Atlantic Research Corporation (ARC), is a diversified, high-technology company. A key goal of its strategic objectives is to achieve a balanced mix of commerce and defence by applying defence or rocket technology to the civil market, by branching into commercial space rockets, and by converting advanced materials technology to non-defence products.

A contributor to the rocket-propulsion industry since its founding in 1949, ARC is now the largest tactical rocket company in the world, providing propulsion systems for such combat-proven missiles as multiple launch rocket systems (MLRS), army tactical missile systems (ATACMS), Tomahawk and Stinger. ARC also produces rockets for Sidewinder, Patriot advanced capability-3 (PAC-3) and the standard missile (MK 104). A leader in man-rated propulsion systems, ARC has developed and produced every shoulder-fired system in the US inventory since the 1950s, including the recently fielded Javelin antitank weapon system. ARC also loads warheads for several systems.

The company designs, develops and qualifies new products and produces several build-to-print systems. It was one of the first to execute a successful programme under the leader-follower concept. ARC develops and produces solid rockets using the full spectrum of propellant types, many of which are ARC innovations.

ARC has had an international presence since the 1960s, developing and producing rockets for allies and/or transferring technology, building facilities, providing offsets and training personnel. It transferred MLRS technology to Italy, France and Japan for co-production, and transferred rocket technology and trained personnel in Turkey and Switzerland for NATO co-production of Stinger propulsion. ARC also transferred Penguin production technology to Norway.


The acquisition of Bell Aerospace in the late 1980s gave ARC a capability in liquid bi-propellant thrusters

ARC is the sole US producer of solid post-boost control gas generators for the fleet ballistic missile, having developed these components for Trident I and II. It developed and produces the nose-fairing removal rocket for Trident, an example of the company's extensive line of auxiliary rockets that have flown on all major US missiles and spacecraft since Vanguard in the 1950s.

The company is the US leader in air- breathing rocket technology following the successful completion of a I0-year, $50m variable flow-ducted rocket (VFDR) programme. This proven technology best meets the requirements of the advanced strike weapon and the beyond visual range air-to-air missile (BVRAAM). ARC has extensive in-house facilities for ramjet testing.

ARC developed divert rockets for the family of missiles that led to the PAC-3, for which it is developing both the end-game divert rockets and the missile booster. Divert rockets have also been developed and produced for the Swedish strix and strategic defence initiative (SDI) applications and are under development for the small low-cost interceptor device (SLID).

The solid propulsion operations of ARC are conducted in four plants in the US: Camden, Arkansas, the largest tactical rocket motor facility in the world; Vernon, California, the largest deep-draw facility in the US; Orange, Virginia, its newest facility; and Gainesville, Virginia, its corporate headquarters and engineering and technology centre of excellence. In the late 1980s ARC acquired the liquid- rocket operations of Bell Aerospace from Textron, providing it with a capability in liquid bi-propellant thrusters for satellite stationkeeping with a line of 5lb thrusters. It also put the company in the upper-stage market with the venerable Agena rocket that has flown hundreds of times with a near-perfect record. The Agena now is being upgraded to Agena 200C for use on the evolved expendable launch vehicles (EELV).

Following the Bell liquid-rocket operations acquisition, ARC also assumed responsibility for the Minuteman III post-boost propulsion system developed by Bell for the US Air Force. Combined with the company's Trident post- boost control system, ARC has become the only US company that has both liquid and solid post-boost capability. In October 1998 ARC agreed to buy the liquid-engine business (LEB) of Royal Ordnance (RO), a British Aerospace subsidiary, and will be forming a British company called ARC UK Ltd to manage and operate the LEB in the UK.

"The expanded technical base provided by RO's key technical talent will enhance ARC's overall capabilities," said James R Sides, ARC's chairman, president and CEO.


ARC's automotive air bages are used worldwide

Twenty-five years ago ARC pioneered the hybrid air-bag inflator. Nearly a decade ago it formed the Bendix Atlantic Inflator Company (BAICO), a joint venture to re-introduce the hybrid as the first viable alternative to sodium azide-based inflators. Then, in 1998, ARC became sole owner of BAICO technology and manufacturing operations in Knoxville, Tennessee. During this time, ARC has used its experience to put millions of these innovative inflators on the road. Currently ARC supplies hybrid inflators for driver, passenger and side- impact applications to major car manufacturers in north America, Europe, Japan and Korea. ARC also has ownership interests in BAG SpA in Collefero, Italy, a joint-venture company supplying inflators under BAICO's licence to European car manufacturers. Energetic materials for all its inflators are supplied by the ARC facility in Camden, Arkansas.

To keep up with future trends in stationkeeping for the vast new constellations of communications satellites, ARC joined International Space Technology Incorporated (ISTI), a consortium of American, Russian and French companies formed to apply the extensive Russian experience in electric propulsion to western spacecraft. ARC is the north American marketing and technical services agent for all ISTI products. ISTI has qualified a 1.35kW model of the stationary plasma thruster (SPT-100) that is in production and baselined on three satellites. ARC has a contract with the air force research laboratory to demonstrate a complete 4.5kW high-performance propulsion system by 2000.

Innovation awards
As a solid rocket company, ARC always has operated an active programme in advanced materials to support its rocket hardware design and production. In the mid-1980s it became apparent that some of this work was applicable to emerging lightweight structures for other applications such as aircraft structures and power plants, both civil and military. Investment in such applications has resulted in several new potential applications. The most immediate and significant of these is the use of ARC's titanium matrix composite (TMC) material in the piston for the divergent nozzle actuator on the F-119 engine for the F-22 Raptor fighter.

ARC uses advanced techniques for co-winding titanium wire with silicon carbide monofilament to produce a composite with three times the stiffness and strength of stainless steel but weighing 40 per cent less. ARC received a technology innovation award from the editors of Aviation Week and Space Technology magazine because of the unique blend of high-performance materials and affordable processing technology that can significantly reduce the weight of the next generation of fighter aircraft. Following the demonstration that TMC pistons are practical and affordable for saving weight on aircraft, new applications continue to emerge.

As ARC celebrates its 50th anniversary

Link: Atlantic Resaerch Corp.

in January 1999, the company finds itself entering the new millennium as a stable, growing, profitable business positioned to provide technical, personnel and facility support to the US Department of Defense and to private industry.