Best-Range Study for a Boost-Coast-Sustain Missile

Midcourse guidance is examined for an air-to-air missile featuring boost-coast-sustain propulsion. A vertical-plane, point-mass model is studied with load factor as a control variable and coasting time as a parameter. Time-range-energy optimal trajectories are computed, open-loop, via the usual necessary conditions and a multiple-shooting algorithm. A requirement on terminal velocity magnitude is examined for its effect on firing range. One of the major results for the missile studied is that, it is not optimal to add a coasting phase between the boost and the sustain phases.