DRDO Abhyas is a high-speed expendable aerial target (HEAT) being built by the

Aeronautical Development Establishment Aeronautical Development Establishment is a laboratory of India's Defence Research and Development Organisation. Located in Bangalore Bangalore (), officially Bengaluru (), is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Karna ...

(ADE) of the

Defence Research and Development Organisation The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) (IAST: ''Raksā Anūsandhān Evam Vikās Sangaṭhan'') is the premier agency under the Department of Defence Research and Development in Ministry of Defence of the Government of India ...

(DRDO) for the

Indian Armed Forces The Indian Armed Forces are the military forces of the Republic of India. It consists of three professional uniformed services: the Indian Army, Indian Navy, and Indian Air Force.—— Additionally, the Indian Armed Forces are supported by ...

Development

As of January 2013, the proof of concept and pre-project trials were completed. The first experimental launch without the main

turbojet engine The turbojet is an airbreathing jet engine which is typically used in aircraft. It consists of a gas turbine with a propelling nozzle. The gas turbine has an air inlet which includes inlet guide vanes, a compressor, a combustion chamber, and ...

of the Abhyas was held at the Chitradurga Aeronautical Test Range on 23 June 2012 to check the launch and configuration capability. The gas turbine engine has been identified and integrated on the Abhyas airframe and its test run with the aircraft fuel system and s-airtake has been completed. The project was sanctioned with an initial DRDO funding of ₹15 crore.

(ADE) will carry out 15 technology demonstrators (TDs) till 2015. After the acceptance of the prototypes or TDs by the

, serial production will start. The Indian Defense Services have also revealed a combined global tender projecting the requirement of 225 HEAT drones. Abhyas can be used as aerial target for missile systems. DRDO successfully test fired Abhyas from

Integrated Test Range The Integrated Test Range (ITR) is an Indian defence laboratory of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO). Located in Balasore, Odisha Odisha (English: , ), formerly Orissa ( the official name until 2011), is an Indian ...

, Odisha on 13 May 2019. The test was conducted to check low altitude flight capability with

radar altimeter A radar altimeter (RA), also called a radio altimeter (RALT), electronic altimeter, reflection altimeter, or low-range radio altimeter (LRRA), measures altitude above the terrain presently beneath an aircraft or spacecraft by timing how long it t ...

in loop demonstration in autonomous flight mode. On 23 December 2021, DRDO successfully flight tested Abhyas from Chitradurga Aeronautical Test Range. A locally developed

data link A data link is the means of connecting one location to another for the purpose of transmitting and receiving digital information (data communication). It can also refer to a set of electronics assemblies, consisting of a transmitter and a recei ...

was proved along with demonstration of high subsonic speed trajectory at a very low altitude and long endurance. Abhyas uses

MEMS gyroscope A vibrating structure gyroscope, defined by the IEEE as a Coriolis vibratory gyroscope (CVG), is a gyroscope that uses a vibrating structure to determine the rate of rotation. A vibrating structure gyroscope functions much like the halteres of f ...

based

inertial navigation system An inertial navigation system (INS) is a navigation device that uses motion sensors (accelerometers), rotation sensors ( gyroscopes) and a computer to continuously calculate by dead reckoning the position, the orientation, and the velocity (dire ...

for guidance and a flight control computer linked to ground station for autonomous operation.

Manufacturing

HAL on 17 December 2021, secured order for manufacturing, assembly, integration, testing and supply of DRDO Abhyas from ADE. The order will be completed under Development-cum-Production Partner (DcPP) with a private sector industry. This order marked the beginning of series production of the platform. The per unit cost of DRDO Abhyas including the launcher is ₹40 lakh. HAL at DefExpo-2022 received Development cum Production Partner (DcPP) / Production Agency (PA) certificate for ABHYAS from DRDO on 20 October 2022.

Design

The fuselage for the Abhyas was designed by adopting the

DRDO Lakshya Lakshya ("target" in Sanskrit) is an Indian remotely piloted high speed target drone system developed by the Aeronautical Development Establishment (ADE) of DRDO. A variant ''Lakshya-1'' is used to perform discreet aerial reconnaissance of battl ...

tow body. The fuselage consists of five sections, namely the

nose cone A nose cone is the conically shaped forwardmost section of a rocket, guided missile or aircraft, designed to modulate oncoming airflow behaviors and minimize aerodynamic drag. Nose cones are also designed for submerged watercraft such as ...

, equipment bay, fuel tank bay, air intake bay and tail cone. The material for the nose and tail cones are made up of Glass Fiber Reinforced Polymer (GFRP), whereas the material of the equipment bay, air intake bay and fuel tank are made up of an aluminum steel

alloy An alloy is a mixture of chemical elements of which at least one is a metal. Unlike chemical compounds with metallic bases, an alloy will retain all the properties of a metal in the resulting material, such as electrical conductivity, ductility, ...

. The wings and tail plane of the Abhyas have been derived from the Lakshya by downsizing them, however the wings of the Abhyas are positioned on the upper-side of the body whereas the Lakshya has under-body wings. For propulsion it is fitted with a gas-turbine engine weighing 19 kg, having a thrust of 25 kg, with an endurance of 30–45 minutes that can cover distance of 400 km. Abhyas is

GPS The Global Positioning System (GPS), originally Navstar GPS, is a Radionavigation-satellite service, satellite-based radionavigation system owned by the United States government and operated by the United States Space Force. It is one of t ...

-enabled, has an on-board flight control computer and a miss-distance indicator. It is also designed for autonomous flight with the help of an

autopilot An autopilot is a system used to control the path of an aircraft, marine craft or spacecraft without requiring constant manual control by a human operator. Autopilots do not replace human operators. Instead, the autopilot assists the operator' ...

. The radar cross section is increased 50 times to emulate a

fighter aircraft Fighter aircraft are fixed-wing military aircraft designed primarily for air-to-air combat. In military conflict, the role of fighter aircraft is to establish air superiority of the battlespace. Domination of the airspace above a battlefield ...

Flight Profile

The Abhyas is launched from a mobile launcher with the help of two 68 mm booster rockets manufactured by

Munitions India Limited Munitions India Limited (MIL) is an Indian state-owned defence company, headquartered in Pune, India established in 2021 as part of the restructuring and corporatisation of the Ordnance Factory Board into seven different Public Sector Undertakin ...

(previously

Ordnance Factory Board Ordnance Factory Board (OFB), consisting of the Indian Ordnance Factories, now known as Directorate of Ordnance (Coordination & Services) was an organisation, under the Department of Defence Production (DDP) of Ministry of Defence (MoD), Gove ...

). The twin rocket boosters helps in providing the initial acceleration until the small turbojet engine starts to sustain high subsonic speed. At the end of its launch phase the burnout booster rockets are jettisoned. Thereafter, the main gas-turbine engine powers the vehicle during cruise phase. Abhyas can fly at speed of 180 meter per second and cover 5 km altitude.

Flight testing

DRDO conducted successful flight test of ABHYAS- High-speed Expendable Aerial Target (HEAT) from ITR

Balasore Balasore or Baleswara is a city in the state of Odisha, about north of the state capital Bhubaneswar and from Kolkata, in eastern India. It is the largest town of northern Odisha and the administrative headquarters of Balasore district. It i ...

Odisha Odisha (English: , ), formerly Orissa ( the official name until 2011), is an Indian state located in Eastern India. It is the 8th largest state by area, and the 11th largest by population. The state has the third largest population of ...

on 22nd September 2020. Two demonstrator vehicles were successfully test flown. During this test, Abhyas cleared all the parameters of evaluation set by the Indian Armed Forces which included 5 km flying altitude, vehicle speed of 0.5 mach, endurance level of 30 minutes and 2G turn capability.

Transportation & storage

The Abhyas drone has a dedicated box for its transportation and storage (2570 mm × 710 mm × 415 mm) made of

Expanded Polyethylene Expanded polyethylene (aka EPE foam) refers to foams made from polyethylene. Typically it is made from expanded pellets ('EPE bead') made with use of a blowing agent, followed by expansion into a mold in a steam chest - the process is similar to t ...

(EPE) with

Cross-linked polyethylene Cross-linked polyethylene, commonly abbreviated PEX, XPE or XLPE, is a form of polyethylene with cross-links. It is used predominantly in building services pipework systems, hydronic radiant heating and cooling systems, domestic water piping, ins ...

(XLPE) foam material inside. It is weather proof, drop and vibration proof and static load-tested.

Usage

Abhyas's

radar cross-section Radar cross-section (RCS), also called radar signature, is a measure of how detectable an object is by radar. A larger RCS indicates that an object is more easily detected. An object reflects a limited amount of radar energy back to the source. ...

(RCS) as well as its visual and

infrared signature Infrared signature, as used by defense scientists and the military, is the appearance of objects to infrared sensors. An infrared signature depends on many factors, including the shape and size of the object, temperature, and emissivity, reflectio ...

s can be augmented to simulate a variety of aircraft for

anti-aircraft warfare Anti-aircraft warfare, counter-air or air defence forces is the battlespace response to aerial warfare, defined by NATO as "all measures designed to nullify or reduce the effectiveness of hostile air action".AAP-6 It includes Surface-to-air m ...

practices and testing of

surface-to-air missile A surface-to-air missile (SAM), also known as a ground-to-air missile (GTAM) or surface-to-air guided weapon (SAGW), is a missile designed to be launched from the ground to destroy aircraft or other missiles. It is one type of anti-aircraft syst ...

(SAM) systems. It can also function as a jammer platform and decoy. The HEAT system is utilized to do away with the post-launch recovery mode for

Indian Navy The Indian Navy is the maritime branch of the Indian Armed Forces. The President of India is the Supreme Commander of the Indian Navy. The Chief of Naval Staff, a four-star admiral, commands the navy. As a blue-water navy, it operates sig ...

, which is time-consuming and difficult in a scenario as the sea.

References

External links

Flight test of Abhyas
* ttp://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Lt9o3lE1k30/URgI81GNlzI/AAAAAAAAD60/e10Z6ktudRk/s1600/ADE's%20Abhyas%20PTA%20.jpg DRDO Abhyas Specifications {{Unmanned aerial vehicles of DRDO Unmanned military aircraft of India Military equipment of India Kapothaka