Applied Physics Lab Air-Exjam

The Air-Exjam (Airborne Expendable Jammer) drone was developed by APL in collaboration with the U.S. Naval Surface Weapons Center. It was to show the feasibility of a low-cost expendable mini-drone for jamming or other EW (Electonic Warfare) tasks, and flew for the first time in early 1982.

The Air-Exjam was a flying-wing delta design powered by a small two-cylinder two-cycle piston engine. It took-off and landed on conventional runways, but parachute/airbag recovery was also possible. The drone was preprogrammed to fly to a selected target area by dead reckoning, and the range to that area was determined by a preset amount of revolutions of an air-driven impeller. Once over the target area, a small RF transmitter was dropped to the ground, and the drone went into loitering mode. The Air-Exjam was also fitted with a radio command control system for remote piloting of the vehicle.

Photo: Terry J. Gander

Air-Exjam

Seven Air-Exjam drones were built, and the flight test program ended at the end of 1983. The Air-Exjam itself was not immediately further developed, but the vehicle apparently led to the BQM-147 Exdrone UAV for the U.S. Marine Corps.

Specifications

Data for Air-Exjam:

Wingspan	2.03 m (6 ft 8 in)
Weight	18.1 kg (40 lb)
Speed	177 km/h (110 mph)
Endurance	3 h
Propulsion	Two-cycle piston engine; 2.2 kW (3 hp)

Main Sources

[1] Kenneth Munson: "World Unmanned Aircraft", Jane's, 1988

Back to Directory of U.S. Military Rockets and Missiles, Appendix 4

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Last Updated: 5 May 2004