Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: 28sweep on September 09, 2002, 10:49:49 AM
-
Here it is:
The Kursk which sank in 354 feet of water in the Barents Sea on August 12 with 118 on board, was an Oscar II-type nuclear cruise missile submarine — the leading submarine participating in the largest naval exercise the Russian North Fleet had staged in a decade.
The vessel, according to the London-based Soviet Analyst, was engaged in the mock sinking of US submarines and aircraft carriers, and was under observation by two US submarines located some 50 miles from the scene, together with several other allied monitoring vessels.
THE KURSK WAS ALSO TESTING A NEW WEAPONS SYSTEM, A SUPERFAST TORPEDO THAT TRAVELS AT SPEEDS OF OVER 230 MPH.
Scientific American reported in its May edition that the supersophisticated torpedoes have been linked to the sinking of the Kursk last August, and even to the arrest and imprisonment of Edmond Pope.
Pope, an American businessman, was charged by Russian authorities with spying, specifically that he had sought to buy plans for the “ultrahigh-speed torpedo.”
“Evidence does suggest” said Scientific American, “ that both incidents revolved around an amazing and little-reported technology that allows naval weapons and vessels to travel submerged at hundreds of miles per hour – in some cases, faster than the speed of sound in water.”
The new technology that allows for these superfast torpedoes “is based on the physical phenomenon of supercavitation.”
According to Scientific American, the new generation of torpedoes, some believed capable of carrying nuclear warheads, are surrounded by a “renewable envelope of gas so that the liquid wets very little of the body's surface, thereby drastically reducing the viscous drag” on the torpedo.
The new technology “could mean a quantum leap in naval warfare that is analogous in some ways to the move from prop planes to jets or even to rockets and missiles.”
In 1997 Russia announced that it had developed a high-speed unguided underwater torpedo, which has no equivalent in the West. Code-named the Shkval or “Squall,” the Russian torpedo reportedly travels so fast that no U.S. defense can stop it.
In late 2000, after the sinking of the Russian submarine Kursk, new reports began circulating that the Chinese navy had bought the Shkval torpedo.
“The Shkval” stated Richard Fisher, a defense analyst and senior fellow at the Jamestown Foundation, “was designed to give Soviet subs with less capable sonar the ability to kill U.S. submarines before U.S. wire-guided anti-sub torpedoes could reach their target. The Chinese navy would certainly want to have this kind of advantage over U.S. subs in the future. At the speed that it travels, the Shkval could literally punch a hole in most U.S. ships, with little need for an explosive warhead.”
“This torpedo travels at a speed of 200 knots, or five to six times the speed of a normal torpedo, and is especially suited for attacking large ships such as aircraft carriers,” Fisher said.
Though the exact cause of the sinking of the Kursk was never officially stated, the Associated Press reported in January that seismic analysis of shock waves suggests that two successive onboard explosions destroyed the submarine. “The first explosion was relatively small, consistent with a misfiring torpedo aboard the submarine Kursk” said a report by Arizona and New Mexico researchers published in the January 23 geophysical journal Eos. The blast was followed about two minutes later by a second blast 250 times larger than the first”, the researchers said.
“The size of the second explosion was so great” said the study, “that it is unlikely any submariner could have survived the corresponding pressure pulse.”
As for the Shkval, it is a 6,000-pound rocket torpedo, about 27 feet long with a range of about 7,500 yards. It can fly through the water at more than 230 miles an hour.
The solid-rocket-propelled “torpedo” achieves this high speed by producing a high-pressure stream of bubbles from its nose and skin, which coats the weapon in a thin layer of gas. The Shkval flies underwater inside a giant “envelope” of gas bubbles in a process called “supercavitation.”
The Shkval is so fast that it is guided by an autopilot rather than by a homing head as on most torpedoes. The original Shkval was designed to carry a tactical nuclear warhead detonated by a simple timer clock. However, the Russians recently began advertising a homing version, which runs out at very high speed, then slows to search for its target.
“As there are no known countermeasures to such a weapon,” stated David Miler in an April 1995 article “Supercavitation Going to War in a Bubble” (Jane’s Intelligence Review) “its development could have significant effect on future maritime operations, both surface and subsurface, and could be put Western naval forces at a considerable disadvantage.”
Scientific American reports that China has purchased around 40 Shkval torpedoes from Kazakstan, “raising the possibility that Beijing could threaten American naval forces in a future confrontation in the Taiwan Strait.” The magazine also says that a Chinese submarine officer was on board the ill-fated Kursk “to observe the test of the new version of the Shkval.”
This report makes clear that Russia has not converted, nor is the world on the threshold the peace that will mark the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart.
On the contrary, Russia is perfecting cutting-edge weaponry of which the West has no equivalent. It sells this weaponry to Communist China, a nation whose military arsenal is growing at an alarming rate
-
I thought this was common knowledge. I heard about the super-cavitating, rocket torpedo well before the Kursk sank. There were article about the US and Canada trying to purchase the technology.
-
Without commenting on the Shkval in particular, I do find it very interesting that Russian Efforts seem to be concentrating on weapons systems that can be fitted to existing platforms. The next generation of ASM coming out of Russia appears to be a compleately self contained weapons canister. Just buy a few attatch them to your existing surface units via staples and krazy glue, and viola! you can challenge anyone for control of the sea. This makes a lot of sense for both export (you can increase your clientel without having to convince them to buy entire new platforms) plus production costs per unit are significantly less.
As a former Sailor who continues to follow Naval developments, Weapons systems like the Yakhont Missile and the Shkval torpedo scare the crap outta me. But we don't know enough about thier operational capabilities to get too worked up about them. At the same time however, we need to make sure that we stay on top of these developments to prevent any surprises should these weapons ever be employed against us.
-Sikboy
-
Aw well, If they perform like they did on the Kursk... we're still safe :D
-
Here's a pic of it...
(http://suppressednews.com/photos/shkval.jpg)
-
Originally posted by 28sweep
“Evidence does suggest” said Scientific American, “ that both incidents revolved around an amazing and little-reported technology that allows naval weapons and vessels to travel submerged at hundreds of miles per hour – in some cases, faster than the speed of sound in water.”
speed of sound in water = 1482 m/s at 20°C = 4862.2 ft / sec
or nearly four times the muzzle velocity of a 9mm pistol
Be careful of what you read. It was written by journalists who write about other peoples knowledge: they may not comprehend what they write.
-
"Unguided"
And I wonder if those US subs 50 miles away were detected?
AKDejaVu
-
And a question for some engineers out there...
If you fire this weapon and rely on cavitation for the higher velocity, wouldn't an unguided weapon be affected by gravity? I see some fins there, but those tiny points would have to be supporting the entire weight of the weapon to keep it from dropping.
AKDejaVu
-
1. didnt we not mention 230MPH....at 7000yards theres no way in hell to get out of the way...
2. For longer ranges and against US boomers they would have been armed with a nuke....no precision guidance needed
-
Originally posted by Tracer-15
1. didnt we not mention 230MPH....at 7000yards theres no way in hell to get out of the way...
That's about 1 minute of travel time. That's 880 feet of travel for a vessel doing 10 mph... I agree that a surface vessel would in deep, but a sub has additional options.2. For longer ranges and against US boomers they would have been armed with a nuke....no precision guidance needed
LOL! OK... I'm curious as to how far "longer ranges" are. I've seen underwater detonations of nukes on film and can't imagine that would be an effective sub vs sub defense system.
So.. you're talking 230 unguided vs 75 guided. I'll take the guided... with or without the nuke.
Now.. if they could launch one of these and figure out a way to guide it... whoa!
AKDejaVu
-
They may have been testing a new weapon but the consensus from *some* in the Russian Navy and *most* other Nations' Naval 'investigators' is that the accident was caused by the malfunction of a standard Russian torpedo.
The ultra short version - a malfunction caused a torpedo engine to 'go hot', and as it wasn't in the water (with the water to limit the RPMs) the inside of the torp. got 'shook up' too much, a volatile fuel substance got where it shouldn't have been (inside the torp.) which cause the torp. to explode in such a manner that the other torp. 'went high order' and that was the end for the submarine.
Mike/wulfie
-
The chief problem with the supercavitation torpedo is that there seems to be no way to control it's direction - probably beyong a miniscule amounts generated by controlling jet exaust. Any such attempt would bring a surface of the torpedo in contact with water and at such speeds it would cartwheel and be destryed.
Neither it seems possible to have any fins protruding beyong the vapor envelope.
So far this kind of torpedo is more like a bullet - fast but unguided.
miko
-
I'm curious here. How effective would counter-measures be? Could not a device with a high-explosive warhead be launched toward the oncoming Shkval torpedo and be programmed to explode when within a certain distance of it, disrupting it's programming or destroying it entirely with the shock wave? I presume studies are already being done of possible counter-measures. Does anyone know anything about them?
Regards, Shuckins
-
Originally posted by miko2d
The chief problem with the supercavitation torpedo is that there seems to be no way to control it's direction - probably beyong a miniscule amounts generated by controlling jet exaust. Any such attempt would bring a surface of the torpedo in contact with water and at such speeds it would cartwheel and be destryed.
Neither it seems possible to have any fins protruding beyong the vapor envelope.
So far this kind of torpedo is more like a bullet - fast but unguided.
Seems you could guide the direction with a type of jet (Water or neumatic) or potentially with subtle changes to the direction of the cavitation generator. Some things that would be very difficult would be getting any kind of guidance system to function in that environment. The cavitation in combination with the water would make most radar/sonar combinations ineffective. A wire system would be difficult to impliment given the speeds involved.
AKDejaVu
-
Does this mean that I have to start working on my backyard bomb shelter again?
-
Hum some you fellas seem to know alot about underwater torpedos. That torpedo looks more like a warhead than a standard torp.
-
So any disruption in the gas envelope makes this thing go wacky?
Sounds like an easy thing to defend against, simple underwater explosion should do the trick.
-
Oh..
there was a chinese navy guy on the kursk..that explains it.
I could just see the torpedo officer screaming "Dont touch that!"in russian
If the soviets can get subs withing 7500 yards of a us Carrier then the US has bigger probs then that torpedo.
Thats only 5 miles? He's inside the destroyer screen by a whole lot by that time. If it could go 25 miles that would be something. then come out of warp and search for a target. Same for subs. if he makes it to within 5 miles of a US SSN or SSBN during a live war then there are definate issues no matter what torpedo he has.
Maybe I played too much Harpoon..but 5 miles is nothing. By definition he has to have a passive lock on the US sub and make it to 5 miles without being detected for this wonder weapon to be of advantage. The US is not going to hold off till 5 miles to fire their ADCAP mk 48s..so he is dodgeing torps for 20 miles before he can launch his golden bullet or the soviets have signifigant acoustic and sensor advantages on the US which is a much bigger concern then the torpedo.
I bet it goes way farther then 7500 yards if it is as interesting as people say. Like first convergence zone range would be very cool...
-
Pongo, thanks for reassuring me and giving me an excuse to quit digging that damn bomb shelter.
-
Not much to worry about. The idea is to get the warhead (an acoustic torpedo) to the target quickly. 7.5K yards is not very long, but some of these submarines are difficult to detect at slow speeds. Depends on sound conditions (propogation paths), source levels, own sonar Nominal Figure of Merit, detection probability, background noise levels. Sometimes ya pick them up long, sometimes right next to ya. :)
The major problem with this type of a weapon against an American submarine is the enemy's ability to detect the American submarine. US submarines are extremely difficult to detect. If you need to get within 7,500 yards to launch your weapon, there is a good chance you have been counterdetected and incoming torpedoes are on the way.
I believe the some countries should concentrate their efforts on improving their economy vice improving their ways to kills Americans, but to each it's own.
-
I think that the way in which this would be effective against US subs is not getting to them undetected. Rather, I see this supertorp as a snapshot weapon fired back down the bearing of a torp shot by a US sub. Kind of like someone throwing a rock at you and you turning and shooting a bullet at them before the rock hits you (kind of a simplistic analogy, I know).
-
Aren't both countries using now torps which are fired as cruise missles and drop in the water with x miles of the target then activate ?
I'm sure they'll find the way to stick one of those into a missle...
As for guidence...
I'm suprised that they haven't done the "self contained sonar/tracking/guiding" unit yet. Lunched by missle with torpedo, drops in the water, goes active and can transmit guiding data to the torpedo , encripted already.
Self, moving at high speed and evading at random...
-
Originally posted by fd ski
Aren't both countries using now torps which are fired as cruise missles and drop in the water with x miles of the target then activate ?
I'm sure they'll find the way to stick one of those into a missle...
Both sides have them, that's for sure. US ASROC, and Soviet SS-N-14 (Nato Code name Silex) I'm not sure what the disposition of those weapons is though. I think (and I'm honestly not sure) that the US Navy has moved away from ASROC in favor of using Choppers with torps for ASW operations. Theory being, you can get the Submarine from range, without exposing yourself.
I'm also not sure where we stand WRT SUBROC, the encapsulated sub launched missile similar in concept to ASROC. Because it had to be launched from a 21" Torp Tube, SUBROC couldn't not accomadate a full torpedo, and as far as I know we only mounted nukes on them (to make up for the lack of sophisticated guidance due in part to the space limitations).
I don't know about the Russian Equivalent of the SUBROC, but I do know that they still deploy a large number of SS-N-14 equipted Ships, although those ships also embark ASW Choppers as well.
-Sikboy
-
VA-111 Shkval underwater rocket
In 1995 it was revealed that Russia had developed an exceptionally high-speed unguided underwater missile which has no equivalent in the West. Code-named the Shkval (Squall), the new weapon travels at a velocity that would give a targeted vessel very little chance to perform evasive action. The missile has been characterized as a "revenge" weapon, which would be fired along the bearing of an incoming enemy torpedo. The Shkval may be considered a follow-on to the Russian BGT class of evasion torpedoes, which are fired in the direction of an incoming torpedo to try to force an attacking to evade (and hopefully snap the torpedo's guidance wires). The weapon was deployed in the early 1990s, and had been in service for years when the fact of its existence was disclosed.
Development begain in the 1960s, when the Research Institute NII-24 (Chief Designer Mikhail Merkulov) involved in the artillery ammunition research was instructed to launch the development of underwater high-speed missile to fight nuclear-powered submarines. On 14 May 1969, pursuant to a government resolution, NII-24 and GSKB-47 merged into the Research Institute of Applied Hydromechanics (NII PGM), which formed the basis of the present day 'Region' Scientific Production Association. Advances in the development of jet engines and fuel technologies, as well as outstanding results in the research of body motion under cavitation made it possible to design a unique missile with a dived speed much greater than that of conventional torpedoes.
When the suction on the low-pressure side of the propeller blade dips below ambient pressure [atmospheric plus hydrostatic head] the propeller blade cavitates -- a vacuum cavity forms. There is water vapor in the cavity, and the pressure is not a true vacuum, but equal to the vapor pressure of the water. High-speed propellers are often designed to operate in a fully-cavitating (supercavitating) mode. A high speed supercavitating projectile, while moving in the forward direction, rotates inside the cavity. This rotation leads to a series of impacts between the projectile tail and the cavity wall. The impacts affect the trajectory as well as the stability of motion of the projectile. The present paper discusses the in-flight dynamics of such a projectile. Despite the impacts with the cavity wall, the projectile nearly follows a straight line path. The frequency of the impacts between the projectile tail and cavity boundary increases initially, reaches a maximum, and then decreases gradually. The frequency of impacts decreases with the projectile's moment of inertia.
Apparently fired from standard 533mm torpedo tubes, Shkval has a range of about 7,500 yards. The weapon clears the tube at fifty knots, upon which its rocket fires, propelling the missile through the water at 360 kph [about 100 m/sec / 230 mph / 200-knots], three or four times as fast as conventional torpedoes. The solid-rocket propelled "torpedo" achieves high speeds by producing a high-pressure stream of bubbles from its nose and skin, which coats the torpedo in a thin layer of gas and forms a local "envelope" of supercavitating bubbles. Carrying a tactical nuclear warhead initiated by a timer, it would destroy the hostile submarine and the torpedo it fired. The Shkval high-speed underwater missile is guided by an auto-pilot rather than by a homing head as on most torpedoes.
There are no evident countermeasures to such a weapon, its employment could put adversary naval forces as a considerable disadvantage. One such scenario is a rapid attack situation wherein a sudden detection of a threat submarine is made, perhaps at relatively short range, requiring an immediate response to achieve weapon on target and to ensure survival. Apparently guidance is a problem, and the initial version of the Shkval was unguided However, the Russians have been advertising a homing version, which runs out at very high speed, then slows to search.
A prototype of the modernised "Shkval", which was exhibited at the 1995 international armaments show in Abu Dhabi, was discarded. An improved model was designed with a conventional (non-nuclear) warhead and a guided targeting system, which substantially enhances its combat effectiveness. The first tests of the modernised Shkval torpedo were held by the Russian Pacific Fleet in the spring of 1998.
The 'Region' Scientific Production Association has developed developed an export modification of the missile, 'Shkval-E'. Russia began marketing this conventionally armed version of the Shkval high-speed underwater rocket at the IDEX 99 exhibition in Abu Dhabi in early 1999. The concept of operations for this missile requires the crew of a submarine, ship or the coast guard define the target's parameters -- speed, distance and vector -- and feeds the data to the missile's automatic pilot. The missile is fired, achieves its optimum depth and switches on its engines. The missile does not have a homing warhead and follows a computer-generated program.
On 05 April 2000 the Russian Federal Security Service [FSB] in Moscow arrested an American businessman, Edmond Pope, and a Russian accomplice, on charges of stealing scientific secrets. A FSB statement said it confiscated "technical drawings of various equipment, recordings of his conversations with Russian citizens relating to their work in the Russian defense industry, and receipts for American dollars received by them." Pope, a retired US Navy captain who spent much of his career working in naval intelligence, was at the time of his arrest the head of a private security firm. On 20 April 2000 the FSB revealed that Pope had been seeking plans the Shkval underwater missile. Pope was detained during an informal contact with a Russian scientist who had participated in the Shkval's creation.
The arrest of Daniel Howard Kiely, deputy head of the Applied Research Laboratory at Pennsylvania State University, came almost simultaneously. The laboratory led by Mr. Kiely has for many years been developing torpedoes for US warships and submarines. Professor Kiely had joined Pope in Moscow to offer technical advice and determine the tasks for Pope's further activity. Kiely was interrogated as a witness. His testimony and objects confiscated during the search proved his involvement in Pope's activities. Later the 68-year-old professor was released and allowed to return to the United States.
The objective of the High-Speed Undersea Weaponry project at the US Office of Naval Research is to develop the vehicle guidance, control and maneuvering capabilities for the quick reaction weapons. High-speed weapons could offer an advantage for Anti Submarine Warfare (ASW) "close encounter" scenarios. The overall system response of a high-speed weapon for breaking off engagements with enemy submarines would be measured in seconds, rather than minutes. The High-Speed Undersea Weapons project has three tasks; Vehicle Guidance, Vehicle Control, and Test Bed Development. Vehicle Guidance deals with homing sensors, signal processing, waveform design, and autopilot commands that are used to guide (either autonomously or with external interaction) the weapon to its target. Vehicle control deals with control and maneuvering of the high-speed weapon with emphasis on stabilizing the supercavitating bubble cavity, and optimizing the flow for low drag. Technical issues include instability due to vehicle planing and tail slap, interaction between cavity with propulsion exhaust, and propulsion system transients, including startup. Test Bed Development is an ongoing effort that develops a test platform to test and evaluate S&T candidate systems such as homing systems, vehicle control, and propulsion systems.
there...does that answer your questions
-
Yup. like I thought. Very interesting technology but not capable in any way of upsetting the naval ballance of the world. The assumption of the nuke version is very questionable, it will not likely kill the shoooting US SSN but it will likley disrupt the torpedo.
So we are loosing a nuke to get a torpedo and likely doing enormous damage to the your own sub..the US would just adopt a stratagy of lobbing torps from extreme range and letting the Soviet subs likely cripple themselves with thier own wonder weapon....
I think the Soviets have it backwards..
you want a long range torp..that goes to the target area at normal 50kt speed or so and aquires the target either through passive or active direction from onboard sensors or remote ones or the sub and locks on and goes to 300 knots at that time for the final phase. of 5000 yards or so.. that would screw up people. and be much more use then what they have. It would also be much more use against carriers and such.
This missle reminds me of the air to air guided missles for the Fw190. kind of a silly useless tech when you realize the engagement sequence but it led to the amraam missle. With 15 years more developement this thing could end up being the typical way that torpedos work. and looking back at the old style will seem silly. Or better yet supercavitating subs...burst speeds of 200 knots.
-
I was talking to a friend of mine where i used to work/ they make torpedoes.
it looks like they are on their second round of layoffs and if their contract is cancelled/ not renewed they will be selling off their business..
laying off the rest of those employees.
Alot of talent will be lost of those folks change careers. Some of those people have been making torpedoes all of their lives.
Anyway just a realistic look at how our job market is affecting the torpedoe industry.
As far as super kewl new techologies..well that's neat.
But they need to keep some of the talent on our side if we are going to keep up.
btw this was the mk 54 program contract that I'm talking about. The mk 48 program is still making money and going strong for now.
-
Originally posted by Tracer-15
VA-111 Shkval underwater rocket
In 1995 it was revealed that Russia had developed an exceptionally high-speed unguided underwater missile which has no equivalent in the West. Code-named the Shkval (Squall), the new weapon travels at a velocity that would
I love the Federation of American Scientists :)
-Sikboy
-
See Rule #10
-
7 years. :)
-
WTF is with all the bumps recently :noid :D
-
I do not know Bruv, but I think it may be time to start suspending forum accounts when it happens.