Breaking news
Russia may be making new super silent torpedoes for submarines.
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Naval Forces News - Russia |
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Russia may be making new super silent torpedoes for submarines | |||
The
appearance of a new submarine, especially a nuclear-powered cruiser
equipped with missiles, is always an outstanding event, since it represents
the security of a country. How can one make it as invulnerable as possible
and not too expensive at the same time? It turns out that it is not
that hard: the submarine only needs to be outfitted with silent weapons. The shipyards of Sevmash have already built two serial underwater cruisers of the 955th type (Borei) - Yury Dolgoruky and Alexander Nevsky before. Presently, the company is building another sub of this project - Vladimir Monomakh. Afterwards, there will be a fourth strategic cruiser of this series - St. Nicholas. In total, according to the weapons program before 2017, it is planned to build eight submarines of this type to thus completely renovate the Russian fleet of strategic submarine. |
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Of course, such submarines are very expensive, and
all of us would really like to see them equal or superior to similar
subs of the United States, Britain, France and China in terms of performance.
The noise factor is especially important at this point, since it is
the noise of the submarine that makes it easy to detect.
Everything on board submarines makes noise. Noise is produced by pumps that push the water through the contours of the nuclear reactor, by steam turbines, electric motors and even by the water propeller. Weapon systems of the submarine make a lot of noise too. Missiles, torpedoes and cruise missiles are very noisy when they are being launched. Everything that makes all this noise, unmasks the submarine and a helps the potential enemy find and destroy it. But is it possible to create such a weapon that would be highly effective and absolutely silent at the same time? It turns out that it is possible, especially for deep-water submarines. Large submersion depths, such as one kilometer, like of the K-278 Komsomolets submarine, serves as a measure of security and protection from anti-submarine weapons - at least, the existing ones. |
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K-278 Komsomolets submarine (Picture: US Navy) |
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However, launching missiles and torpedoes from such
depth is quite problematic not to mention the fact that missiles and
torpedoes roar so loudly under the water that detecting them at a distance
is an easy nut to crack.
However, creating a fundamentally new and also totally silent weapon for deep-water submarines is not so hard. Imagine something like a large deep-water bomb in a tear-drop case with cross-like rudders at the stern and a massive released cargo at the nose. Containers with such shells are placed on the bottom of the sub, because the sub shoots them "underneath itself." The new type of weapons that can be called as follows: "gravitational self-propelled projectile," or, for short, GSPP. |
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Artist Impression: A Shkval torpedo is launched from a submarine (Source: Internet) |
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Approaching a target at a great depth, an aircraft
carrier for example, the submarine gets ready for attack, the control
system of a projectile receives data on the speed, the course of a target
and a distance to it. All parameters of the trajectory are calculated,
the projectile is discharged and starts to sink. In this case, naturally,
a projectile gains a certain speed. At this very moment, the rudders
of the projectile change its trajectory towards the target. The shell
continues to sink, but it approaches the target, almost silently, because
it does not have an active engine.
When the projectile reaches a certain point of the trajectory, the system discharges the ballast. The ballast drowns and immediately begins to surface, but again, it moves towards the surface along the trajectory guided by the rudders, and thus covers a long distance, as the on-board computer calculates it as horizontal as possible. Finally, closer to the enemy ship, the homing guidance system is activated, possibly together with an engine that will provide high accuracy. That's it! The enemy's vessel is thus struck from underneath, where every surface ship is most vulnerable. The trajectory of the projectile in the direction of the target will be reminiscent of a silhouette of a house with the roof ridge upside down. It would also be possible to develop a fundamentally new type of small deep-water submarine for this type of weapon. A small size means that the sub will not be too expensive, and it would be possible to build many of such submarines. In addition, it will not have missiles on board, so the price would be relatively low. Finally, just because the new sub would be quiet, they would pose a serious threat to any aircraft carriers. Source: PRAVDA.Ru |