Chapter 1,149 Is this how Burke 3 competes with 055?
With this large shield, we can finally stand on the same starting line as Dongfang's 055. However, we have encountered problems with the small shield.
The dual-band radar of the 055 is very advanced. The lower part uses the S-band, which is responsible for the main air search mission. The upper part uses the X-band, which can obtain higher accuracy. At the same time, due to the high installation position, it can obtain better low-altitude detection capabilities.
In addition, the small shield and the large shield are oriented at an angle of 45 degrees, making the blind spot even smaller.
Of course the Yankee Burke 3 also wants to do this, but now it encounters many problems.
"How could there be insufficient power? Don't we use an integrated power system?" asked a naval officer present.
"Yes, it is an integrated power system. However, considering the stability and reliability of the system, we decided to use a normal gearbox to drive the propeller instead of electric propulsion. If you want to use this technology, then we need to get it from Europe.
purchase."
Although the Americans have the advanced LM2500, they do not have advanced electric propulsion technology. It is obviously not in their interests to give orders to Europe for the main power system.
"According to our intelligence, the Renhai class also uses ordinary drive shaft propulsion. They also have various concerns about electric propulsion for warships. We cannot be too aggressive," Lucas continued.
In terms of warship power, the British are the most adventurous, even using all-electric propulsion on their aircraft carriers. However, the Americans do not dare to be so rash and have to use traditional ones.
If you use traditional ones, you will definitely face the problem of insufficient power supply. After all, it is impossible for all the power of the entire ship to be used to generate electricity.
The Burke-class destroyers have always used the ancestral LM2500 gas turbine. The four gas turbines are arranged in twos, facing each other end to end. Therefore, the two axes at the tail of this warship rotate in opposite directions. If viewed from the stern, the left axis rotates counterclockwise.
, the right axis is clockwise. This design can also allow the propellers to generate opposite torsional moments to ensure the balance of the hull. Just look at the butt of the Burke-class and you can see that the propellers on both sides are exactly opposite.
These four gas turbines are only used to drive warships, and special AG9130 gas turbine generator sets are used to generate electricity. There are three units in total, each with a capacity of 2,500 kilowatts.
This system is not enough even if it is used on the Burke 1. Therefore, the Burke-class destroyer can only specialize in one of them. Specifically, it can only do one of the air defense missions and the anti-missile missions, but not both at the same time.
For the captain, this also means that the captain of the destroyer has to face a difficult choice: if there are missiles flying towards him and missiles flying towards the mainland, what should he choose? To protect his own safety,
Or to protect the security of the homeland?
Of course the Americans are aware of the problems involved, so they are also making improvements. In the Burke 2A, the generator set was changed to AG9140RF, and the power of a single unit was increased to 3,000 kilowatts. In the current Burke 3, the auxiliary engine was upgraded to AG9160RF, and the single unit
The power has been increased to 4000 kilowatts, but at the same time, the size has also been further expanded, with a length of 9.88 meters, a width of 2.71 meters, and a height of 3.81 meters. The size of this thing is comparable to the LM2500.
If it were the original Burke 3, it would be very difficult to stuff this thing in. Fortunately, the Navy required an enlarged displacement, so they could easily stuff this kind of auxiliary engine in. It was still the same three units. However, after calculation, it was found that although
The power generated is higher, but the power used is also higher, but it’s still not enough!
What should I do if it's not enough? Just make do.
Forget about the four-sided shield, let’s make a rotating double-sided shield, which is just right and is still a mature product.
The U.S. Navy has mature capabilities.
After all, in the Aegis era, their warships still faced the problem of weak low-altitude detection capabilities, so they also had professional low-altitude blind-filling radars. Up to now, they have developed into mature AN/SPQ-9B radars. This radar uses back-to-back
The double-sided phased array radar uses X-band, and its high installation position gives it the best field of view. It can easily track anti-ship missiles flying across the sea. After all, the U.S. Navy is most worried about being attacked.
Attacked by ultra-low-altitude sea-skimming anti-ship missiles.
Now, dual-band radar consumes too much power, so we might as well use this one instead.
"No, this method is too backward." Swift immediately shook his head: "The warships in the East have already acquired dual-band phased arrays, and our radar must not be worse than theirs."
"Then we can only switch to British gas turbines to free up space in our engine room."
These are not just a few amphibious assault ships, this is the main destroyer, which often requires dozens of ships to build. If the British power plant is used, the British will be happy, but what about them? Can they themselves be happy? General Electric
The company will lodge a serious protest!
"Our radar is not bad, and it is a mature technology. Now, what we need most is to build this kind of warship as soon as possible!" the officer on the side said.
"Okay." Swift compromised: "Let's use this radar. Can this radar share data with our SPY-6?"
"Sorry, this can't be done yet, but once the software is debugged, it should still be possible."
Swift frowned again. If data cannot be shared or integrated into a system, is it still called dual-band?
The advantage of dual-band radars is that they complement each other's blind spots. The two must be integrated together. When one radar searches for data, it can be passed to the other radar. The large shield and small shield work together to form an unbreakable protective umbrella.
What now?
In order to save power, just use a rotating shield, but these two shields still can't share data! Can it still compete with 055? It's the same level as 052DL! One main radar and one low-altitude blinding radar
.
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content! Where is our powerful technology in the United States?
However, this integration does not require changes to the hardware, it only requires upgrading the software. This is not possible now, but in the future, it may be possible.
The U.S. Aegis system has had almost no hardware changes since it was put into use in the 1980s. However, through software upgrades, the performance has been upgraded again and again, not to mention the radar system, even missiles, torpedoes, etc.
Weapons, now they are also taking the path of software upgrades.
The current Aegis system software has been upgraded to baseline 9. This Burke 3 will be improved to baseline 10, and will continue to be upgraded in the future to obtain powerful performance through upgrading.
In order to start work as soon as possible, we have to endure this.
Swift gritted his teeth: "Okay, let's wait for the upgrade in the future. Do you have a design drawing? Show us."
"Of course." Lucas turned on the computer and put on the projection. He said smugly: "Everyone, what you are about to see is the most advanced Burke 3 destroyer!"
Everyone opened their eyes wide and looked at the screen. What did they see? On the ancestral clothes drying pole, there was the small rotating array radar just mentioned. There were other complex antennas on it. Below it was the bridge. Four
The area phased array radar is placed at a 45-degree angle, with vertical transmitters at the front and rear. The entire warship looks like an enlarged version of a simple Burke 2.
Look at the 055 again. It has a fully stealthy shape and an extremely simple appearance. There are various shields attached to the integrated radio frequency mast. Look at our own side. This kind of warship has continued its previous rough route. At this moment, Swift can no longer bear it.
He was stunned and shouted: "Is this your product? You have spent so long time and applied for so much research and development funds, just to enlarge the Burke-class destroyer and then hand it over to the Navy?"
"Sir Swift, please calm down." Lucas quickly explained: "Of course we know the needs of the Navy, but we also have to be realistic. We know that the most urgent thing for the Navy right now is to start construction as soon as possible. If that's the case
If so, we must keep the original structure as unchanged as possible, so that we don’t need to do electromagnetic compatibility tests. If we use advanced comprehensive radio frequency technology, then we need to do all the supporting experiments, which not only costs a lot of money,
We still have to face the problem of a two- to three-year research and development cycle. Everyone, it is not a simple matter to remove all our existing radar equipment and then use several shields to undertake related tasks. Think about DDG
-1000 project delays!”
This is a very puzzling thing. It is obvious that the Americans have spent a lot of money on the DDG-1000 project, and have also verified many technologies on it, such as the integrated electric propulsion of the whole ship, such as integrated radio frequency technology, such as advanced ship
gun system, etc. However, these technologies cannot be transplanted to Burke 3, so that Burke 3 is a simple upgrade of Burke 2, without much change from the inside out.
Why?
Only the Yankees know this well. The result of using advanced technology is immaturity!
Take the power system as an example. They used two MT30 and two 4500 gas turbines as the power system of the warship. They were all used to generate electricity. There was no problem in driving the DDG-1000 of more than 14,000 tons. It was said that it would be transplanted to Burke 3
It's fine, but why don't Americans use it?
Of course it's because of the immaturity of the ship's integrated power system! For a warship that often sails at sea, it will definitely be affected by the moisture on the sea. However, the system of the Yankees often loses its lock due to moisture. A serious incident
, a lock suddenly fell while passing through the Panama Canal, almost paralyzing the canal.
Therefore, they chose their own gas turbine on the Burke 3 and used conventional propulsion. At least the brake failure would not affect the power system.
Because it is not an integrated power system, the power supply must be insufficient and the dual-band radar on the DDG-1000 cannot be used.
Speaking of DDG-1000, the dual-band radar on it is also quite impressive. It uses the world's first dual-band radar, including the X-band SPY-3 radar and the S-band SPY-4 radar. In theory,
These radars are very powerful. The former focuses on low-altitude detection, especially the search for Soviet-style supersonic sea-skimming anti-ship missiles. It can detect them in advance and indicate targets for the missiles, such as Sea Sparrows, standard missiles, etc. After all, X-band
The accuracy is very high. With it, the Yankees no longer need target illumination radar. The previous Aegis system was subject to this limitation and was unable to achieve true anti-saturation attack capability.
As for the latter, it is even stronger. It is the main radar. It can detect whether it is low altitude or high altitude. The range exceeds 500 kilometers. Moreover, the two radars can also exchange data. For example, when one of the radars
When you are attracted by a target coming from a certain direction and cannot separate the beam, the radar on the other side can take over the scanning, saving you from being shot in the face.
However, such an excellent radar system cannot be integrated into Burke 3 because of insufficient power!
On the Burke 3, these previous radars were not used, but the brand-new SPY-6 radar was used. Looking at the number, it is easy to think that this radar will be more advanced. In fact, this is purely a misunderstanding, because SPY-6
6 radar is a low-cost radar developed because the SPY-4 radar was too expensive.
The Americans have developed a combination of SPY-3 and SPY-4, and have been quite confident for a long time. They hope that these two radars can replace the many radars on hand. For example, the SPY-3 radar can replace the SPQ-9A.
/B low-altitude blinding radar, SPS-67 search radar, search illumination radar supporting the MK23/MK91 fire control system, SPN-41/46 air traffic control radar, etc. From this point of view, this radar has great potential. As for the SPY-4
, which can be used as the main radar in the future.
This chapter is not finished yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content! However, the price is unfortunately high! The radars that these brothers originally planned to replace are still alive and well, and Burke 3 continues to use the SPQ-9 radar.
, but they were shelved because they were too expensive. Even the third ship of DDG-1000 was so expensive that it even omitted the main SPY-4 radar!
Later it was the turn of the SPY-5. This is a cheap three-sided phased array radar, placed on the three sides of the tetrahedron of the bridge. The Americans are also aware of the disadvantages of high price, so they are no longer rich, but
, the response was mediocre after its launch.
Next it was the turn of the SPY-6. During the development stage of this radar, the cost-first advantage was implemented, using mature technology as much as possible, and saving as much money as possible. Therefore, this radar was used in the Burke 3.
Although SPY-6 is cheap, its power is not low. If it is turned on at full power, the lights of the entire ship will probably be dimmed, let alone another set of phased array radars.
Insufficient power, how to break it?
Since dual-band is not possible and speed is required, what else can we do? Just leave it as it is and upgrade it a little, which is cheaper.
"Moreover, we are also thinking about the navy. After all, what we are building now is Burke 3, which is very similar to our previous Burke class. This is right. If we make a stealth modification, after it is built, we will find that it is similar to the Burke class.
Dongfang's 055 is very similar, so what will the world say about us?" Lucas still spoke plausibly.
Yes, he has this rhetoric.
The warships we are building now are at least unique. If we also build a stealth model, and the appearance is the same as the 055, wouldn't it be embarrassing if it was spread out?
Everyone's faces were ugly.
The navy's main carrier-based aircraft has been experiencing constant twists and turns. Even if the X-32 plan was first determined, the navy is now more inclined to the X-35 and has even begun to place orders. After all, the performance of the Flying Toad is too poor.
.
However, this has also led to lagging behind. Moreover, if the X-35 is selected in the future, like Dongfang’s fourth-generation stealth aircraft, the outside world will definitely criticize them for taking the path of the Orientals. The carrier-based aircraft has gone, but what about this warship? It will also go
The same road as the East?
Shameful.
Swift gritted his teeth and continued to look at other aspects.
"What is this hair hanging system used for?"
"Currently, we believe that there is no time to develop a vertical hair unit larger than Dongfang, so we are mixing the existing MK41 and MK57 vertical hair systems. Specifically, MK41 is used in the front and MK57 is used in the rear.
, This can meet the navy’s usage needs for a long time to come.”
Dongfang uses a hair drop system with a diameter of 850 mm and a length of nine meters. It is the largest hair drop system in the world and is larger than the American one.
The MK41 hanging hair commonly used by Americans. In simple terms, this hanging hair is 635 mm. In detail, it is a standard module with eight launch tubes. This module belongs to an independent launching unit with a length of 3.17 meters.
, width 2.08 meters, depth 7.67 meters.
There are eight openings on this module. Each opening is a square with a side length of 635 mm. Inside, three types of launch tubes can be installed, codenamed MK13, MK15 and MK14. The first two are used to launch standard missiles and missiles respectively.
The Aslok missile is 5.79 meters long, and the latter is used to launch the Tomahawk, which is 6.71 meters long. It is also possible to mix missiles smaller than this.
It can be seen that the biggest thing MK41 can launch is the Tomahawk, which can no longer meet future needs. Therefore, the Americans have made the MK57 vertical hair. This vertical hair is a structure of four tubes and one unit. Each unit weighs
15.24 tons, length 4.33 meters, width 2.29 meters, height 7.925 meters. These four tubes are a single row structure. The side length of each missile silo is 710 mm and the depth is 7.19 meters.
The latter was larger and could launch heavy missiles, but it was still not big enough. Later, when the Americans had hypersonic missiles, they found that they were not enough, so they had to remove the naval gun in front of the DDG-1000 and install this
Regarding the specialized launching device for hypersonic missiles, the Yankees were the first to propose universal launchers, but in the end they took the path of professional launchers, which is very sad.
However, the DDG-1000 project at least left some useful things for the Americans. Although this MK57 is not big enough, it is at least better than the MK-41! The only flaw is that it was originally designed according to the side vertical hair.
So there are four groups of one unit, but it’s not a big problem, just arrange them at the back of the warship.
Using two different hair hangers on a warship to install different weapons increases the flexibility, which the navy should like.
However, when Lucas looked at the expressions of the officers present, it seemed that no one could laugh. What? Isn’t it bad to dislike our Burke 3? This is the most advanced 10,000-ton engine in the world!
"Everyone, our Burke 3 may not look that high-end, but we guarantee that the technology of this destroyer is the most mature. As long as the Navy passes the review and Congress approves the funds, construction can start at any time, and the price is
Cheap enough for mass production!" Lucas said.
Swift let out a long sigh. Cheap prices and mass production are the most important things! How many detours has the Navy made over the years?