SHIPBORNE MISSILE LAUNCHERS

Yuri Ivanov
Head and Chief Designer of KBM State Engineering Design Bureau

Vyacheslav Krasilnikov
Deputy Chief Designer

For cruise missiles, delivered to missile bases and ships in container-launchers, specific launch mounts have been developed. These mounts provide for firing the missiles, storage of the missiles aboard ship, and loading of container-launchers onto a ship in rough seas without impacts.

he Soviet Union was the first maritime nation to devise and build missile boats armed with antiship cruise missiles. To fire the missiles, it was necessary to develop various equipment, including low-weight elements of a missile system.

Basalt antiship missile launchers

The KBM Engineering Design Bureau, commissioned to develop and produce prototypes of a container-type stationary missile launchers, managed to achieve this goal by using a high-strength weldable aluminum-magnesium alloy to manufacture containers, covers and other body parts. This material created specifically for maritime aplications met all requirements for missile launchers, except one: it was not clear how this alloy would withstand the corrosive effects of the solid-propellant gas jet of a missile booster. The first live firings of missiles fitted with solidpropellant boosters revealed that all fears and doubts of developers were well founded. The launcher withstood only one missile launch. Conduct of extensive research and incorporation of a number of improvements in the launcher design allowed developers to produce a launcher made from the aluminum-magnesium alloy that withstood dozens of firings without repair. Thus, this alloy was adopted as the main material to manufacture the launcher's body structures, thereby reducing their weight 2-3 times compared to steel launchers.

The use of pressed aluminum-magnesium alloy sheets in virtually all body elements allowed developers to create the Bal-E coastal mobile missile system mounted on the MAZ-543M truck chassis, currently in production, for which the weight of the carried equipment played even more vital role than for missile boats.

The next step to improve the missile launcher was to develop and introduce a modular design concept. The essence of the modular concept consisted in the development of different structural elements designed to assemble different missile launchers for use on various types and classes of ships.

Quadruple missile container

For example, a family of launchers intended for the Moskit missile system was created in this way. The launchers were comprised of one-missile or two-missile container modules, a hydraulic module, shock-absorbing module and control console. All modules were made from standardized structural elements. From these elements the following types of launchers were developed:
– vertical twin launcher;
– horizontal twin launcher;
– triple launcher;
– quadruple launcher.

In each of the aforementioned launchers, provision could be made for elevation to the launching or loading angle and all of them were provided with an impact absorption system.

The time required to develop and manufacture the new launcher that fully meets the carrier-ship requirements is shorter while the costs incurred in the design and launching of production are lower. The high degree of commonality of constituent elements simplifies and radically reduces operation, maintenance and repair costs.

Metel-Rastrub missile launcher

The launcher's maximum delivery set includes four missile containers assembled into one unit, a hydraulic unit designed to feed the working fluid to actuating mechanisms, elevating mechanism, torsion-type impact absorption unit, control console from which commands are sent to the actuating mechanisms, as well as indicating and warning devices.

A container is basically a tube welded from pressed aluminum-magnesium sheets. The container's top and bottom have spherical covers fitted with hydraulic drives designed to open and close them. There are guides inside the container on which the missile slides during the launch. The container is also outfitted with mechanisms to lock and unlock a missile, and an electrical connector intended to connect the missile with the ship's missile launch control system.

Uran antiship cruise missile launcher

Some other launchers, for example, those of the Medvedka antisubmarine missile and SS-N-14 missile systems, in addition to the aforementioned facilities, are equipped with a platform permitting the launcher to be turned to the desired firing plane.

For cruise missiles, delivered to missile bases and ships in container-launchers, specific launch mounts have been developed. These mounts provide for firing the missiles, storage of the missiles aboard ship, and loading of container-launchers onto a ship in rough seas without impacts. The launch mounts reduce the effect on the missile of overloads occurring due to the ship motion. They also reduce impact and impulse overloads caused by detonation of mines or bombs near the ship. These overloads are reduced to the level that can be withstood by the missiles. The launch mount of this type is essentially a welded frame with the container-launcher mounting and locking elements arranged on its top. The bottom part of the frame has funnel-shaped catchers which engage with fixed pillars on the ship's deck when the frame in assembly with a container-launcher is loaded onto the ship. The pillars can be set at any place on the ship's deck. They are fitted with spring shock-absorbing devices that reduce overloads on the missile when a container-launcher is being mounted aboard the ship. Moreover, they reduce overloads on the missiles aboard the ship during its routine activities. The wire bundles of the launch mount connect the missile's onboard control system with the ship's missile launch control system.

The KBM Engineering Design Bureau has also developed a number of other launchers intended for antiship, antisubmarine, antitorpedo, ECM and other shipborne systems.