280mm MRL - RS 80

JFC Fuller

JFC Fuller

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PMN1,

I don't know about Foil but I understand that Hunting Engineering was the RS80 contractor.
 
RS80 was a tri-national program like SP70 and used a similar Leopard 1 derived hull. The prime industry partners were MBB, Hunting Engineering and Oto Melara. MBB was responsible for the sub-munitions dispensed by the rocket which of the same type as those deployed by their MW-1 (Strebo) Tornado dispenser. Six rockets were carried by each launcher and they had a range of 40-60km.

Britain withdrew from RS80 in 1975 which settled a dispute over the rocket being tailored for accuracy (British requirement) or reduced time of flight (Germans and Italians). The latter two stayed with the project with FSD in 1976 until being superseded by MRLS (which itself wasn’t contracted until 1977 as GSRS/General Support Rocket System). The Germans called RS80 MARS/Mittlere Artillerieraketensystem which they later reused on the MLRS.

I have a picture on file and will upload it here once I find it.

Edit: Here is a tiny picture from Google. I'm sure I have something better on file but.
 

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Abraham Gubler said:
RS80 was a tri-national program like SP70 and used a similar Leopard 1 derived hull. The prime industry partners were MBB, Hunting Engineering and Oto Melara. MBB was responsible for the sub-munitions dispensed by the rocket which of the same type as those deployed by their MW-1 (Strebo) Tornado dispenser. Six rockets were carried by each launcher and they had a range of 40-60km.

Britain withdrew from RS80 in 1975 which settled a dispute over the rocket being tailored for accuracy (British requirement) or reduced time of flight (Germans and Italians). The latter two stayed with the project with FSD in 1976 until being superseded by MRLS (which itself wasn’t contracted until 1977 as GSRS/General Support Rocket System). The Germans called RS80 MARS/Mittlere Artillerieraketensystem which they later reused on the MLRS.

I have a picture on file and will upload it here once I find it.

Edit: Here is a tiny picture from Google. I'm sure I have something better on file but.
Click to expand...

Presumably quite a heavy system then if using a tank hull.

The rockets would seem to be at least 4/5th the length of the Leopard 1 hull??

Wonder why 3 each side, looks like it could have been 4 with very little modification.
 
Anyone have the planned dimensions for RS80 and planned payload(s)?
 
I've never seen specs given out other then that is already posted. But its pretty easy to eyeball that they are about ~20ft long if that is a stock Leopard 1 hull. In comparison M26 rockets for MLRS are ~13ft long, which fits well with these things having outright twice the design range at an earlier date. They should be in the one short ton class to reach 60km with a useful dumb cluster payload in that event. MLRS accuracy is already so bad any given rocket and indeed, most of the entire pattern can completely miss the aim point at max range, so that makes a lighter warhead kind of unlikely.


They are in any event plainly much bigger then a M26 or Russian Uragan series rocket which are ~700lb class weapons. In fact they seem a lot like Smerch class rockets, which would be a good reason why not very many are carried. BM-30 loaded actually weighs as much as a Leopard I tank, but empty weight of the truck platform would be much less which would allow far more rockets to be carried. It isn't all about having 'space' when that launcher is power operated and the vehicle is significantly armored.
 
Are we assuming that the rocket fills the full length of the tube? I'd have thought it might have fill one a part of the tube, the rest acting as a barrel to guide it on the start of its trajectory. These were unguided rockets IIRC.
 
Artillery rockets normally do fill almost the complete barrel, a smoothbore barrel exited at low velocity will provide very little stabilization. In fact such tube launched rockets are normally spin stabilized and use deploying fins to spin themselves, so you want them out of the barrel as quickly as possible so the fins can unfold.
 
Are you sure this system was smoothbore? I seem to remember many years ago seeing pictures of the muzzles of these tubes and they were rifled, but I could be mistaken on that, I admit.

I would have said also that spin stabilisation was achieve far easier without fins, than with them, because of the drag associated and the time required for them to flip out, after the rocket has left the tube. Most spin-stabilised rockets utilise exhaust gases to start the rocket spinning, even in the tube.

Either way, why such a long tube? I suspect you'll find that the rocket fills only a third to half the length of the tube, not its whole length, to enable the rocket to "spin up" before exiting the muzzle of the tube and gaining some level of gyroscopic stability.
 
Finally found my pictures saved from the internet years ago. Also a bit more info: Oto Merlara's involvement was limited to build an anti personnel warhead for the Italian version. Tubes look pretty smoothbore but with two rails?
 

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It was a long time ago. Obviously I was mistaken about the rifling. I apologise.
 
Nice!!

I'm confident that Greg (aka GTX) has some pics of this design in either model or mock-up form!! :eek:

Regards
Pioneer
 
Looks like the one discussed here: http://www.secretprojects.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=14896.35
 
Great stuff Tround we've been data poor on the RS80. Perhaps a super keen mod could combine the two threads or even pull all the RS80 stuff out of the British MRL thread and combine it here.

topics split
 
I agree with you, something must be made. ( Jemiba has a job to make )

cordially
 
Thanks tround. A SP-70 chassis with a RS-80 launcher. Could you tell us the source ?
 
Of course .
It's a article from the FAMAG (Field artillery magazine ) :" Do we need a Multiple Rocket Launcher ? " by LTC Allan R. Stern .
I don't know if the magazine is still aviable on the NET . If you are interested i can make a PDF .
 
Some pictures of prototype models (RS80, SP70)
http://forum.worldoftanks.eu/index.php?/topic/284739-shrivenham-trip-pt1/
Many greetings
 
image from above link attached.

cheers,
Robin.
 

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Rickshaw said:
It was a long time ago. Obviously I was mistaken about the rifling. I apologise.
Click to expand...

A bit late, but the M270's tubes are rifled FWIW. The most recent GMLRS-ER uses canards for stabilization and does away with the rifling, allowing it to achieve about twice the range or so over legacy GMLRS because it's slightly fatter or something.

M270 being the immediate successor of RS80 in German inventory and having its rockets specifically redesigned to incorporate the German AT2 mine (intended to be the primary weapon of RS80) I guess counts for this thread.
 
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What was the use case for these? Same as the Smerch? Not that I really know what the Soviets wanted with such a big rocket. Rear area interdiction?
 
Cjc said:
What was the use case for these? Same as the Smerch? Not that I really know what the Soviets wanted with such a big rocket. Rear area interdiction?
Click to expand...

Yes they were intended to fire the AT2 mine at deep targets i.e. second echelon MRRs and stuff. The Germans didn't have a SOTAS so they couldn't actually see what they were shooting at. The entire plan was to just saturate every roadway going west with tons of landmines and slow the Russians down.

The failure of RS80 is why the M270 MARS (BRD version) has AT2 land mines.
 
9f18sggh3n461.jpg
 

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