M270 MLRS and M142 HIMARS Developments

sferrin said:
We're not threatening to invade them.
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The U.S. is hardly treating them like a five eyes ally since WWII either. There is an open economic war, and while absorption of them as the 51st state is not realistic, the idea of absorption of the U.S. as the 17th province would make the current administration froth at the mouth.
 
Orionblamblam said:
Looks like it started to tank in mid October, 2024.
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I agree with the sentiment that all arms deals are negotiated ahead of time with specific limitations discussed, mitigated, or accepted.

It would also be true that all arms purchases are political and that alternative sources would be used merely to send a message, were a country with a robust production schedule and no strings attached on offer to Europeans.
 
www.dvidshub.net

Project Convergence Capstone 5

An Autonomous Multi-Domain Launcher experiments with Direct Support Fire Technology during Project Convergence-Capstone 5 on Fort Irwin, Calif. PC-C5 serves as a venue for the Joint services and Multinational allies to integrate and aggressively transform the operations of future warfighters...
www.dvidshub.net www.dvidshub.net
defence-industry.eu

U.S. Army showcases advanced Autonomous Multi-Domain Launcher (AMDL) at Project Convergence-Capstone 5

The U.S. Army has unveiled significant advancements in autonomous warfare technology through the successful experimentation of the Autonomous Multi-Domain Launcher (AMDL) during Project Convergence-Capstone 5 (PC-C5).
defence-industry.eu defence-industry.eu
 
Anduril awarded a contract to certify a 4.75-inch rocket motor that could lead to a 30-round rocket pod for MLRS/HIMARS. Goal is again, affordable volume fire. I'd expect some sort of guidance but maybe not high precision.

www.defensenews.com

To amass cheap rockets, US Army picks Anduril to develop solid motor

Anduril Industries will develop and qualify a 4.75-inch solid rocket motor for long-range precision rocket artillery.
www.defensenews.com www.defensenews.com
 
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TomS said:
Anduril awarded a contract to certify a 4.75-inch rocket motor that could lead to a 30-rounch rocket pod for MLRS/HIMARS. Goal is again, affordable volume fire. I'd expect some sort of guidance but maybe not high precision.

www.defensenews.com

To amass cheap rockets, US Army picks Anduril to develop solid motor

Anduril Industries will develop and qualify a 4.75-inch solid rocket motor for long-range precision rocket artillery.
www.defensenews.com www.defensenews.com
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No reason not to put an INS/GPS on it. It will require some guidance or else it’s just a BM-21 by another name.
 
TomS said:
Anduril awarded a contract to certify a 4.75-inch rocket motor that could lead to a 30-rounch rocket pod for MLRS/HIMARS. Goal is again, affordable volume fire. I'd expect some sort of guidance but maybe not high precision.

www.defensenews.com

To amass cheap rockets, US Army picks Anduril to develop solid motor

Anduril Industries will develop and qualify a 4.75-inch solid rocket motor for long-range precision rocket artillery.
www.defensenews.com www.defensenews.com
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I mean with 30 shots in BM-21 style you only need them just tight enough for an even field for an supression attack. I would even dare to say that lower precision (than GMLRS) is a good thing
 
TomS said:
Or possibly just INS. All you want out of guidance for this is an even dispersal pattern to replace cluster munitions.
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The best option will be the one that allows you to tailor the pattern for the terrian and needs.

Like you will want a widely dispersed pattern if you are targeting troops in the open to maximize the fragmentation coverage.

But if you are targeting a vehicle convoy you will want a tighter spread or basically a LINE to more likley damage the vehicles and put it out of commission. Especially if you are using warheads with high density reactive materials that basically make the shrapnel minibombs.

To say nothing of being able to basically seeing a trench line and just...

Put a rocket in it at the center of every zig of the zag the trench use to minimize shrapnel coverage. Allowing to clear out a massive piece of fortifications.

Plus if the INS good enough, which is an EXTREMELY LOW BAR you have to build down to met, you can air burst the rockets at the correct height for best effects for a given terrian.

With some simple gear you can have ALOT of options with a single warhead type.
 
TomS said:
Or possibly just INS. All you want out of guidance for this is an even dispersal pattern to replace cluster munitions.
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If you are putting actuated fins and an INS system on it, why would you skimp on the GPS? If you want more dispersal, adjust your aim points accordingly. And quite honestly I do not think the army is that interested in suppressing fire these days - given target generation tools like Prometheus/Firestorm/SHOT, there’s little reason not to precisely engage point targets en mass. ~120mm would have a decent chance of knocking out an AFV with a JDAM like level of precision. If there’s jamming, settle for less damage or engage the jammer with something beefier.
 
Josh_TN said:
If you are putting actuated fins and an INS system on it, why would you skimp on the GPS? If you want more dispersal, adjust your aim points accordingly. And quite honestly I do not think the army is that interested in suppressing fire these days - given target generation tools like Prometheus/Firestorm/SHOT, there’s little reason not to precisely engage point targets en mass. ~120mm would have a decent chance of knocking out an AFV with a JDAM like level of precision. If there’s jamming, settle for less damage or engage the jammer with something beefier.
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Can your 12pmm Go into what 40-70km? The Edepro G2000/52 can go 52km alone (or lets take the G2000's 42km). With ALITEC we can expect up to 40% range increase so 58,8- 72,8 km range. An INS allows the system to be relativ precise and still small that said i wouldn't say GPS isn't possible to see. Hey if they want even IR Guidance could be choosen: https://www.twz.com/21023/israeli-m...grad-artillery-rockets-into-precision-weapons .

Side question but do we know the length? Most BM-21 like missiles are only around 3m at most long but we have space for mutch morw
 
Josh_TN said:
If you are putting actuated fins and an INS system on it, why would you skimp on the GPS?
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Mostly because of spoofing. If you can reliably reject spoofing, sure, keep GPS, but I'm not sure we can count on that. Pure INS sidesteps the whole issue of whether or not you can trust your GPS signal.

Alternatively, you could adopt something like the EPIK guidance proposed by Rafael as a retrofit to BM-21 rockets. Optical image matching, using reference image collected by your targeting assets (drones, observers, etc.)
 
TomS said:
Mostly because of spoofing. If you can reliably reject spoofing, sure, keep GPS, but I'm not sure we can count on that. Pure INS sidesteps the whole issue of whether or not you can trust your GPS signal.

Alternatively, you could adopt something like the EPIK guidance proposed by Rafael as a retrofit to BM-21 rockets. Optical image matching, using reference image collected by your targeting assets (drones, observers, etc.)
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Is spoofing really a problem? I would think mimicking the Pcode, let alone the future MCode, very difficult. I had assumed military receivers simply are jammed on the carrier frequency, denying any signal, forcing the INS to do all the work. If anything I would just want an INS only mode, were it truly necessary, rather then removing GPS altogether.

I cannot imagine a terminal seeker is cost effective on a rocket this small; I assume low cost is a big driver of the project and seeker volume will cut into the rather mild HE content at this caliber.
 
Josh_TN said:
Is spoofing really a problem? I would think mimicking the Pcode, let alone the future MCode, very difficult. I had assumed military receivers simply are jammed on the carrier frequency, denying any signal, forcing the INS to do all the work. If anything I would just want an INS only mode, were it truly necessary, rather then removing GPS altogether.

I cannot imagine a terminal seeker is cost effective on a rocket this small; I assume low cost is a big driver of the project and seeker volume will cut into the rather mild HE content at this caliber.
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Its a bolt on kit which also Houses the whole guidance (IR/EO, Laser, INS and GPS) with the control surfaces. That said considering the possible range of the rocket alone while being less than ¾ of the length of the Pod it should be possible. Even a larger than 20kg warhead is more than possible.
 
TomS said:
Or possibly just INS. All you want out of guidance for this is an even dispersal pattern to replace cluster munitions.
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Is anyone going to want to do that now though?

The recent country announcements around the land mine treaty I suspect will be followed by announcements on the cluster munitions convention...
 
timmymagic said:
Is anyone going to want to do that now though?

The recent country announcements around the land mine treaty I suspect will be followed by announcements on the cluster munitions convention...
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I mean you can combine it. Give or take your average speed of mach 1 and a ins with 1 degree per hour drift rate give you an CPS of less than 10m. Perfect for having a tight cluster pattern on your target.
 
Josh_TN said:
I do not think the army is that interested in suppressing fire these days - given target generation tools like Prometheus/Firestorm/SHOT,
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NMaude said:
And IIRC there are mass-produced US GPS-jammer HOJ seekers that enable the likes of GMLRS and SDBI to home in on the anti-GPS jammers.
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I'm pretty sure that that is still in the research phase as per an article from maybe a year ago? Something about the military funding a college to do the r & d, but I don't believe that anything is yet in production. Could be wrong, though.
 
Josh_TN said:
Is spoofing really a problem? I would think mimicking the Pcode, let alone the future MCode, very difficult. I had assumed military receivers simply are jammed on the carrier frequency, denying any signal, forcing the INS to do all the work. If anything I would just want an INS only mode, were it truly necessary, rather then removing GPS altogether.

I cannot imagine a terminal seeker is cost effective on a rocket this small; I assume low cost is a big driver of the project and seeker volume will cut into the rather mild HE content at this caliber.
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I believe that Russia is both jamming & spoofing, which, as you said, is apparently quite sophisticated, although I don't know nearly enough about the subject.

As for the terminal seeker being cost effective, if APKWS is deemed to be sufficiently affordable to take out drones, why wouldn't the same be the case for a Grad round, for example?
 
Joint Soviet Fighter said:
As for the terminal seeker being cost effective, if APKWS is deemed to be sufficiently affordable to take out drones, why wouldn't the same be the case for a Grad round, for example?
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If you can lase the target, sure. That probably is not a common situation.
 
kqcke for you said:
I mean with 30 shots in BM-21 style you only need them just tight enough for an even field for an supression attack. I would even dare to say that lower precision (than GMLRS) is a good thing
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With The Grad, if you fill the top row with ten rounds, leave the rest empty, & then fire, the result is actually a pretty straight line, iirc, so that would at least be more accurate, but loading anything more than the first two rows & then letting the rockets fly, between the shaking & everything else, winds up being a waste. I want to say that China opts for cluster munitions in their standard Grads, which makes much more sense than just firing wildly, but I've never seen that in action.

As an experiment, someone should assemble 40 of these, below, give every crew/group the same target, & then let them perform their own calculations before launching. Obviously, it won't be as precise as HIMARS/UMPK, but I would be extremely interested to see "the spread", as it were.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRfZVfMpkVM
 
Joint Soviet Fighter said:
I'm pretty sure that that is still in the research phase as per an article from maybe a year ago? Something about the military funding a college to do the r & d, but I don't believe that anything is yet in production. Could be wrong, though.
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In procurement for Ukrainian JDAM-ER (and presumably some US systems as well) last year. In that tread was also a demo from a few years ago using SDB-II. Seems likely to be a fielded capability at this point.

Post in thread 'Home-on-GPS jam guidance' https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/home-on-gps-jam-guidance.32404/post-686023
 
NMaude said:
Do you have a link to this article?
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My mistake - it's a company as opposed to a college with the work being stated to be completed by October 1st of this year as per the contract &, as TomS posted with the link to that thread, I guess that it's been in development for a while, now, but I don't know if it's actually in service, at this point. Sorry about that.

theaviationist.com

Ukrainian JDAM-ERs Will Be Equipped With Home-On GPS Jam Seekers

The upgrade is meant to counter the proliferation of Russian EW systems that caused the effectiveness of Ukrainian Excalibur GPS-guided artillery rounds
theaviationist.com theaviationist.com

 

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