NPOMash 3M22 Zircon Hypersonic Missile

[mokahete]

I still doubt zircon is purely rocket powered. Even assuming liquid fuel, look at size and weight of air launched missiles like KH-22. Now imagine how much the first stage external booster would have to struggle with load. An air breathing engine is always going to be more mass efficient and every Soviet/Russian surface launched supersonic missile I can think of was an air breather. It would be quite surprising if Zircon was a purely rocket driven missile. Additionally , liquid fuel would raise a lot of safety issues for ship/sub use. The Russians have used liquid fueled SLBMs in the past but I do not believe for some decades as the USSR; the USN never accepted the practice with early exception of Regulous.

Na, I'm of the belief that it uses solid fuel.

Well large part of my believing zircon to be rocket sustained is based on this Indian missile that called "Shaurya" as mentioned before.


Length~10m, width~0.74m, weight 6+tons.
Uses solid fuel, two stage missile.

Shaurya surfaces as India’s underwater nuclear missile: New “hybrid” technology more advanced than China’s or Pakistan’s

www.ajaishukla.com

Here's the article from 2010.
*******Shaurya surfaces as India’s underwater nuclear missile: New “hybrid” technology more advanced than China’s or Pakistan’s
By Ajai Shukla
Defexpo 2010, New Delhi

The country’s top defence scientist has, for the first time, revealed that India’s new Shaurya missile, which can carry a one-ton nuclear warhead over a distance of 750 kilometers, is specially designed to be fired from Indian submarines, and could form the crucial third leg of India’s nuclear deterrent.

If launched from a submarine off the China coast, it is capable of reaching many of China’s major cities, including Beijing, Nanjing and Shanghai.

Air and land-based nuclear weapons are delivered to their targets by fighter aircraft and ballistic missiles respectively. Since these can be knocked out by an enemy first strike, the most reliable nuclear deterrent has traditionally been underwater, missiles hidden in a submarine.

Dr VK Saraswat, the DRDO chief and Scientific Advisor to the Defence Minister, revealed to Business Standard at the ongoing Defexpo 2010, “We have designed the Shaurya so that it can be launched from under water as easily as from land. The gas-filled canister that houses the missile fits easily into a submarine. The underwater leg of the nuclear triad needs to be totally reliable and needs a state-of-the-art missile.”

India’s undersea deterrent has so far revolved around the K-15 ballistic missile, built with significant help from Russia. The K-15 was to equip the INS Arihant, India’s lone nuclear-powered submarine, which is being constructed in Visakhapatnam. But now, after rigorous underwater testing, the Shaurya could be the mainstay of Arihant’s arsenal.

“The Shaurya was developed from ground up as a submarine-capable missile”, confirms Dr Prahlada, the top DRDO scientist responsible for liaising with the military. “Every piece of technology for fitting it in a submarine is already in place.”

Shortly before the Defexpo 2010, Dr Saraswat had publicly stated that India’s missile technology was ahead of China’s and Pakistan’s.

Now top DRDO scientists have revealed that the Shaurya is not a ballistic missile, as it has been thought to be; it is actually a hypersonic cruise missile, which never leaves the atmosphere. A ballistic missile is like a stone being lobbed towards a target. Rockets toss it upwards and towards the target; after the rocket burns out, gravity pulls the missile warhead down towards the target. Buffeted by wind and re-entry forces, accuracy is a problem; and, since the ballistic missile’s path is predictable, shooting it down is relatively easy.

The Shaurya has none of these issues. Its solid-fuel, two-stage rocket accelerates the missile to six times the speed of sound before it reaches an altitude of 40 kilometers (125,000 feet), after which it levels out and cruises towards the target, powered by its onboard fuel. While ballistic missiles cannot correct their course midway, the Shaurya is an intelligent missile. Onboard navigation computers kick in near the target, guiding the missile to the target and eliminating errors that inevitably creep in during its turbulent journey.

The Shaurya, say DRDO sources, will strike within 20-30 metres of its target after travelling 750 kilometres.

Conventional cruise missiles, like the American Tomahawk and the Indo-Russian Brahmos, offer similar accuracy. But their air-breathing engines carry them along slowly, rendering them vulnerable to enemy aircraft and missiles. The Shaurya’s solid-fuel, air-independent engine propels it along at hypersonic speeds, leaving enemy fighters and missiles far behind.

“I would say the Shaurya a hybrid propulsion missile”, says Dr Saraswat. “Like a ballistic missile, it is powered by solid fuel. And, like a cruise missile, it can guide itself right up to the target.”

Making the Shaurya even more capable is its ability to manoeuvre, following a twisting path to the target that makes it very difficult to shoot it down. In contrast, a ballistic missile is predictable; its trajectory gives away its target and its path to it."*******

 

[mokahete]

Na, I'm of the belief that it uses solid fuel.

Well large part of my believing zircon to be rocket sustained is based on this Indian missile that called "Shaurya" as mentioned before.
View attachment 767454View attachment 767455
View attachment 767456
Length~10m, width~0.74m, weight 6+tons.
Uses solid fuel, two stage missile.

Shaurya surfaces as India’s underwater nuclear missile: New “hybrid” technology more advanced than China’s or Pakistan’s

www.ajaishukla.com

Here's the article from 2010.
*******Shaurya surfaces as India’s underwater nuclear missile: New “hybrid” technology more advanced than China’s or Pakistan’s
By Ajai Shukla
Defexpo 2010, New Delhi

The country’s top defence scientist has, for the first time, revealed that India’s new Shaurya missile, which can carry a one-ton nuclear warhead over a distance of 750 kilometers, is specially designed to be fired from Indian submarines, and could form the crucial third leg of India’s nuclear deterrent.

If launched from a submarine off the China coast, it is capable of reaching many of China’s major cities, including Beijing, Nanjing and Shanghai.

Air and land-based nuclear weapons are delivered to their targets by fighter aircraft and ballistic missiles respectively. Since these can be knocked out by an enemy first strike, the most reliable nuclear deterrent has traditionally been underwater, missiles hidden in a submarine.

Dr VK Saraswat, the DRDO chief and Scientific Advisor to the Defence Minister, revealed to Business Standard at the ongoing Defexpo 2010, “We have designed the Shaurya so that it can be launched from under water as easily as from land. The gas-filled canister that houses the missile fits easily into a submarine. The underwater leg of the nuclear triad needs to be totally reliable and needs a state-of-the-art missile.”

India’s undersea deterrent has so far revolved around the K-15 ballistic missile, built with significant help from Russia. The K-15 was to equip the INS Arihant, India’s lone nuclear-powered submarine, which is being constructed in Visakhapatnam. But now, after rigorous underwater testing, the Shaurya could be the mainstay of Arihant’s arsenal.

“The Shaurya was developed from ground up as a submarine-capable missile”, confirms Dr Prahlada, the top DRDO scientist responsible for liaising with the military. “Every piece of technology for fitting it in a submarine is already in place.”

Shortly before the Defexpo 2010, Dr Saraswat had publicly stated that India’s missile technology was ahead of China’s and Pakistan’s.

Now top DRDO scientists have revealed that the Shaurya is not a ballistic missile, as it has been thought to be; it is actually a hypersonic cruise missile, which never leaves the atmosphere. A ballistic missile is like a stone being lobbed towards a target. Rockets toss it upwards and towards the target; after the rocket burns out, gravity pulls the missile warhead down towards the target. Buffeted by wind and re-entry forces, accuracy is a problem; and, since the ballistic missile’s path is predictable, shooting it down is relatively easy.

The Shaurya has none of these issues. Its solid-fuel, two-stage rocket accelerates the missile to six times the speed of sound before it reaches an altitude of 40 kilometers (125,000 feet), after which it levels out and cruises towards the target, powered by its onboard fuel. While ballistic missiles cannot correct their course midway, the Shaurya is an intelligent missile. Onboard navigation computers kick in near the target, guiding the missile to the target and eliminating errors that inevitably creep in during its turbulent journey.

The Shaurya, say DRDO sources, will strike within 20-30 metres of its target after travelling 750 kilometres.

Conventional cruise missiles, like the American Tomahawk and the Indo-Russian Brahmos, offer similar accuracy. But their air-breathing engines carry them along slowly, rendering them vulnerable to enemy aircraft and missiles. The Shaurya’s solid-fuel, air-independent engine propels it along at hypersonic speeds, leaving enemy fighters and missiles far behind.

“I would say the Shaurya a hybrid propulsion missile”, says Dr Saraswat. “Like a ballistic missile, it is powered by solid fuel. And, like a cruise missile, it can guide itself right up to the target.”

Making the Shaurya even more capable is its ability to manoeuvre, following a twisting path to the target that makes it very difficult to shoot it down. In contrast, a ballistic missile is predictable; its trajectory gives away its target and its path to it."*******

And in this case the inefficiency penalty seems to go into "weight" rather than size.

Shaurya is ~10 m long, width~0.74m at thd thickest.

X51 is 7.62m long( but it's launched from b52 at 15km altitude, for ground launches, booster needs to be bigger bringing its length closer to 9m)
width at thickest 0.6-0.7m.

So dimensions are/will be fairly similar( with shaurya being slightly larger).



But difference comes in weight.

Shaurya weighs 6+ metric tons.
X51 has empty weight of 1.8 metric tons, full weight will be ~2.3-2.5tons at most.

And both X51 and shaurya Seems to have same max range of ~460+miles (750km).


So if this article is true and if Indians can do it.
Not far fetched to think russians can do something Similar with their zircon.

 

[Forest Green]

I still doubt zircon is purely rocket powered. Even assuming liquid fuel, look at size and weight of air launched missiles like KH-22. Now imagine how much the first stage external booster would have to struggle with load. An air breathing engine is always going to be more mass efficient and every Soviet/Russian surface launched supersonic missile I can think of was an air breather. It would be quite surprising if Zircon was a purely rocket driven missile. Additionally , liquid fuel would raise a lot of safety issues for ship/sub use. The Russians have used liquid fueled SLBMs in the past but I do not believe for some decades as the USSR; the USN never accepted the practice with early exception of Regulus.

ETA: correction: Regulus was jet powered not liquid. So while the USN has had JP on its ships and boats, it has never stored liquid rockets.

A Kh-22 warhead is ~3-4x the weight of a Zircon's though.

 

[mokahete]

A Kh-22 warhead is ~3-4x the weight of a Zircon's though.

And the original design dates back to 1960s.

 

[Josh_TN]

A Kh-22 warhead is ~3-4x the weight of a Zircon's though.

Do we have reliable Zircon warhead weight? I would assume 500-1000kg but I’ve never even seen a guesstimate.

 

[kqcke for you]

Na, I'm of the belief that it uses solid fuel.

Well large part of my believing zircon to be rocket sustained is based on this Indian missile that called "Shaurya" as mentioned before.
View attachment 767454View attachment 767455
View attachment 767456
Length~10m, width~0.74m, weight 6+tons.
Uses solid fuel, two stage missile.

Shaurya surfaces as India’s underwater nuclear missile: New “hybrid” technology more advanced than China’s or Pakistan’s

www.ajaishukla.com

Now top DRDO scientists have revealed that the Shaurya is not a ballistic missile, as it has been thought to be; it is actually a hypersonic cruise missile, which never leaves the atmosphere. A ballistic missile is like a stone being lobbed towards a target. Rockets toss it upwards and towards the target; after the rocket burns out, gravity pulls the missile warhead down towards the target. Buffeted by wind and re-entry forces, accuracy is a problem; and, since the ballistic missile’s path is predictable, shooting it down is relatively easy.

Well having an solid rocket motor slowly burning to coast (more or less) around the same altitude is still something different from a scramjet cruise capability. Also all this stuff about ballistic missiles being easy is well Just an extend of how hard they are to kill. I can make then go fly an unpredictable path too its just ineficient.

The Shaurya has none of these issues. Its solid-fuel, two-stage rocket accelerates the missile to six times the speed of sound before it reaches an altitude of 40 kilometers (125,000 feet), after which it levels out and cruises towards the target, powered by its onboard fuel. While ballistic missiles cannot correct their course midway, the Shaurya is an intelligent missile. Onboard navigation computers kick in near the target, guiding the missile to the target and eliminating errors that inevitably creep in during its turbulent journey.

The Shaurya, say DRDO sources, will strike within 20-30 metres of its target after travelling 750 kilometres.

Conventional cruise missiles, like the American Tomahawk and the Indo-Russian Brahmos, offer similar accuracy. But their air-breathing engines carry them along slowly, rendering them vulnerable to enemy aircraft and missiles. The Shaurya’s solid-fuel, air-independent engine propels it along at hypersonic speeds, leaving enemy fighters and missiles far behind.

Propely it along at hypersonic speeds is an interresting statement as we quickly come to the debate of how long and how far. Using mostly lift, high altitude and a slow burning relativ powerful motor may be enough for some time but not enough. That said a lot of Energy can be regenerated with the terminal dive but it would be very strongly influenced by chance of correction.

“I would say the Shaurya a hybrid propulsion missile”,

That doesnt make sense with the later statement.

says Dr Saraswat. “Like a ballistic missile, it is powered by solid fuel. And, like a cruise missile, it can guide itself right up to the target.”

Well if there ballistic missiles couldnt do it until then its sad...

Making the Shaurya even more capable is its ability to manoeuvre, following a twisting path to the target that makes it very difficult to shoot it down. In contrast, a ballistic missile is predictable; its trajectory gives away its target and its path to it."*******

I mean in theory with the right software most ballistic missiles today could do it too but it would waste a lot of energy hence range.

 

[Josh_TN]

Regarding X-51: note that ~1.5 meters of that length is flow through interstage, completely empty. It is overall a much smaller platform than Russian cruise missiles; it has a rather ungainly stack because it was an experimental system with no intention of weaponization. I use it for comparison of what other scramjets would need to get to operating altitude only because we have hard weights and dimensions for it. Nothing about it would apply to a rocket driven missile.

 

[Dilandu]

Na, I'm of the belief that it uses solid fuel.

Erm, why?

 

[Josh_TN]

I mean in theory with the right software most ballistic missiles today could do it too but it would waste a lot of energy hence range.

Flat trajectories put far more stress on the airframe and most ballistic missiles are not designed for that. Presumably the Indian system uses a sturdier airframe and a slow burning grain of solid fuel for the horizontal part of its flight to extend range and reduce forces on the airframe.

I am still doubtful the Russian weapon works this way; it is significantly smaller.

 

[kqcke for you]

Flat trajectories put far more stress on the airframe and most ballistic missiles are not designed for that.

Sure but its not like we couldnt do it with a "purely" ballistic missile which was my overarching point.

Presumably the Indian system uses a sturdier airframe and a slow burning grain of solid fuel for the horizontal part of its flight to extend range and reduce forces on the airframe.

Yeah only a slow burning or well multiple pulses with relativ slow burn as we see it falling from one altitude to another.

I am still doubtful the Russian weapon works this way; it is significantly smaller.

Yeah it would be interresting how there liquid rocket fuel compares to the solid option of shauruya

 

[mokahete]

Well having an solid rocket motor slowly burning to coast (more or less) around the same altitude is still something different from a scramjet cruise capability. Also all this stuff about ballistic missiles being easy is well Just an extend of how hard they are to kill. I can make then go fly an unpredictable path too its just ineficient.

Propely it along at hypersonic speeds is an interresting statement as we quickly come to the debate of how long and how far. Using mostly lift, high altitude and a slow burning relativ powerful motor may be enough for some time but not enough. That said a lot of Energy can be regenerated with the terminal dive but it would be very strongly influenced by chance of correction.

That doesnt make sense with the later statement.

Well if there ballistic missiles couldnt do it until then its sad...

I mean in theory with the right software most ballistic missiles today could do it too but it would waste a lot of energy hence range.

It does waste lots of energy.
The missile weighs 6+tons.
And the max range is Said to be 750km.

X51 has empty weight of 1.8tons( 2.2-2.5 max weight at most) and has max range of 700+km too.

 

[mokahete]

Flat trajectories put far more stress on the airframe and most ballistic missiles are not designed for that. Presumably the Indian system uses a sturdier airframe and a slow burning grain of solid fuel for the horizontal part of its flight to extend range and reduce forces on the airframe.

I am still doubtful the Russian weapon works this way; it is significantly smaller.

Zircon didn't look any smaller than p800/brahmos in the video released.
And p800/brahmos is ~9m in length with booster.

 

[mokahete]

Erm, why?

Based on that "Shaurya missile".

 

[mokahete]

Well having an solid rocket motor slowly burning to coast (more or less) around the same altitude is still something different from a scramjet cruise capability

Yeah, but it does mimic the flat trajectory of cruise missiles while being at hypersonic speed and has freedom of movement to have an unpredictable path.
And HCM's are hyped due to their flat trajectory at relatively lower altitude at hypersonic speeds and freedom of movement that gives them unpredictable path.

So they do reach similar category in terms of difficulty of interception.

 

[mokahete]

Sure but its not like we couldnt do it with a "purely" ballistic missile which was my overarching point.

It is quite an easy thing to do compared to developing a scramjet.
I already mentioned the ease of making rocket sustained hypersonic missile that can cruise compared to scramjets Like x51.

Countries can take an easy route if they are fine with weight penalty that comes with significant less efficient propulsion or they find it too hard/expensive/ time consuming to develop a scramjet.
Indians took that easy route in past, because they were nowhere near capable of developing a scramjet in early 2000s.

Russians can take similar route.

 

[Scott Kenny]

Regarding X-51: note that ~1.5 meters of that length is flow through interstage, completely empty. It is overall a much smaller platform than Russian cruise missiles; it has a rather ungainly stack because it was an experimental system with no intention of weaponization. I use it for comparison of what other scramjets would need to get to operating altitude only because we have hard weights and dimensions for it. Nothing about it would apply to a rocket driven missile.

I suspect that a weaponized X-51 would replace the flow-through interstage with part of the solid rocket booster.

The annoying part of hypersonics is that you need to be doing Mach 9+ to get into "doing your own weight in TNT in kinetic energy at impact."

 

[Josh_TN]

It does waste lots of energy.
The missile weighs 6+tons.
And the max range is Said to be 750km.

X51 has empty weight of 1.8tons( 2.2-2.5 max weight at most) and has max range of 700+km too.

X-51 uses totally different principles and had no warhead; I used it only as a comparison to an air breathing engine to note that if Zircon is in fact air breathing, it is almost certainly not a pure scramjet.

 

[Josh_TN]

Zircon didn't look any smaller than p800/brahmos in the video released.
And p800/brahmos is ~9m in length with booster.

X-51 used an off the shelf ATACMs booster and 1.3 m worth of empty space for its interstage. The dry weigh of the cruiser itself was < 1500 lbs, or about double just the warhead on the P800. They are not remotely the same size in any dimensions but length, though the complex shape of the cruiser makes a direct volume analysis difficult.

Worth noting the fuel load of X-51 was a mere 270 lbs of JP-7.

 

[mokahete]

X-51 uses totally different principles and had no warhead; I used it only as a comparison to an air breathing engine to note that if Zircon is in fact air breathing, it is almost certainly not a pure scramjet.

that's believable, that small detachable booster on zircon is nowhere capable of putting zircon at the altitude it needs to be and attain enough speed to activate the scram jet( if it does posses one that is).

Well, I'm still of the beleif that Zircon is not a scramjet but solid rocket sustained missile instead and russians went into the same direction as indians did with their Shaurya.
Though I am still open to a small possibility that it can be scramjet, ultimately we need to see it's nose clearly without the cap.

 

[kqcke for you]

I suspect that a weaponized X-51 would replace the flow-through interstage with part of the solid rocket booster.

The annoying part of hypersonics is that you need to be doing Mach 9+ to get into "doing your own weight in TNT in kinetic energy at impact."

And even then they effect is rather small compared to a warhead which (assuming similiar effect) can be rather small

 

[Josh_TN]

I suspect that a weaponized X-51 would replace the flow-through interstage with part of the solid rocket booster.

The annoying part of hypersonics is that you need to be doing Mach 9+ to get into "doing your own weight in TNT in kinetic energy at impact."

That is pretty much confirmed by dummy HACM round photo; it seems pretty clearly to have a truncated interstage.

Hypersonics are about flight time and evading defensive measures, not employing kinetic energy. I think most any, if not all, “hypersonic” weapons are only supersonic at impact after passing through the thicker lower atmosphere.

 

[mokahete]

X-51 used an off the shelf ATACMs booster and 1.3 m worth of empty space for its interstage. The dry weigh of the cruiser itself was < 1500 lbs, or about double just the warhead on the P800. They are not remotely the same size in any dimensions but length, though the complex shape of the cruiser makes a direct volume analysis difficult.

Let's say, if we put Shaurya and x51/scramjet missile (ground launch varient) into a VLS on a ship or canister In TEL.
Will those canisters be similar in size?

 

[mokahete]

That is pretty much confirmed by dummy HACM round photo; it seems pretty clearly to have a truncated interstage.

Hypersonics are about flight time and evading defensive measures, not employing kinetic energy. I think most any, if not all, “hypersonic” weapons are only supersonic at impact after passing through the thicker lower atmosphere.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1895843905889058860

View: https://x.com/Varun55484761/status/1895843905889058860


Here's a claim of "still being hypersonic in terminal".
Don't know how can the seeker work with all the plasma.
If it was land attack It could have been more believable.

DF-17 is also Said to be hypersonic in its terminal stage, but it's a land attack( anti ship varient in development, possibly active in secret by now)
Don't know if anti ship varient will also be hypersonic or slow down to higher supersonic for seeker to aquire target.

 

[Scott Kenny]

And even then they effect is rather small compared to a warhead which (assuming similiar effect) can be rather small

I mean, if we're getting into kinetic energy weapons, a 2000lb bomb only has about 1000lbs of boom inside (IIRC the rest of the Mk80 series have a similar proportion). The problem is that KE goes up by the square of the velocity, double the speed to quadruple the boom.

Let's say an X-51 sized hypersonic weighs in at 1500lbs for the cruiser. It can only carry maybe 250lbs of HE inside volume wise, it'd be much better used with a nuke in the business end. But in order to get the kinetic boom equal to 1/6 the weapon weight, the missile would need to impact at about 1250m/s. Assuming I've done my math right...

 

[Josh_TN]

Let's say, if we put Shaurya and x51/scramjet missile (ground launch varient) into a VLS on a ship or canister In TEL.
Will those canisters be similar in size?

Yes, because the booster used is short and fat and the interstage is long and empty. But most of that canister would be dead space.

HACM likely has has dimensions closer to 6m by 0.5m, judging by the suspected booster dimensions and available photo of the training round.

 

[mokahete]

Yes, because the booster used is short and fat and the interstage is long and empty. But most of that canister would be dead space.

But missiles are still needed to be put in vls/canister.
Hence the space required to host X number of Shaurya In X number of VLS/canister will be similar to space required to host X number of x51/scramjet missiles, on a ship.
Though weight would be massively different.
But again, in terms of ground or ship based launcher weight won't be much of a problem.
Weight is still in single digits in terms of tons.
And russian ships have long history of carrying large and heavy anti ship missiles.

Weight would become a massive/significant problem if missile is to carried by aerial platforms like b52 though.

But zircon is a land and ship based antiship/land attack missile .

 

[Dilandu]

Based on that "Shaurya missile".

Which have zero relation to Tsirkon, as far as I know. On the same logic I could claim that American Tomahawk is powered by solid-fuel rocket; because it launches from Mk-41 launcher, and all other missiles that could be fit into Mk-41 are solid-fuel, so Tomahawk must also be soldi-fuel rocket powered.

 

[TomS]

I believe the bottom photo is suspected to be NGs HALO submission. Certainly it has nothing to do with HACM, which is RTX.

The sign with that model says "artist's concept." So not representative of any actual design.

 

[flateric]

Which have zero relation to Tsirkon, as far as know.

You don't know.

 

[Forest Green]

Do we have reliable Zircon warhead weight? I would assume 500-1000kg but I’ve never even seen a guesstimate.

Nowhere even close, 250-300kg depending on source. It's a narrower missile than the P-800, which had 300kg warhead weight.

 

[paralay]

Yakhont, kinetic energy of the rocket + explosion energy = 72.34 MJ + 700 MJ = 772 MJ
Zircon, kinetic energy of a rocket without a warhead 5580 MJ (1080 kg, 3.22 km/s)

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The impact energy of the Yakhont missile at a mass of 1,500 kg at the moment of impact is ~1.46 GJ. This corresponds to a realistic scenario where most of the fuel is used up, and the impact power is provided by a combination of kinetics and explosion.

The kinetic energy of the Zircon rocket upon impact is ~5.6 GJ, which is equivalent to 1.3 tons of TNT. This makes it one of the most powerful non-nuclear weapons in the world, capable of destroying even well-protected targets at hypersonic speeds.

https://chat.deepseek.com

 

[Forest Green]

Kinetic energy alone doesn't make for penetration unless the object impacting has sufficient structural integrity. So applying the maths to the whole missile is probably unrealistic.

 

[Josh_TN]

I’m confident it will hurt. Most any surface combatant only needs a harpoon sized hit to be combat ineffective anyway.

 

[Scott Kenny]

Kinetic energy alone doesn't make for penetration unless the object impacting has sufficient structural integrity. So applying the maths to the whole missile is probably unrealistic.

The effects of a magnesium-skinned Talos on a WW2 era DE (which is pretty typical of modern ship construction thicknesses) would indicate otherwise...

 

[NMaude]

The effects of a magnesium-skinned Talos on a WW2 era DE (which is pretty typical of modern ship construction thicknesses) would indicate otherwise...

I've seen a photograph of the DE hulk very shortly after it was hit by a Talos missile and IIRC it was almost cut in half.

 

[Scott Kenny]

I've seen a photograph of the DE hulk very shortly after it was hit by a Talos missile and IIRC it was almost cut in half.

Exactly. Photos are on the Okieboat site, and are rather horrific to see as a Sailor.

Hit more or less just right of amidships next to a funnel and knocked the boiler out the bottom of the hull. Then the fuel and magnesium airframe fragments burned what was left.

Huh. The okieboat website is having issues today, or I'd link the photos.

 

[Forest Green]

The effects of a magnesium-skinned Talos on a WW2 era DE (which is pretty typical of modern ship construction thicknesses) would indicate otherwise...

Absolutely, but it depends whetther the target is hard or soft. Calculations were done showing that 'Rods from God' would actually shatter on impact with a hardened object like a bunker so, for such targets, you can only really include the warhead weight in KE calcs.