Sea Wolf and Sea Dart: Unbuilt Derivatives and Cancelled Applications

This was Sea Dart Box Fire, basically what you see in the diagram. During my brief involvement I worked for the chap who ran the demo in the picture below. The demo was the box, a live Chow and flight worthy but empty airframe. The one off missile test was fired at the gun range at Portsmouth which upset quite a few locals*. As far as I know, had the system made it into service, the Sea Dart in the box was a regular round.

The idea was distribute boxed rounds around small ships in a task group and use a capital ship with 909 illuminators thus extending the area covered. The tricky bit was getting the missile into the acquisition attitude/bearing considering the box was fixed to the deck. The scheme was to heal the ship at just the right timing whilst in a turn ..... Never really proven but there was a plan and ship guiding kit proposed to make it possible.....ish.

The 909 was very powerful so it could provide illumination well in excess of Sea Darts normal range;-Indeed so powerful there were concerns about health effects and even pyro cook off, if it accidentally picked up a friendly helo returning to the ship (hence close range) if left in automatic lock up mode.

*the test was hush-hush so the locals were not inform. The test site was rather under used and when it was, only relatively small pops. This test was very loud, really loud , the noise was of a considerably longer duration than normal and hence it caused a bit of a surprise. Of course it made the local news which defeated the object of being hush-hush.
 

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So were the Batch 3 Type 42s originally due to get 1030 STIR radar and VL Sea Darts in place of the 1022 and the Twin arm Sea Dart ?
 
I believe the 1030 STIR - with back to back antenna - was planned for the Type 43 the Type 42 would have received the single sided 1031. I think that the double headed 1030 would have caused topweight problems for the Type 42.
 
I've never really got much detailed information on the Type 1030, the Friedmans books on Naval Weapons systems I have only have a cursory mention of it in connection with the Type 1022; as they were written well after the cancellation of the system.

The information I have; and I did do a quick Google search to see if anything new was on line, says that the Type 1030 STIR would have had two antenna similar to the ones used for the Type 1022 - a development of the Dutch LW08 radar. The Type 1031 was to have been a light weight development with less processing power and only a single antenna. The testing of the 1030 equipment took place on the frigate Londonderry, a temporary mask being raised on the aft deck. I've seen photo's of the Londonderry with the mast but never with the antenna attached. I believe the project was cancelled in 1981 when the Type 43 was cancelled.

I know it isn't much but it is all I've got.
 
From a web search some years ago - The Type 1030 STIR. The unit was undergoing tests for some time at the then A.S.W.E. (Admiralty Surface Weapons Establishment) - since undergone several re-namings, it later became part of A.R.E. (Admiralty Research Establishment) and now I think it is part of the organisation called Qinetiq, on Portsdown Hill just north of Portsmouth U.K.
I used to live in Portsmouth and recall seeing it on its mast when you drove past.
 

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Friedman's British Destroyers and Frigates has fragments of information which kind of build up a picture.

The background seems to start around the mid-1970s, NSR 7946 being issued for a long-range radar as the first step to upgrading Type 42. This STIR radar in 1976 fell within NST 6503 for the GWS 30 Sea Dart modernisation coupled with missile and system improvements, intended for a Batch IV.
NST 6505 was the upgrade not limited by the Type 42 hull and was GWS 31 with mid-course guidance, VLS, anti-radar Sea Dart, new warhead and fuse - all embryonic stuff for the Type 42 successor.
The first Type 43 sketch designs arrived in 1978 - with double-ended launchers and four Type 909 and GWS 31 but lacking some of the goodies like VLS.

The prototype Type 1030 had back-to-back antennas for maximum data rate. So perhaps the production version would have had a single antenna? Presumably the artists impressions of Type 43 show a single-antenna Type 1030?

Friedman says that ultimately Type 1022 came closest to meeting NSR 7946. But Type 1022 had been selected before June 1976 (and before GST 6503 and 6505 were formulated) and indeed was fitted to the last two Batch II ships HMS Nottingham and Liverpool on completion in 1978.

Type 1022 married a British antenna with the Signaal LW-08 radar electronics. Was the antenna from, or evolved from, that of Type 1030 (or vice versa)?

Thorvic said:
So were the Batch 3 Type 42s originally due to get 1030 STIR radar and VL Sea Darts in place of the 1022 and the Twin arm Sea Dart ?
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The DGS paper of June 1976 only specifically mentions NST 6503 for the GWS 30 Sea Dart modernisation with missile and system improvements and the STIR replacing Type 1022 and Type 992R as being for the Batch IV (along with improved UAA-1, Montana EO surveillance system, FH5/UA-13).
His paper lists Batch III as getting STWS 2 torpedo tubes for Stingray, Type 2028 sonar replacing Type 184, ICS 2A, NATO Sea Gnat decoys, Millpost Phase 1 ECM, modified Ops room, EO tracker.
A lot of this kit never materialised.

GWS-31 was always intended for a Type 42 successor (Type 43) and briefly made Type 44 look possible as a superior Type 42 despite being a single-ended Sea Dart ship.
 
As a tangent...where does Desertcar fit in here? Did it become the 909 director?

Chris
 
Re: Type 1030; Friedman's Naval Radar, 1981 states:
This is the full STIR, incorporating a Marconi antenna and transceiver. It is scheduled for operation in 1985, and presumably outwardly resembles Type 1022.
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So not much detail at all and odd that Friedman seems ignorant of the prototype, but he was probably correct in predicting a similar antenna to Type 1022.

Re: Desertcar; those plan drawings that feature Desertcar in Brown's Rebuilding the Royal Navy are curious. The escort carrier designs date from 1966, but elsewhere in that book, and in Friedman's British Destroyers and Frigates there are plans of Type 82 and other Sea Dart-equipped escorts that date from 1964 and have the illuminator clearly labelled as Type 909.
But Jordan's article 'Postwar Weapons in the Royal Navy' in Warship 2015 states that the Type 909 was initially known as Desertcar.

Does anyone what the differences were between Type 909 and Type 909M?
GWS 31 was supposed to offer further upgrade to Type 909M so that suggests it had already been fitted to some Batch II ships?
 
CJGibson said:
Aye, that's where I saw it. Doesn't get a mention in the index and it's a rather odd name for a navy item!

Chris
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Hood said:
Re: Type 1030; Friedman's Naval Radar, 1981 states:
This is the full STIR, incorporating a Marconi antenna and transceiver. It is scheduled for operation in 1985, and presumably outwardly resembles Type 1022.
Click to expand...
So not much detail at all and odd that Friedman seems ignorant of the prototype, but he was probably correct in predicting a similar antenna to Type 1022.

Re: Desertcar; those plan drawings that feature Desertcar in Brown's Rebuilding the Royal Navy are curious. The escort carrier designs date from 1966, but elsewhere in that book, and in Friedman's British Destroyers and Frigates there are plans of Type 82 and other Sea Dart-equipped escorts that date from 1964 and have the illuminator clearly labelled as Type 909.
But Jordan's article 'Postwar Weapons in the Royal Navy' in Warship 2015 states that the Type 909 was initially known as Desertcar.

Does anyone what the differences were between Type 909 and Type 909M?
GWS 31 was supposed to offer further upgrade to Type 909M so that suggests it had already been fitted to some Batch II ships?
Click to expand...

I wonder if the Future Fleet Working Party deliberately used some code names to reduce the amount of alphanumeric designations used in presenting their findings. I would assume the general layouts would be for consumption of both higher-ups in the service and political types, not engineers.

Also, and this was tickling the back of my brain, but Desertcar was a racehorse of the 50s which was a good hurdler. Funny how that works, I’m not into racing, and thought Desertcar might be a racetrack, but I followed the thread and voila! (And the horse had it’s heyday 15 years before I was born!)

Ref: https://sites.google.com/site/carverwilliamjockey/james-mick
 
Hood said:
Does anyone what the differences were between Type 909 and Type 909M?
GWS 31 was supposed to offer further upgrade to Type 909M so that suggests it had already been fitted to some Batch II ships?
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Not completely sure as I wasn’t specifically involved in that bit but it would make sense if the 909m would be the 909 equipped for mid course update. I certainly remember the mid course transmission aerial went under the 909 radome.
 
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starviking said:
Also, and this was tickling the back of my brain, but Desertcar was a racehorse of the 50s which was a good hurdler. Funny how that works, I’m not into racing, and thought Desertcar might be a racetrack, but I followed the thread and voila! (And the horse had it’s heyday 15 years before I was born!)

Ref: https://sites.google.com/site/carverwilliamjockey/james-mick
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Did you notice the horse named immediately after it? Someone doing a double on 'Desertcar and Nore Buoy' would definitely catch the RN eye!

There was a long tradition of naming UK stuff after racehorses. Back in WWI the RN had the 24 class, named for Derby winners, and didn't call it the Racehorse class largely because it already had the Racecourse class, while the LNER named many of the East Coast express trains of the A1/3 and Peppercorn A2 classes after famous racehorses. Someone choosing to use a racehorse name as the name for a project doesn't surprise me at all, and I'd be even less surprised to find out it wasn't the only one.
 
Some of the rainbow codes were racehorses. Blue Envoy ran in the 1955 Grand National (66/1, bit of an outsider) and like its namesake, was a non finisher. Fell at the first.

I suppose the 18-letter limit on horse names lends itself to codenames

My favourite is Hoof Hearted, owned by Wayne Rooney.

1955 Grand National - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

www.collthings.co.uk

Funny Racing Horse Names - Including Hoof Hearted & Oil Beef Hooked | Cool Things Collection | Collthings.co.uk

Showcasing a growing collection of the funniest racing horse names from around the world. Some of these were not allowed by the horse racing authorities and if they had would have been a horse racing commentator’s worst nightmare. We also...
www.collthings.co.uk www.collthings.co.uk

Cut to Youtube clip from Life of Brian...

How I miss the days when you could phone up the pub and ask for Spartacus or Jack Russell.

I'll get me coat...

Chris
 
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What was the advantage of the Marconi Antenna over the 'standard' Dutch Antenna of the LW08?
 
Some of the early files linked early in this thread will have to be reposted because some of them where linked to MegaUpload which has been defunct for years now.
 

Apparently, Marconi gave considerable thought to 805 series directors for Lightwight Seawolf and LW Sea Dart.

And a brochure: https://marconiradarhistory.pbworks.com/w/file/fetch/132789144/Naval Weapon Control Systems.pdf

I’d not sure if the same 805SD director could work with both LW Seawolf and LW Sea Dart if a single ship was fitted with both missiles.

Looking back at the thread, BAe preferred the Signaal VM40 and the eventual choice of the RN was the 911 for both the Invincibles and T42B3s, which surely would have limited export prospects.
 
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zen said:
Vertical Launch is an intriguing requirement.....favours full 360 degree coverage and use on ships.
It also means your silos don't give away your expected threat direction.

Liquid rocket motors could potentially do away with the booster stage......
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They also mean nasty propellants that can leak out...



Firefinder said:
I assuming that the USN Talos and the aborted Typhon Missile has similar issues with their ramjets? Seems like it be obvious but you never read of them...
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I've read that Talos broke Mach before it left the rail, so it was at Ramjet ignition speed essentially instantly. Talos' minimum range had more to do with the guidance package than the propulsion.
 
Scott Kenny said:
I've read that Talos broke Mach before it left the rail, so it was at Ramjet ignition speed essentially instantly. Talos' minimum range had more to do with the guidance package than the propulsion.
Click to expand...

I don't know about the Talos being supersonic before it left the launch-rail however according to the Okie Boat website the combined Talos/launch-booster stack was unstable in flight and only became stable when the booster separated, those eight seconds during the boost-phase the missile's autopilot was busy keeping the airframe stable until booster separation.
 
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@jsport You are being pointed to forum member RP1 - Dr Rachel Pawling, not Pawley, lecturer in Ship Design, University of London. Could you check on the Pawley name, and possibly provide a link to the right X-message? Please?

The public here might like some context.
 
jsport said:
Dr Pawley on x (twitter)
claims to be an instructor of ship designers.
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Dr Pawling is absolutely what she claims to be. You have no way of easily checking my credentials (intentionally so), but she and I move in similar professional circles, and have done for nearly twenty years. We've never actually met, but she taught a fair proportion of my colleagues and there are very good links between my employer and her department.

Aside from that, I'm not sure what containerised Sea Wolf and DS30 have to do with the Fleet Solid Support programme. Quite apart from anything else, Sea Wolf is at the end of its life, and publicly-released graphics of the ships show DS30 and Phalanx fitted conventionally.
 
Just an aside…
Weren’t the ‘Fort Victoria’ class RFA’s originally intended to be fitted with ‘lightweight’ Sea Wolf?
 
If memory serves, the Fort Victorias were originally specced with VL Sea Wolf because they were intended to operate in the GIUK gap as the central ship of a small hunting group based on austere ASW frigates (can't remember if that was the initial cuts of Type 23, or Type 24 or 25), which rather put them in harms way. Type 23 evolved to be rather more capable, allowing the Fort Victorias to have a less exposed role, and VL Seawolf to be cut.
 
I know for Seaslug a nuclear version was proposed with multiple types of warheads considered before the project was killed. But I just found this document title stating that such nuclear option was considered for the Seadart as well!
Did anybody heard about this Nuclear Seadart proposal before?
"Proposal for a nuclear warhead for the SEA DART surface-to-air guided missile"

Proposal for a nuclear warhead for the SEA DART surface-to-air guided missile | The National Archives

The official archive of the UK government. Our vision is to lead and transform information management, guarantee the survival of today's information for tomorrow and bring history to life for everyone.
discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk
 
I remember mention of it but didn’t see any details. The dates correspond with when they were freezing the missile internal component layout so my guess is the study was asking questions such as is it possible to fit a warhead of this size and weight? And if not, should something of this size, what impact would it have on the overall architecture? All very top level, typical for a layout pre-study and more to tick a box that it’s been looked at, and then move on.

Sea Slug was massive compared to Sea Dart so any nuclear package would have to really push the miniaturisation technology.

Never heard of an ABM Sea or Land Dart, guidance would have been marginal and it was a bit slow for such a rapidly incoming target.
 

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