Naval guided 120-155 mm munitions on land based platforms?

[Frtigern]

As we enter into a new era of armored, aviation and naval warfare, one development that has caught my eye is the use of guided munitions for conventional 155 mm artillery. No longer does artillery need to be as carefully calibrated, charted, and corrected to be effective. All one gun needs are satellites triangulating a target and be able to provide artillery fire within 5-20 m instead of the traditional 200-300 m of unguided shells. It's also capable of providing suppressive fire within 150 feet of friendly troops. Also range has been increased by a factor of three, from 16 km from a traditional 155 mm shell to 57 km on the M982 Excalibur shell.

BAE Systems Armaments Systems and Lockheed Martin are cooperating developing munitions for a 155 mm naval gun, the Advanced Gun System and the Long Range Land Attack Projectile (LRLAP), with a max range between 140-190 km. The longest range rocket assisted projectile fired from a M109 howitzer is 30 km.

The M712 Copperhead is a laser guided 155 mm artillery shell, which has a max range of 16 km, but is being proceeded by the GPS guided M982 Excalibur artillery shell, which has a max range of 36-57 km. The XM1156 Precision Guidance Kit by BAE Systems and Alliant Techsystems is a program to retrofit precision guidance system for existing 155 mm artillery shells.

Now my question is whether the M109A6 Paladin and the M777 howitzer have the ability to match capabilities of the 155 mm naval gun on the new Zumwalt class destroyer? Is the turret design and technology too different to simply be retrofitted to land based platforms? Would it be possible to build a tracked version of the Advanced Gun System to replace our aging M109s? What are the disadvantages and advantages of a GPS guided artillery shell over a laser guided one? What are the disadvantages of a laser guided artillery shell? If this were possible, would it be possible to retrofit this GPS guidance onto 120 mm shells used in the M1 Abrams? If the Oto Melara 127/64 naval gun can fire guided artillery shells 120 km why not a 120 mm gun? In fact, that is what XM1111 Mid-Range Munition (MRM) is being developed to do, but has dual-mode semi-active laser/imaging infrared guidance system. Now is that the best guidance combination for land based gun platforms, or is it possible to have three?

This is interesting:

Post #10, by little icebear


Monarc, which stands for "Modular Naval Artillery Concept", is a joint development of Rheinmetall Defence, Krauss-Maffei Wegmann GmbH, ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems and Thales Nederland B.V. The concept calls for mounting the turret of a 155 mm army artillery system onto the deck of a frigate-sized ship. The consortium selected Germany's PzH2000 self-propelled howitzer as the turret system, which is capable of engaging targets at ranges of up to 40 kilometres (Rheinmetall is currently working on a new generation of ammunition with twice the range). The turret system has been successfully installed on a German Navy 124-class frigate. Thanks to Monarc, the world's navies can benefit from the German defence industry's technological lead in the domain of large-calibre artillery systems.

http://www.militaryphotos.net/forums...ced-Gun-System

Now, will this work the other way around? Mounting naval guns on tracked or towed chassis?

Advanced Gun System

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Gun_System
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Ra...ack_Projectile
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M777_Lightweight_Howitzer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M712_Copperhead
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M982_Excalibur
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XM1156_...n_Guidance_Kit
http://www.globalsecurity.org/milita...ions/m1156.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XM1111_Mid-Range_Munition
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otobreda_127/64

[Soothesayer]

There's no 'obvious at first sight' reason why 155mm shells and their fuzes shouldn't be used in both land and sea environments. However, they would need to be designed for the most demanding, likely to be naval because ship's guns can cope with higher muzzle velocities and salty atmosphere corrosion may be a factor. This almost certainly increases cost.

Modern naval guns use unmanned turrets, which means metal cartridge cases with built in primers. The rounds may be fixed, semi-fixed or seperate loading, but invariably single charge. This makes them very easy for automated handling and unmmaned turrets.

Artillery turrets are generally manned (with the odd exception and a huge increase in complexity, all of which has to be fitted into a relatively small space envelope). Ammo is usually designed for separate loading and variable charges. Bagged charges are also normal, which means separate primers. In modern guns like AS90 or PzH2000 these are used in their own magazines mounted on the gun. However they have finite capacity (typically 12 - 24 primers) and have to be changed, this means someone in the turret (or even more complexity) even if shells and charges can be handled automatically.

The PzH2000 turret on a ship was a German joke, de-manning a manned turret was always going to be a farce, which is probably why it didn't go anywhere.

Naval turrets are far too big for land use (way outside the railgauge dimensions which is a standard requirement for AFVs) and lead to a vast vehicle, not a tactically good idea.

Another useful trait of artillery is the ability to feed ammo from outside while the gun keeps firing. The dear old Swedes whose operational experience of arty is a tad 'limited', completely lost the plot on this one with the highly automated unmanned 'turret' of Archer.

I'd also point out that the XM1156 kit is not precision guidance. It 'merely' reduces dispersion to a few metres, which is actually a totally different matter and very important and useful (and lots cheaper). As for Excalibur, all I can say is GMLRS does it better (and a bigger bang).

[String]

Originally Posted by Soothesayer

Another useful trait of artillery is the ability to feed ammo from outside while the gun keeps firing. The dear old Swedes whose operational experience of arty is a tad 'limited', completely lost the plot on this one with the highly automated unmanned 'turret' of Archer.

I'm not sure I agree. Seems like the swedes went after a 'shoot and scoot' platform and for that the Archer suits well.

[Naffenea]

I don't see why it wouldn't work. After all we were using CWIS platforms as CRAM's in Iraq and those worked wonderfully.

[lcm1]

Originally Posted by Frtigern

As we enter into a new era of armored, aviation and naval warfare, one development that has caught my eye is the use of guided munitions for conventional 155 mm artillery. No longer does artillery need to be as carefully calibrated, charted, and corrected to be effective. All one gun needs are satellites triangulating a target and be able to provide artillery fire within 5-20 m instead of the traditional 200-300 m of unguided shells. It's also capable of providing suppressive fire within 150 feet of friendly troops. Also range has been increased by a factor of three, from 16 km from a traditional 155 mm shell to 57 km on the M982 Excalibur shell.

BAE Systems Armaments Systems and Lockheed Martin are cooperating developing munitions for a 155 mm naval gun, the Advanced Gun System and the Long Range Land Attack Projectile (LRLAP), with a max range between 140-190 km. The longest range rocket assisted projectile fired from a M109 howitzer is 30 km.

The M712 Copperhead is a laser guided 155 mm artillery shell, which has a max range of 16 km, but is being proceeded by the GPS guided M982 Excalibur artillery shell, which has a max range of 36-57 km. The XM1156 Precision Guidance Kit by BAE Systems and Alliant Techsystems is a program to retrofit precision guidance system for existing 155 mm artillery shells.

Now my question is whether the M109A6 Paladin and the M777 howitzer have the ability to match capabilities of the 155 mm naval gun on the new Zumwalt class destroyer? Is the turret design and technology too different to simply be retrofitted to land based platforms? Would it be possible to build a tracked version of the Advanced Gun System to replace our aging M109s? What are the disadvantages and advantages of a GPS guided artillery shell over a laser guided one? What are the disadvantages of a laser guided artillery shell? If this were possible, would it be possible to retrofit this GPS guidance onto 120 mm shells used in the M1 Abrams? If the Oto Melara 127/64 naval gun can fire guided artillery shells 120 km why not a 120 mm gun? In fact, that is what XM1111 Mid-Range Munition (MRM) is being developed to do, but has dual-mode semi-active laser/imaging infrared guidance system. Now is that the best guidance combination for land based gun platforms, or is it possible to have three?

This is interesting:


Now, will this work the other way around? Mounting naval guns on tracked or towed chassis?

Advanced Gun System

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Gun_System
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Ra...ack_Projectile
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M777_Lightweight_Howitzer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M712_Copperhead
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M982_Excalibur
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XM1156_...n_Guidance_Kit
http://www.globalsecurity.org/milita...ions/m1156.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XM1111_Mid-Range_Munition
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otobreda_127/64

What,no more killed by 'Friendly Fire', what is this World coming to!~ lcm1

[Frtigern]

Originally Posted by Soothesayer

As for Excalibur, all I can say is GMLRS does it better (and a bigger bang).

A MLRS may do it better but a non-automated naval precision 155 mm turret or towed artllery piece may be easier to transport and supply.

[SRV Ron]

Laser guided is most ideal when there is a forward observer that can paint the target without getting killed himself in the process.

GPS guided, while the most ideal for anti terrorism missions, is not ideal due to the risk that a determined foe would destroy or jam the GPS network in an all out war.

[Carl Schwamberg]

Originally Posted by Frtigern

... No longer does artillery need to be as carefully calibrated, charted, and corrected to be effective.

What makes you think using guided projectiles
does not require carefully calibrated, charted, and corrected preparation?

Originally Posted by SRV Ron

Laser guided is most ideal when there is a forward observer that can paint the target without getting killed himself in the process.

Last time I was any where close to laser guided ordnance it fell 3000+ meters short and killed the two man team with the laser designator. Light wounds to the artillery FO teams training a hundred meters distant. Really bad day for us.

Originally Posted by SRV Ron

GPS guided, while the most ideal for anti terrorism missions, is not ideal due to the risk that a determined foe would destroy or jam the GPS network in an all out war.

The Iranians managed to hijack a US drone just this year. Thinking these electronic systems are 'secure' is about as smart as folks thinking their codes & encryption machines were secure back in WWII.

[Soothesayer]

Using precision munitions changes the place where the precise work occurs, less on the gun position more in the targetting arean, you don't pluck coords accurate to 1 metre out of thin air.

The only advantage of laser homing munitions is against moving targets, and that use needs quite a lot of operator skill and good coordination with the firing gun, not forgetting rapid reaction all arond since the window of opportunity may be quite small. Again, easier said than done. The moving target problem is probably best solved with loitering munitions.