Re <<Escalation>>
Nothing about HIMARS, just equalisers and borons siliconinvestor.com
I observe that should such systems as below be made as longterm loitering sea-bottom-dwellers, and work in some connected fashion w/ anti-ship ballistic missiles, being idle in the navy becomes a thing of the past when picking on littler domains
scmp.com
Chinese scientists plan boron-powered supersonic missile that can fly and swim
- Anti-ship device will be able to cruise at commercial airliner altitudes and reach 200 knots underwater, project team says
- Volatile element that reacts in both air and water will power the ‘cross-media’ weapon
China is developing a supersonic anti-ship missile that will be able to travel further and faster than any traditional torpedo, according to researchers involved in the project.
The 5 metre (16.4 feet) missile will be able to cruise at 2.5 times the speed of sound at about 10,000 metres (32,800 feet) – the same altitude as a commercial airliner – for 200km (124 miles) before diving and skimming across the waves for up to 20km.
Once it is within about 10km of its target, the missile will go into torpedo mode, travelling underwater at up to 100 metres per second (200 knots) using supercavitation – the formation of a giant air bubble around it which significantly reduces drag, according to the researchers.
It will also be able to change course at will or crash-dive to a depth of up to 100 metres to evade underwater defence systems without losing momentum.
Lead scientist Li Pengfei and his team said no existing ship defence system was designed to handle such a fast “cross-media” attack. “This can greatly improve the missile’s penetration capability,” they said.
One of the biggest challenges for the developers is the power system, because of the need to produce considerable thrust while breathing in either air or water. But Li’s team said the problem could be solved by using boron – a light element that reacts violently when exposed to both, releasing a huge amount of heat.
The team, from the college of aerospace science and engineering in the National University of Defence Technology in Changsha, Hunan province, unveiled a blueprint for the missile’s power system in the September 8 issue of the peer-reviewed Journal of Solid Rocket Technology, published by the Chinese Society of Astronautics.
Boron was briefly added to jet fuel by the US Air Force in the 1950s to increase the power of supersonic bombers. But the project was abandoned because the ignited boron particles were hard to control and formed a layer of debris that gradually reduced engine performance.
The hypersonic race has rekindled interest in boron in recent years. China, for instance, has built air-breathing scramjet engines using solid fuel containing boron nanoparticles to accelerate missiles to five times the speed of sound or faster, according to openly available information. |
