I would guess they probably determined it's not cost effective to use long range sams given the anti air radars are not the strongest on the 054a
054/A FFG Thread II
- Thread starter tphuang
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szbd
Junior Member
dude, that's 50G. and 5 mach
U-VLS is CASIC's creation. Obviously U-VLS will favor CASIC products. The HT-1 is displayed in CASIC's area in the Zhuhai air show hall.
The model is as official as it gets, so it confirms more missiles slated for the U-VLS including CM103. HT-1E with the "E" is the export variant, which means its real name is HT-1. This goes with the new style that export names are getting "E" added. Instead of "FL9000N" for example, you get "HHQ-10E". This is for marketing purposes. Customers want something the PLA is using rather than an untried product.
Because a good majority of the PLAN's missiles are from CASIC including HHQ-9, YJ-83, YJ-18, HHQ-10, they got a strong inside track in winning this contract. CASIC can also be called the PLAN's missile supplier with a few notable exceptions.
Those notable exceptions are from CASC, which is more noted for their space and satellite work, but is also doing missiles. They are responsible for the HQ-6 and HQ-16 systems. We see them offering this LY-70 now which looks like an ESSM sized missile and is packed in sets of four in land delivery.
Now for this "clean sheet design". Even the FM3000 started as a clean sheet design with no direct connection to any previous missile design. We don't really know if missiles like FM3000, SD30 or LY-70 started as land based design adapted to naval base, or is it they started as a naval based design adapted to land based. People might want to get the maximum out of their existing products so its not surprising a naval system like Type 1130 CIWS is adapted into a land system. Missiles can start being conceived as a universal land-sea design, then split into variants.
It would be a tremendous waste of effort to design a brand new missile solely for export, not to mention the system reaching the deployable stage. If the missile is a failure, rejected for whatever reason, it should not reach to the point you want to sell it to customers. It would have been weeded out early, so you can throw your financial and human resources to the survivor and chosen champion. It does not make sense to me to continually developing a non accepted design in parallel with the chosen design to the point that the non accepted design has reached an export status.
I'm willing to consider it as a possibility, but I do not think we have enough evidence at this stage to say it is so definitively.
Until such a point that we get confirmation of the domestic UVLS's designation, or someone
Except there have been quite a number of new missile systems developed for export (among many other systems in other domains intended for export) that do not enter PLA service, so if FM-3000N is for export as well -- there is certainly precedent for it. In fact, the sheer number of missile and UAV systems that overlap in characteristics and capabilities is somewhat gratuitous.
If FM-3000N were the 3-5 missile, it would be very strange that the usual suspects have not acknowledged or alluded to it, given its showing at the airshow and how significant the 3-5 missile is for the PLAN.
My point is to keep an open mind -- sure, maybe FM-3000N will be 3-5, or maybe the LY-70 will be 3-5, or SD-50 will be developed into 3-5, or perhaps it will be a clean sheet design that we have yet to see.
Range is not the only factor important to a missile. There is reaction time, time to intercept, PK or percentage of kill and so on. You can have longer ranged missiles but their reaction time and their PK may not be as good. For some reason both the PLA and the PLAN loves the HQ-16. The ones in the driver seat may have data and experience that we don't know about.
If they want to push it to 150km, I am sure they could. The ones in charge of the HQ-16, CASC, is responsible to many space rocket launches.
Without knowing the depth of the VLS, I am not sure if you can launch a cruise missile from that, or its worth making a cruise missile just for this VLS. Its better to fire the cruise missiles off the YJ-83 launchers. In fact, the YJ-83 now has a new version with a IIR seeker which allows it to attack land targets. So you got your land attack missile through a missile with a joint capability. Its kind of like Harpoon -> SLAM/SLAM ER, but SLAM is a land attack missile based on the Harpoon airframe, while the IIR YJ-83 (YJ-83B) is meant to attack both sea and land targets. Furthermore, the YJ-83 with the IIR seeker has boosted its range to 290km, still under MTCR rules, which can be more for domestic versions. They could follow this up with a stealthier version of the YJ-83.
Upgrading them to launch YJ-12 is another choice they can make. The systems are already there as applied on the 054AP.
I am not sure how significant a quadpack MRSAM is for the PLAN, because if it does, they would already have one. It does not necessarily need to reach Mach 5 for example, we know the PLA (or any military service) can agree to lower the goal posts in order to get the thing out sooner if they are in a hurry. Speed trumps perfection, and you can still improve the missile through future versions so you will reach the original goalposts anyway.
I do not think that the contract is won, or determined at this point. I am only saying FM3000N is a candidate, and a leading one because CASIC is behind it. They need to have a face off with all the other contenders, NORINCO (SD30) and CASC (LY-70), and the winner is picked.
If FM3000N has reached to an advanced testing phase and is suddenly repositioned into an export product, did they already have a face off and the FM3000N lost? This can mean someone else might have the winner but didn't display it on Zhuhai in its naval form. If CASIC lost, then CASC could have won it.
A lot of UAV and missiles systems displayed in Zhuhai comes from companies I don't know much about or virtually unknown, looking to get capital investment and so on. Such as the HD-1 missiles. But CASIC and CASC are major SOEs, these are not small fry.
I don't understand how any of this is relevant to the conversation at hand.
My point is that we have been expecting the 3-5 missile to emerge in some form over the last 4+ years, that it is a quadpackable missile, and that the PLAN are working on it.
The 3-5 missile is one of the few new missile systems that we know is intended to equip the UVLS.
How much of a priority the PLAN places on a quadpackable MR SAM or the exact characteristics of the 3-5 missile is not interesting to consider but not important for what we are discussing.
So, my suspicion is that 3-5 missile is likely in late stages of advanced development already, if not about to enter service already.
The nature of VLS launched missiles, is that new weapons can be developed, tested, without pictures or videos released to us at all, and even enter service for a number of years in operational warships, without us knowing... until the PLAN suddenly choose to disclose it and quietly allow a picture of a weapon being fired from a VLS to be released to the public.
I suspect that we will only know in hindsight, years after the PLAN chooses to disclose it to us.
It's possible 3-5 is FM-3000N, or LY-70, or one of the other medium range small footprint SAMs we saw, but it could also be something clean sheet -- that is to say, a missile that we haven't seen shown for export yet.
That's all I'm saying.
Do we know of any other missiles that can sustain a 50G turn?
Modern AA missiles can easily have a ground attack function added to them using only software updates, and if no defensive missiles/systems can shoot down a missile launched from a frigate 50km away, that is traveling at Mach 5 while pulling 50G terminal maneuvers then perhaps this will be a key role for the new missle.
If so, I would suggest that this missle could arm a future (submersible?) arsenal ship program.
Modern AA missiles can easily have a ground attack function added to them using only software updates, and if no defensive missiles/systems can shoot down a missile launched from a frigate 50km away, that is traveling at Mach 5 while pulling 50G terminal maneuvers then perhaps this will be a key role for the new missle.
If so, I would suggest that this missle could arm a future (submersible?) arsenal ship program.
PL-8 is said to have a maximum overload of 40G, and the PL-10 is said to have a maximum overload of 60G. I reckon there should be some AAMs and SAMs in between. If I remember the PL-12 is said to be 38G, and the LY-60 at 35G.