Henri K speculate that major milestone is reached at least prototype of railgun is close being manufactured
Beginning of industrialization of the naval electromagnetic gun?
BY
The Chinese shipbuilding group CSIC may have started the industrialization phase of electromagnetic gun, according to our analysis of the latest institutional publications.
Indeed, a delegation from the Central Military Commission, the highest command body of the Chinese army, visited on April 15 at a "certain" research institute of the Chinese group.
reported that throughout the visit, HU Wen Ming (问 鸣 PD) CEO accompanied Army General ZHANG You Xia (又 侠 侠), Head of Delegation and Director of the Development Department Military equipment, as well as several senior officials, such as the purchasing office manager and the director of the central planning office.
In particular, they visited the "test site" and listened to HU's report on the progress of the "project" and production, as well as the performance and characteristics of the "project".
General ZHANG said after the visit that he was fully satisfied and grateful for the progress made and the contribution made by that institute in the field of "naval equipment".
So what is this research institute and above all, what is this project, a priori of the Chinese navy, which attracted the heavy weights of the army?
The index may be found in one of the photographs of the article, on which one can identify the general of army ZHANG Youxia and the CEO of CSIC HU Wen Ming in the middle, and on the side of HU we have A familiar face - that of MA Wei Ming (马伟明), Vice-Admiral of the Chinese Navy, specialist in electrical engineering and one of the youngest academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering.
Photo taken after the visit of the CMC delegation to CSIC Institute 713 (Photo: CSIC)
MA is best known for its many fundamental research in electric propulsion and electromagnetic launch.
Following this trail and going through the latest publications of the CSIC group, we see that the man was visiting in mid-April accompanied by HU Wen Ming at the Institute 713 (*), an entity that designs and produces Naval guns for the Chinese navy, such as the
H / PJ-26 of 76 mm or the
H / PJ-38 of 130 mm for example.
Everything leads us to believe that a major event or milestone took place in April, around a naval armaments project in the electromagnetic field, which pushed all these people to gather together.
However, it is clear from our sources that CSIC Institute 713 has had little involvement in the design phase of the naval electromagnetic gun, a project funded by the Chinese Navy. The design is actually entrusted to Beijing University of Technology and Institute .
It can therefore be assumed that the Institute 713 has followed the development and is now concerned with the industrial production, or at least the prototyping, of the electromagnetic gun project of the Chinese Navy.
This point is also confirmed by an article (*) published on the Weixin social network of the Institute 713, which mentions the visit of the Academician MA to their test site in mid April. The latter spoke in particular of "several prototypes of the major product" (重点 产品 样机 样机).
CSIC Group CEO and academic MA Wei Ming at Institute 713 (Photo: CSIC)
For the moment we have little details on this Chinese electromagnetic gun, but we believe it is a small-caliber CIWS. Indeed, in an article published by the group CASIC in November 2016 is mentioned "the technologies of the universal launch of missiles electromagnetic" and "the technologies of electromagnetic launch for short-range curtain air defense" (近程幕 防空 防空 电磁 电磁 技术 技术 技术 技术
It is therefore not surprising that Chinese air force personnel can be seen in the photos taken during the delegation's visit to Institute 713, as parallel projects seem to have been launched In the field of anti-aircraft and anti-missile defense.
Examples include the visit of the deputy commander of the Chinese Air Force to Institute 27 of the Chinese electronics group CETC in February 2014. This first witness attended a demonstration described as "impressive" 'It could be an electromagnetic gun, but we do not yet know the details of this parallel project.
Chinese Air Force personnel were present during the visit to the 713 Institute (Photo: CSIC)
Finally, one could also exclude for the time being the possibility that this electromagnetic gun of the Chinese navy is of the ETC (Electrothermal-chemical) type, because this type of technologies is currently under development at the NUST University in Nanjing and The NORINCO armaments group, if we believe in their presentation at the 29th International Symposium on Ballistics.
Data from the ETC canon tests carried out by NUST University (Image: NUST)
To be continued.
Henri K.