Modern CIWS & Anti-Missile Systems (Deployed and in development)

crobato

Colonel
VIP Professional
Re: US Testing Laser CIWS at White Sands

I picked this up from my RSS feed.

Talking about lasers, scientists are developing what they call a laser WMD.

As in Weapon of Mosquito Destruction.

Basically, its lasers that work with a CIWS principle, although instead of radar, they use sound waves to identify, then track the mosquito threat. Then the laser will zap it. With such a system, its possible to kill hundreds if not thousands, and using audio signatures, distinguish between Malaria carrying mosquitoes and harmless ones.

The benefits are immense especially in certain countries. Malaria kills millions every year.
 

williamhou

Junior Member
Re: US Testing Laser CIWS at White Sands

I picked this up from my RSS feed.

Talking about lasers, scientists are developing what they call a laser WMD.

As in Weapon of Mosquito Destruction.

Basically, its lasers that work with a CIWS principle, although instead of radar, they use sound waves to identify, then track the mosquito threat. Then the laser will zap it. With such a system, its possible to kill hundreds if not thousands, and using audio signatures, distinguish between Malaria carrying mosquitoes and harmless ones.

The benefits are immense especially in certain countries. Malaria kills millions every year.

The laser could hit a person or ruin surrounding materials...
 

crobato

Colonel
VIP Professional
Re: US Testing Laser CIWS at White Sands

Its probably just strong enough to kill a mosquito but not people and the environment.
 

cmb=1968

Junior Member
Re: US Testing Laser CIWS at White Sands

I'm not sure if they had reached the point of taking account smoke and fog. All we are seeing are technological demonstration. Even if you take conditions into consideration, the only likely approach is to increase power but you can't do anything about reducing visibility. Its just sheer physics.

Ablative armor is not that hard to make. Not referring to missiles, but on tanks. It works similarly to the principle used on the tiles for the Space Shuttle. The substance is likely to be ceramic. Simply said, if the substance gets superheated, creates a lot of dirty opaque smoke when vaporized, then it is potentially ablative.

These laser systems are meant to supplement, not replace, current projectile based weapons.

Would Areo gel work to defuse a LASER hit on a tank, or at lease increase the time it would take to kill the tank?
That stuff has a extremely high heat dissipation rate.
You can hold a piece in your hand while using a blowtorch on it.

LASERS can be tailored to emit light at a certain frequency that will allow it to move through the atmosphere with a limited amount of loss in strength.

Their is the free electron laser with can change the frequency with ease though it is still in the research phase. The government has a working prototype at the Sandia National laboratory.

The free electron laser will be very versatile allowing one unite to be mass produced instead of numerous types tailored to one environment.
 
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Ambivalent

Junior Member
Re: US Testing Laser CIWS at White Sands

Not certain smoke or other atmospheric phenomena are an impediment. In Desert Storm the laser range finders of the M-1's did just fine penetrating the considerable smoke of battle. So did the thermal imagers. It might not be the impediment imagined.
What will limit this weapon's usefulness is the power available on the host ship. I don't see these being plopped on every ship using a CIWS today.
Aerogels feel a lot like some styrofoams. Not sure what protection it would offer if the surrounding metal structure is damaged by the laser. It would not be a structural surface of an aircraft or missile, it's too fragile for that.
 

Scratch

Captain
Re: US Testing Laser CIWS at White Sands

And yet another advancement in laser-weapon development. Not a CIWS related thing, but probably close enough to be posted here.
This time an "offensive" employment and not a rather "defensive" one like a CIWS. Brings a lot of precision and, being an airborne platform, flexibility.
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USAF Tests Anti-Ground C-130 Laser

By kris osborn
Published: 29 Jul 2009 16:13


A U.S. Air Force C-130 incinerated a dummy ground target by firing a megawatt-class chemical oxygen iodine laser at White Sands Missile Range, N.M, during a June 13 test of the service's Advanced Tactical Laser (ATL), Boeing officials said.

"We fired the laser in-flight. We hit a target board on the ground," said Gary Fitzmire, vice president of Boeing's directed energy systems.

The test flight originated from nearby Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M.

The ATL - configured to deploy on a C-130 - is designed to destroy ground targets while moving with little or no collateral damage, Fitzmire said.

"We were able to conduct many ground tests to build confidence of the system and the laser itself. Last summer, we conducted an integrated ground test. Our targets are ground-based tactical targets such as a fuel tank, vehicle or communications node," Fitzmire said.

The roughly $200 million ATL program began in late 2002. Several more flight tests are planned for this summer, Fitzmere said.
 

montyp165

Junior Member
Re: US Testing Laser CIWS at White Sands

Having talked about this on another site, someone made the mention of how particle beams would prove to be more effective than lasers, even with the focusing and power generation issues.
 

Jeff Head

General
Registered Member
US Successfully engages multiple UAVs over water with navalized Laser CIWS

Having talked about this on another site, someone made the mention of how particle beams would prove to be more effective than lasers, even with the focusing and power generation issues.
Charged particle weapons will follow the laser development.

Right now, the laser system continues to progress.

The official name now is the US Navy's Laser Weapons System or LaWS. Under contract, Raytheon has coupled a32-50 megawatt laser with the Phalynx CIWS and has been testing it for the last 2-3 years.

In 2010 they used it to shoot down several UAVs over water.

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I expect the LaWS to be coupled with stronger lasers (FEL) as time goes on and the power is available (ie. with the new Ford Class carriers and the Zumwalt class destroyers. Within ten years you will see the US mount effective laser CIWS capable of downing low flying, high speed crusie missiles, and ballistic missiles from US Navy vessels.
 

SinoSoldier

Colonel
Re: PLAN Type 054 FFG Thread II

The 1130's sudden and pronounced appearance on the 054 perhaps signifies and/or reinforces the defensive nature of these vessels. One would expect the more "high-value" 052C/D to sport these systems, but it seems that the PLAN is really keen on using these ships as players in a wider network of naval task groups rather than as individual units.
 
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