14-meter outer diameter hull means slightly larger than Borei class and Ohio SSBN as well.
with these tender announcement and soyo post as well. looks like construction of first Unit has started.
Last edited:
09V/09VI (095/096) Nuclear Submarine Thread
- Thread starter Hendrik_2000
- Start date
with these tender announcement and soyo post as well. looks like construction of first Unit has started.
What guancha folk said was that JL-3 has an obvious range requirement that it must reach, so its payload will obviously need to be sacrificed to satisfy that range requirement.
JL-4 will obviously need to be larger than any known SLBMs. It needs to carry same number of warheads and have to be able to reach all of CONUS from SCS. Neither the Russians nor the Americans have the same requirements. hence, their SLBM don't need to have as long range.
But does it really matter if it has a bulge on the top? Maybe that won't be the most hydrodynamic configuration, but they should have more powerful SMR by then? And SSBNs aren't expected to go that fast anyways.
JL-4 will obviously need to be larger than any known SLBMs. It needs to carry same number of warheads and have to be able to reach all of CONUS from SCS. Neither the Russians nor the Americans have the same requirements. hence, their SLBM don't need to have as long range.
But does it really matter if it has a bulge on the top? Maybe that won't be the most hydrodynamic configuration, but they should have more powerful SMR by then? And SSBNs aren't expected to go that fast anyways.
Borei is double hull and the diameter is given as 13.5 m, single hull Ohio is 13 m. Borei-A has no "bump" which corresponds well with R-30 Bulava SLBM being 12.1 m long. If it had to house R-39, the outer hull superstructure would be enormous.
The throw weight requirements imposed if you want both the SCS to serve as the main bastion and range all of CONUS with many RVs are extremely high. From mid-SCS to FL is well over 14000km, even if you relax that to ranging DC or the upper southern US states from SCS it's still above 13500km. For reference the 60t D5 tops out at ~7500km with a full load of 8 Mk5s, offloading by half (~4 Mk5/8 Mk4a) only brings that to ~11000-11500km. It's just not practical to have an SLBM much larger than that, even dimensions aside such massive mass loss when each SLBM is ejected causes a sharp buoyant thrust of the sub which needs to be corrected before the next launch, stretching out salvo pacing. Assuming generally similar propellant & slightly higher weight of Chinese RVs, a D5 class or slightly larger JL-4 might be able to range most of CONUS with a mix of 4-6 heavy & light RVs from SCS, then with some missiles kept offloaded with perhaps 2-3 to range southeastern US, like how some MM3 were kept with fewer than 3 RVs during the cold war to range Central Asian targets.
Last edited: