Questions Thread: Russian Navy

Not really a question anyone could actually answer.

Depends on the target and the torpedo and the guidance lock and a hundred other aspects like depth etc.

Soviet subs had a lot of reserve bouyancy and were fully compartmentalised like western subs... but they also had double hull designs which would maximise their ability to survive.


Think of it like a seat belt... I can't say a seat belt will keep you safe in a crash, but that is no reason to not wear one.

If a SSBN shoot a SLBM under the Artic iced sea, what happens:
a) the missile breaks the ice and reaches its target;
b) the missile breaks the ice but doesn´t reache its target;
c) the missile explodes against ice.

If any SSBN were to launch an SLBM submerged under anything but the thinnest of ice the missile would smash against the ice and be damaged or destroyed. Rocket fuel and oxidiser (liquid or solid propellent rockets) would blaze away for half an hour or so... the warheads would not be armed so no nuke explosion.

Some SSBNs could break through very thin ice a few cms thick and launch missiles while surfaced... the Russian Akula class (NATO codename Typhoon) was design specifically to break through several metres of ice to launch its missiles while surfaced... protected from enemy torpedoes by the ice around it.

All other SSBNs are not designed to surface in the Arctic through ice to launch their missiles and would likely never take such a risk.



All SLBMs are paper thin and would shatter or break at the slightest resistance at the waters surface... even minor damage to the nosecone of a missile will lead to instability as it accelerates up leading to the nose cone being "blown off" with a likely catastrophic failure of the missile in flight.

Borei class don't have the superstructure strength of the Akula (Typhoon) class and also don't have the very high freeboard and are not designed to surface through ice to launch their missiles.

Their missiles are the Bulava SLBM which are solid fuelled missiles that would be seriously damaged if launched through ice and even if they made it through would not likely retain their structural integrity... ie they would fly off in a funny direction and likely explode.

The very specific shape of the akulas tower structure was designed to penetrate several metres of ice for the purpose of launching SLBMs.

It is hard to be sure, but we know some range figures for the missiles that have come before it.

The missile known in the west as Sunburn, or SS-N-22 which is carried on the Sovremmeny class destroyers and some light missile boats has a range of 120km and flies supersonically (1.8 or so at low level and mach 2.2 at medium altitudes) at a height of less than 7m. The highest altitude it attains is 300m to spot its target and then it drops down and attacks from below 7m.

Later versions were adapted so they flew at higher altitude for the first part of their flight and then dropped down low when they reached the radar horizon to the target, which extended its flight range to about 250km because jet engines are vastly more efficient in the thinner colder air at altitude, plus the fact that it is a rocket ramjet design the solid rocket fuel burns at a set rate for a fixed period of time... at very low altitude it would accelerate the missile to a max speed and then hold it at that speed until it burned out. By climbing however you more efficiently use the high thrust to climb to thinner colder air... the extra energy used in the climb can be recovered in the eventual descent, but the more efficient flight at altitude means moving faster for the same throttle setting which means a lower throttle setting can be used for the same speed or higher speed can be achieved.

Now the replacement for Granit and Sunburn (3M80) is Onyx, which has been revealed to have a 500km range at altitude and 250km range at low altitude and a speed in the mach 1.8 at low level and 2.5 at medium altitudes.

The Zircon uses a scramjet, which means the air intake does not need to slow the air flowing through the engine to subsonic speed for combustion.

To achieve mach 7-8 it will have to fly high but at that sort of speed it is relatively safe as long as it can manouver. The speed doesn't come at the cost of fuel... we are not talking about just dumping lots of fuel into an AB to get the extra speed, this is a much higher thrust engine that retains thrust at very high speed, so flight range should be vastly increased as well as speed.

I would expect a flight range from at least 500km to maybe 700km but only at high altitude.

AFAIK all the Kiev class vessels had a heat resistant surface to prevent damage from downward vectored jet engines... AFAIK it was also anti skid.

Regarding the Kuznetsov AFAIK it also has a heat resistant surface.

Their subs all have noise reducing rubber tiles on their exterior... I don't see why they (and the heat resistant tiles) couldn't also have anti skid properties as well.

Of course when covered in 50cm of ice there is no such think as an anti skid surface...