Poliment-Redut Naval Air Defense System

Hole wrote:
Redut silo after launch of a 9M96. Lots of space for a fatter missile.

Yeah I always wondered why don't they deploy the 48N6 missiles in the Redut cells of project 20380?

Lenght is an issue IMO.

For Corvettes and perhaps Frigates, but in Destroyers and Cruisers and Carriers it should not be an issue.

OK... lets look at this...



Now look at this...



The top is the naval Redut and the lower system mounted on the truck is the land based S-350 system... now both are supposed to use the same 9M96 and 9M100 missiles... if we compare them I think they are different... I think the four small missiles in the truck seem to match the width of the larger longer missiles, but on the naval system the four smaller missiles seem to be rather wider than the single missiles...

BTW ignore the image in the second picture claiming to be the 9M100 as the image is the fabled R-77M with an enlarged rocket motor and folding rear grid fins that is no relation at all to the 9M100 missile.

If we then look at this...



We can see the 9M96 missiles can be mounted very close together and can indeed occupy the same circumference as the full sized S-300F or S-400 missiles... look at the bottom where the four tubes gets wider to the base that is the same size as the full sized missiles in the other launch positions.

And based on the truck image this tube:



Should be big enough for four 9M100 missiles to be stored... so how many could be fitted to properly use the available space even with just one layer... Remember this hole is the size of the big tubes on that truck...

according to that maks 2021 screenshot each launcher tube can hold 12 9m96 missiles and can hold 32 9m100 missiles.

Well that is a thing too... if it holds only 32 9M100 missiles that is not four missiles per tube for 12 tubes... because four times 12 is 48 missiles... if four 9M100 missiles fit in each 9M96 launch tube then 32 9M100s should fit into 8 launch tubes.

Perhaps it is a feature of the S-350 launch vehicle that at most it can communicate and operate with 8 tubes with 32 missiles and the remaining four tubes must carry four 9M96 missiles... so it is limited to 36 missile control channels... four being 9M96 and 32 being 9M100 missiles.

Maybe it is an export system limitation.

Maybe it is an error.

They don't seem to like to talk about their new SAMs as much as I would like them to.

What we do know is that the hatches for the 9M96 missiles are huge compared with the size of the missile tubes being used.

The core problem seems to be that they might not want us to realise the extend of the number of missiles and types they can carry... they have already stated that the Redut is compatible with 400km range missiles and that suggests that S-400s should be able to be carried in the 250km and 400km range versions, as well as the 60km and 150km range 9M96 missile types as well as the 15km range 9M100 missiles.

The two real questions are... can the missiles be stacked.... a missile launcher able to carry the huge S-400 400km range missiles are going to be ten or so metres deep, which is wasteful loading much smaller lighter shorter missiles like the 9M100 types.

For each tube that could take an S-400 missile, four 9M96 missiles should fit too, but the 9M96 is not half the length of the S-400 missiles so four missiles in the tube is all you could hope for. The 9M96 missiles occupy the same diameter as a pack of four 9M100 missiles however so even without layers a missile tube able to carry S-400 missiles should also carry four 9M96 missiles and each of those 9M96 missile tubes could hold four 9M100 missiles... but the depth needed for the S-400 should allow two layers of the 9M100 missiles to be carried in that tube, so assuming layers and two layers for 9M100 missiles one Redut missile tube should be able to carry one 250km or one 400km range S-400 missile or four 150km or 60km range 9M96 missiles (in any combination... all 150s, all 60s, two of each, or three of one and one of the other), or that tube could hold combinations of 9M96 and 9M100 missiles where each 9M96 missile is replaced by 4 9M100 missiles in one layer or 8 missiles in two layers... so 1 x S-400, 4 x 9M96, 16 (one layer) 9M100 or 32 (two layers) 9M100 missiles.

This would offer flexibility and the capacity to carry enormous numbers of missiles ready to fire.

My thoughts on layers stem mainly from the fact that if you design a missile launch tube to hold the biggest longest missiles then even filling with the smallest missiles you have a lot of empty unused missile tube doing nothing.

The 9M96 are both too long to consider layers, but the much shorter 9M100 it makes sense... and is a good way of boosting numbers of missiles easily.

Look at land systems for SAMs in the Soviet Union... next generation systems normally increase the number of ready to fire missiles by a significant number each time.

1x9m96 per cell or quad pack 9m100 per cell.

For corvettes an frigates having 150km and 60km and 15km range SAMs makes sense, but the size of the missile tube on the Redut shows a much wider missile could be loaded in those tubes.

I rather suspect that for destroyers and cruisers and also large ships like helicopter carriers that the same launcher will be able to carry S-400 missiles... which raises the question why carry 60km range 9M96 missiles when you can carry 400km range SAMs in the same number in the same tube.... or even 250km S-400 missiles.

They said 250km and 400km range missiles are compatible... I honestly don't think it would be possible to develop a 400km range version of the 9M96 unless you replaced the rocket motor with a scramjet motor which would require a complete redesign of the missile, or made it a tandem missile like the US Standard missiles with a large solid rocket booster attached to its back end and double its length.

Ironically that might make sense with the 9M100 because the lower part of the tube is empty so doubling the length to fill the launch tube and fit a tandem solid rocket motor would greatly extend its flight range, but I would think the whole purpose of the Redut design is to match the S-400 system at sea.

To be clear mentions that long range missiles will be developed it is important to keep in mind that the S-300F systems on the Orlans and Atlants only had a range of 150km in the Fort-M version and was never improved beyond that AFAIK... which is why I think a launch problem with an S-300 missile might have started a fire and led to the sinking of the Moskva rather than being hit by an enemy missile which the liars in Kiev suggest.

Interesting information on the UKSK capacity of the new ships, but rather disappointing to me I must say.

I did hold out hope that they would go for a Redut system with greater depth for larger longer missiles, allowing 250km and 400km range S-400 missiles... one per tube in the Redut system with 12 tubes meaning 400km and 250km range S-400 missiles in each launcher... on the smaller ships we have seen so far it only carried one 9M96 or S-350 missile per tube which is 12 tubes with a 150m or 60km range S-350 missile in each, or each missile could be replaced with four 9M100 missiles of the S-350 family in each tube too.

I thought maybe the systems in the Corvettes and Frigates didn't have the depth to take the longer SAMs of the S-400 family which we know from the UKSK drawing:



Where the 9M96 is 6.2 metres long and the 9M100 is 3m long, while the 40N6 is almost 8m at 7.8m... my hope was that the Redut tubes were designed for 6.2m depth on corvettes and frigates so all the padded space around the 9M96 was for testing and that operationally they could load four 9M96 missiles under each hatch, but those 9M100 missiles fill up the space available so to get four 9M96 missiles the hatches would need to be bigger despite probably fitting... lots of padding and wasted space.

I was hoping the version of Redut in the destroyers would have greater depth and therefore a single S-400 missile like 40N6 could be loaded in a tube instead of the 9M96, and that four 9M96s could be loaded under each hatch and that 9M100 could therefore be loaded in enormous numbers under each hatch, but this information about the larger SAMs being loaded into UKSK tubes seems to contradict this.

Ironically if the drawing is to scale above of the UKSK system the space the 9M96 missile takes under the hatch looks bigger than the space it takes up under the Redut so the 40N6 might actually fit into the width of the Redut hatch and being a 12 tube launcher would make more sense to carry such missiles instead of 9M96 for long range use... assuming it has the depth to carry the longer missile.

I would have thought they could have designed the missiles better... like Matryoshka dolls, where the smaller missiles fit into the larger missile tubes in greater numbers so you get the consolation of having more missiles when you go to shorter missile ranges.

Ie you can have four smaller missiles with shorter range in the same space as a bigger missile.

Clearly not to be.

Of course with new missiles for TOR and Pantsir that increase numbers by a factor of four and the new very short range anti drone and anti artillery missiles the number of defensive missiles of all kinds is going to increase.