Project 20380(5): Steregushchy Corvette #2

Would be good if they could create a magazine loader that loads all the tubes in one launcher at a time... fill the cassette with the missiles you want to load on shore or on another support ship at sea and then crane it over and lower it over the launcher... they could design attachment points on the loader and the launcher so they align and lock together while the tubes are loaded, with space for the hatches to open out of the way and the missile tubes are lowered down into place and then the empty magazine can be lifted away and returned to shore or support ship to be reloaded and reused for the next launcher.

Each pier or support ship could have multiple crane operating at once.

Vertical launchers are going to be pretty widely used so being able to reload them quickly and safely is worth a bit of extra complication and design work...

The original TOR missiles came in a block of four missiles ( a single row of four missiles) that was lowered into the turret in one piece... two of them loaded the vehicle ready for use.

These pod things were used when the TOR vehicle carried 8 missiles ready to fire but the new missiles came in individual tubes with 8 tubes of the new missiles fitting in the space the four tube block fitted on the vehicle so with the new missiles you could carry 16 ready to launch missiles. (which were faster and more accurate and longer ranged...)

The new deck mounted TOR missiles might just be a block of ready to fire missiles... take the old empty one out and put the full new one into place type thing.

The Uran is a good missile, not everything needs to be armed with hundreds of vertical missile tubes... some patrol craft barely ever fire a shot in anger... let alone have to sink the entire HATO navy single handedly.

Replacing the Kortik/Kashtan with Redut VLS is a sensible idea as this was only installed due to Redut not being ready in time (as all other subsequent 20350s were fitted with). If they do scale down the Poliment radar and fit it as well then that is a huge upgrade. I would have thought that Zaslon would be a better fit as its being fitted to late-model 20350s like Aldar longname and Retivy.

I also wonder how she will carry Kalibres? Gremy has 3S14 bin located fwds but she is ~700 tons heavier. Maybe delete the Kashtan and fit an uplifted deck structure like was done on 1155M Adm Shaposhnikov? If so they would need to install the Redut to the vacated space allocated to the Kh-35s? I can't imagine there is space below decks in this area suitable for a deep heavy module like the 3S14.

I suspect for a small patrol ship like this most of the time those UKSK launch tubes will have Otvet anti sub weapons rather than calibrs or zircons.

Interestingly the UKSK can also carry long range SAMs if required as well as short range self defence SAMs too... but not very efficiently.

There is one crucial point.
20380 goes docking for a mid life repair means that the system runs perfectly well and as planned.
Yes, ship is a long lasting asset, yet needs regular maintenance.
And ... boom ... they just do.
Don't write it off, like some world superpower with super ships guess the names.

The main issue those ships have is the lack of Redut. I guess they can do the retrofits, if they wanted to, but it would be expensive and slow. Those ships are pretty space optimized as it is.

Still, given the lack of hulls they have, it might happen.

Keep in mind where it operates.
A Kortik on it's tail is still one of the most potent systems in the whole of Baltics.
Uran is second to none.
And that all goes with a 2kt corvette ...

The Severnaya Verf Shipyard has delivered the Project 20380 latest missile corvette Merkury to the Russian Navy, the Shipyard’s press office reported on Thursday.

https://tass.com/defense/1616195

"Mercury" solemn ceremony acceptance

It is kind of annoying how they still have not managed to reduce the time to build these ships in a consistent manner. Aldar was built in 5 years, but now Sharp is going to take 7 years. Looking at the construction history, this cannot be attributed just to the shipyard, since they cannot seem to be able to deliver the subcomponents on time to the shipyard, it is hard to expect them to finish a ship without the parts to do it. Severnaya Verf seems to be doing even worse since Mercury even took a whole 8 years to enter service.

This is pretty pathetic when Russia needs these ships now, if not yesterday. Japan is building the Mogami class frigate. These are frigates with larger displacement, better propulsion, but roughly similar weapons payload. The Japanese seem to be able to consistently build these ships in 3 years. They already built 4 of them in 4 years. They put two in service every year.

I cannot tell what is worse, the excruciating long time it takes Russia to build these ships, or the fact they stopped ordering these ships between 2006 and 2012. They basically wasted 6 years while the rest of the Soviet era fleet rusted.

I think it is pretty obvious they need to change the way ship procurement is done. They need to be able to do serial purchases of equipment, and actually fund these before the ships start being built. I do not think the worst point is the shipyards anymore. I mean a lot of them are largely obsolete, and there are lots of issues, like lack of automation and building of large prefab modules at certain sites. But there has been consistent funding by the Russian Investment Fund to improve this situation with tooling.

For example the D500 marine diesel engine has basically been sitting for like a decade waiting until someone funds a large enough order to justify building a production line for it. Like WTF.

Some people pissing their pants because it takes too long to make some ships in Russia without knowing what is being built and where all the parts and systems come from.

From using German diesel engines to Chinese to now making their own, nothing has changed and everything is easy they should be making 50 boats a week obviously because everything is fully funded there are not other demands on money and resources and international trade is running fine.

Obviously they need thousands of these little boats because selling oil and gas internationally means they don't need their own shipping fleet of tankers for oil and gas... they need pissy little ships like this to guard ports... because experts on the internet say so.

Perhaps if you had managed a real project in your life you might understand but it is clear you have neither the experience nor the interest to even just try to understand.

But why compare with the FREMMs, why not chocolate fish... cadburies makes millions every year... so why can't Russia make more corvettes...