TOR Air Defence system

Don't those bottom images show the vehicle with the front portion with a crane to load missiles from other vehicles into the rear missile carrying vehicle?

So that top image is the DT based TOR vehicle but not using its crane from the front vehicle to load missiles into the rear vehicle but a separate loading vehicle using its own crane to transfer missiles from the loader vehicle into the rear vehicle of the launch vehicle?

Which would suggest the loader vehicle is reversed the guy controlling the crane in the loader vehicle seems to be in the back section of the loader vehicle, while the missiles he is loading seem to be in the front vehicle of the loader vehicle.

In the launch vehicle as shown in the bottom photos the crane is in the front vehicle obviously with the turret and launcher and search and tracking radars in the rear vehicle portion.

So presumably if the missiles are on flat back trucks the launcher uses its own crane in the front vehicle to load missiles into the launcher in the rear section, while if a loader DT vehicle is there its crane is in its rear vehicle while its missiles are in its front vehicle and it loads the missiles into the launch rear vehicle...

magnumcromagnon wrote:
Ideally this new miniature missile is 50% the diameter of the standard Tor-M2 missile, allowing the tube to be quad packed. With 16 standard launch tubes that are quad packed, you get 64 mini missiles to combat drones. Realistically speaking it will likely be a mix of missiles, and I could definitely see 6 tubes that are quad packed giving 24 missiles to engage drones, and 10 standard missiles to engage aircraft, PGMs, and everything else.

I always thought the Tor system was quite inefficient in its arrangement. By confining all the missiles within a turret ring, they've artificially limited the quantity of missiles they could fit with each TELAR. If I had a go at it, I'd have a fixed superstructure occupying the space where the turret ring sits to house the missiles. I'd then have the sensors atop a folding mast on a rotating turntable just above where the control cabin is located. This should significantly increase the amount of missiles per TELAR (your working area is now a square with sides equal to the diameter of the turret ring instead of a rectangle within that same ring) while making the sensor tower a lot more responsive during training. If you require space for electronics you could mount them as overhangs around the superstructure which is great for servicing as well.

I always thought the Tor system was quite inefficient in its arrangement.

To be fair when it first came out it was amazing... 8 ready to launch missiles that are relatively cheap simple command guided weapons with an incredibly sophisticated radar search and tracking system... it was a significant step up from OSA with 6 ready to launch missiles in terms of tracking performance and the sort of targets it can hit reliably.

The first OSA had 6 missiles (actually the first OSA had only four missiles ready to fire See photo added to bottom of this post...) exposed to the weather and damage, while the later models had the missiles in launch box shaped missile tubes... the TOR protected the missiles deep inside the vehicle from the weather elements and of course enemy fire...

When they upgraded the first TOR with smaller lighter missiles with better range and more accuracy and precision, then having 16 ready to launch missiles was an enormous step up again... and 15km range vs 12km was an improvement too... Tunguska started with 8km range missiles and went to 10kms in comparison...

As it mentions it still uses relatively large heavy missiles because it is supposed to be able to take down A-10s and Apache helicopters as well as incoming Maverick missiles and Hellfires and even bombs and standoff weapons.

Having a much smaller missile to engage rather small drones makes a lot of sense, and because the system still uses very sophisticated radar and optical systems, they can be kept as being simple command guided weapons that are relatively cheap and easy to mass produce in the large numbers you would need them in.

By confining all the missiles within a turret ring, they've artificially limited the quantity of missiles they could fit with each TELAR. If I had a go at it, I'd have a fixed superstructure occupying the space where the turret ring sits to house the missiles. I'd then have the sensors atop a folding mast on a rotating turntable just above where the control cabin is located. This should significantly increase the amount of missiles per TELAR (your working area is now a square with sides equal to the diameter of the turret ring instead of a rectangle within that same ring) while making the sensor tower a lot more responsive during training. If you require space for electronics you could mount them as overhangs around the superstructure which is great for servicing as well.

I had similar thoughts myself... if the missiles are vertically launched then they really don't need to be in the turret itself except that being in the turret allows longer missiles to be used... I was thinking that unmanned trailers could be attached to the standard vehicle that could simply have large numbers of vertically arranged ready to fire missiles. For a battery defending an airfield for instance you could have several trailers for each vehicle and use the vehicle or other light towing vehicle to position trailers around the airfield or facility you are defending with a given launcher optically connected to the launcher by line of sight communication like a laser system so the trailers launch missiles depending on their location in regard to the detect target... the trailers could be dug in and fairly well hidden they just need exposure upwards to allow the missiles to launch upwards... they don't need to move or turn... and could be plugged in to the base power supply and information network too. You could have roaming TOR vehicles with dozens of trailers with hundreds of missiles available.

That idea of having sensors on an arm that could be raised for better field of view is a good idea too.

The reason for the turret is to allow depth for long missiles but having missiles in trailer based systems and of course standard type TOR systems means you could have a custom TOR system with the sensors on the arm for sneaky slow low flying drones that creep up using cover like trees and bushes to remain undetected.

In addition to radar and optics it would be useful to mount some sort of EW weapon to jam or disable the target directly too.

A 40mm grenade launcher with 40mm grenades with tail mounted command laser fuses for air bursts would be useful mounted on the arm too because the TOR has excellent radar capability so it could accurately track the grenades and fire a laser at the grenades to set it off a few metres in front of the drones with a large HE charge and lots of forward flying fragments to take down the drones.... and also for use against enemy ground forces that might attempt to attack the airfield too.

These mini missiles are a great idea too... should greatly reduce their length, so you could have 64 ready to fire short range self defence missiles on a much lower smaller lighter vehicle, and perhaps 64 full sized missiles on a trailer...

The thing is that multiple different solutions would be a good idea, because each has advantages and problems.

Certainly for new vehicles they are much bigger and should allow more missiles to be carried, but advances in radar and electronics might mean much smaller but also much more powerful radar coverage... instead of something like the current TOR system a Boomerang or Armata or Kurganets vehicle might have a rather small turret with 3 or 4 faces with AESA antennas for new photonic radar that is fixed and offers 360 degrees of coverage for both search and tracking in a wide range of frequencies... perhaps even including optical frequencies, while the troop compartment is all just vertical launch tubes for missiles...

Nice... so what they are saying is that the capable electronic and optronic systems of the TOR will be used to detect targets but cheaper systems linked in to the system will be used to engage the targets where practical... so TOR might detect a drone but Kornet-EM or some cheap weapon will be used to bring the target down using target data from the network...

Would make a light vehicle similar to a BRDM-2 fitted with datalink communications and optronic sights and a decent RWS turret with a 40mm grenade launcher with laser command detonated HE rounds or a 30mm cannon with command detonated HE shells located around the place to cheaply bring down drones and other targets.... and maybe some cheap laser beam riding SOSNA/PINE missiles as well as a few Kornets...