Our MoD purchased 3M54 Klub for 6 subs ! It’s true not rumour 😀
Source : SIPRI

I had no intent to doubt Hoa please believe that…there are different variants of the 3M54 missile though and SIPRI does not seem to list which one Vietnam has ordered. Plus the same weapons system can launch the 3M14 LACM…which, given the proximity of somewhere like Zhanjiang to Hai Phong, might be an interesting capability for Vietnam to deploy. 😉

Yes, but the single burn motor is rather slow.

Sufficient in Meteors case to push it up to 4 times the speed of sound though so, thrust curve or not, in BVRAAM application its a moot point. Bayern Chemies view as follows: http://www.bayern-chemie.com/ramjet.htm

If required a rocket motor can be made to be throttled and burn slower. Thats not the ramjet is for, there is a lot of false assumptions about it IMHO.

Throttling a solid fuelled rocket?. You can have a dual pulse motor with differing burn profiles but thats a little different. Ducted rockets and ramjets have similar characteristics so, for the purposes of the exercise….ie differentiating between a solid rocket and an air-breathing motor, they can be considered as the same. The only context I’ve heard of throttle-able solid motors is in spaceflight with very complicated electrical variance of specialist solid fuels burn rate. Nothing applicable to missile weapons.

The end result is a ramjet missile can match the range of a rocket powered missile with twice the size and weight.

Correct…and one with a quite different optimal flight profile.

Ramjet, or rocket powered, missile will run out of gas before its max range and glide the remaining path.

Right and wrong. Maximum kinematic range and maximum effective ranges are very different numbers. As is well documented here the latter is even dependent on engagement geometry.

The big difference is in the operative flight profile dictated by the propulsion option. If your motor impulse is 15 secs then even at M4 basic arithmetic tells you that motor burnout is just over 20km downrange and after that point energy expended is only being replaced by trading altitude….hence the loft profile.

Ramjets do follow ballistic path and they do it even better than rockets, as higher the altitude = less drag = higher speed = higher mach number = more compression = more efficient ramjet becomes.

….but, as you have explained yourself, the thinner the air and the lesser the available oxidiser…there is a tradeoff. Ramjets CAN follow a ballistic path…but they dont HAVE to as they can exceed a direct profile solid rocket comfortably without recourse to it….see earlier comment about gliding ramjets.

Thats why all the NASA s hypersonic projects use rocket boosters or carrier aircraft before ramjet is activated.

No the rocket booster is needed to get sufficient airflow into the ramjet for the engine body to compress for fuel injection and ignition. Ramjets commonly have boosters to achieve this. The NASA scramjet technology uses similar process.

“Ramjets sustain thrust more than rockets” is an incomplete estimate. If they are of the same size and weight, of course.

…and this was the original contention. We were discussing NEZ’s of a Meteor equipped Rafale with an RVV-AE/SD carrying Su-35. This was before the revelation that Su-35’s standard warload will be at least 4 R-37 type weapons!!!. Who knew!?.

This alone gives us a clue that R-37 does have significantly higher boost + sustain time than Meteor. People keep saying R-37 is a draggy missile; True, but in order to reach a greater range, a draggy missile would needs even longer sustain time.

After a brief googling the testing seemed to suggest that the direct flight profile for R-37 gave a range of about 80nm or 160km. Loft trajectories accounted for the great ranges beyond that. Hence my earlier question as to whether R-37/RVV-BD was capable of 8g in the end game AND 200km range at the same time or whether it was a case of 8g terminal manoeuvre OR 200km+ range.

Andraxxus

I took the numbers from R-27 manual. Like I said, I guesstimated Meteor’s numbers according to its 100 km max range.

Would I be right in thinking that the R-27 uses a single burn motor and a loft profile to get the range figures you mentioned?.

Be it ramjet or not, all missiles will coast to its target after sustainer rocket is exhausted. If ramjet on Meteor was running after 100km it would have greater, say 150km, range.

Thats not the case…ramjets dont tend to coast very well as they invariably have great big drag-inducing air intakes. The value of the ramjet is exactly that it is burning relatively longer than an equivalent rocket motor and does away with the ballistic boost-coast profile that earlier weapons require. Weapons such as, I believe, the R-27 and -37’s….though I am, of course, willing to stand corrected on that.

The relative NEZ’s for the ramjet weapon, compared to the rocket weapon, are therefore larger as the latter must rely on the energy from remaining inertia which, once expended in manoeuvre, cant be recovered…where the ramjet weapon will still have the energy to catch as its still, on direct profile, under power.

The weapon on the wing station?. Isnt that the ASM-3 supersonic antiship missile?

RVV-BD – MiG-31BM and Su-35 (range 200 – 300 km.)
izd.810 – PAK FA (range ~ 400 km.)

Perhaps a silly question but why the need for a 400km missile on a 5th gen LO fighter design?. Isnt the purpose of LO to be able to close on emitters without being tracked?

Likely as the IN dont actually have all that much rotary lift capability!. A through deck may allow for development of enhanced vertical envelopment techniques etc going forwards, but, its hardly a necessity at their present level.

Makassars a bit small for the task going by what the Indian Army’s intent to deploy seems to be. From what I’ve read theyre converting an entire infantry division, 54th in Hyderabad, for amphibious ops. Whether they intend to aim for forced entry capability or not remains to be seen I imagine but it would suggest brigade-strength landing capability as a requirement.

That puts the ship needed as something capable of putting at least a supported battalion ashore plus support elements, so, more on the order of a BPE, Dokdo or a Russian 1174.

I’d not be sure of that b_i_o if you look at the LM footage for VARIOUS all the components are there. LSD, ISTAR, light strike. As dj notes 600lb and high endurance/900nm range means a big air vehicle…one too big for simple ScanEagle style launch/recovery.

Realistically that does mean VTOL in some description so ducted fan, tilt-rotor such as an EagleEye variant or AD-150 (http://adflightsystems.com/public/documents/AD-150.pdf?), autogyro or something equivalent on a substantial airframe. One thing this isnt going to be is cheap!.