Oto Melara to attend DIMDEX 2012

: Posted On Tuesday, 28 February 2012 16:01

DIMDEX 2012 - Show Daily News

Oto Melara to attend DIMDEX 2012

76/62mm gun and its ammunition: the story of a success

The 76/62 SR, today in service with 58 Navies worldwide, is a multirole medium caliber naval gun mount, designed for anti-missile and anti-aircraft as main role, and conceived for installation on multipurpose ships of any class and type.

From the operational point of view, the 76/62 gun can fire at the max rate of fire (120 rds/min) all the loaded ammunition, without interruption, delivering a huge amount of ammunition payload on the target Vs time, also on very distant targets. The 76/62 gun’s powerful and stabilized servo systems allow fast reaction to re-phasing commands from one target to the other and precision and accuracy in aiming.

Moreover the mount can also be fitted with a dual or multiple ammunition feeding system in order to provide the User with the capability to easily and rapidly select, from the carousel, different types of ammunition, in accordance with the incoming threats.

Oto Melara, a world leader in naval weapon systems, will attend DIMDEX 2012, the third Doha International Maritime Defence Exhibition and Conference in Qatar

Oto Melara 76mm Strales naval gun system

The 76/62 gun mount can be deployed for:

Naval Gun Fire Support
Anti Surface Warfare (ASuW)
Anti Air Warfare (AAW)
Anti Missile Warfare (AMW)
Asymmetric warfare

In particular the latest developments in the ammunition field have brought the 76/62 gun mount to an excellency in terms of lethality in counter-acting asymmetric threats and air targets including both high speed manoeuvring missiles and the new NGS and ASuW requirements, emerging from Littoral warfare.

The 3AP fuze, can fit the 76/62 pre-fragmented ammunition, ensuring top performances in critical engagement conditions, such as those involving sea skimming missiles and fast manoeuvring boats. The 3AP fuze can be programmed in three operating modes:

Impact (Fast and Delayed Action)
Time (Volume Saturation and Air Burst)
Proximity (Standard, Gated, Anti-Missile, Conventional Air Defence, Air Defence, Anti Surface)

The 3AP fuze has a microwave RF sensor which behaves like a seeker detecting the target at long range. The relative velocity and position are measured and a built-in CPU sets up the trigger point of maximum lethality. Moreover a Digital Signal Processor provides full rejection of sea clutter at minimal distance from sea surface.
All the 76/62 gun mount including the ones already in service can be upgraded by the introduction of a Fuze Programmer Device.

Oto Melara DART (Driven Ammunition with Reduced Time of flight) guided projectile

To fulfil the new challenging requirements like manoeuvring anti-ship missiles even the supersonic ones, Oto Melara has developed the DART (Driven Ammunition with Reduced Time of flight) guided projectile, capable to be re-vectored towards the target during its time of flight.

DART ammunition can be fired by the 76mm Strales system, that presents new features:
- double ammunition feeding system,
- digital console
- guidance antenna
- gun shield r
- electronic equipment specifically designed for the DART ammunition guidance.

STRALES is extremely effective against today generation of anti-ship missiles and also in ASuW, especially where simultaneous engagement of multiple manoeuvring targets is involved, cooperating with the unique sustained firing capability of 76mm gun.
DART is a sub-calibre projectile with canard which is directed to the target by the guidance beam generated by an antenna placed on the gun mount within a protective shield Its effectiveness is further increased by pre-fragmented warhead and 3AP microwave programmable fuze.

The extraordinary results achieved with DART, especially related to aerodynamic and guidance, combined with the positive and successful experience matured with the Vulcano 127mm family of ammunition, have led Oto Melara to opportunely scale the latter, to re-use the electronic and aerodynamic of the DART and work on the realization of the VULCANO 76 family of ammunition.

As a matter of fact, by providing guidance technology in Anti Surface Warfare and in Naval Gun Support scenarios, VULCANO 76 is ideally complementary to DART, the guided ammunition for the Oto Melara 76mm Naval guns which is currently in production for AAW.

The objective of the VULCANO 76 program is to allow the 76/62mm Naval Artilleries to reach a substantial increase of range and pin point accuracy when engaging surface threats, as well as supporting troops or neutralising valuable targets onshore.

The guidance technology provided for this new family of ammunition is based upon GPS and IR guidance (and SAL in the future), allowing “fire and forget” operations. It therefore can respond to the requirement of split fire distribution: a target further ahead can be engaged with no need to wait for lethality assessment on the previous target.

This requirement is considered particularly important since there is a consolidated trend in littoral warfare operations where a single gun may be requested to engage multiple targets within short distances and short reaction time.

With both GPS and IR guidance, VULCANO 76 is capable to ensure top level accuracy at a range in excess of 40 Km. For the ballistic version (unguided), a range in excess of 30 Km is reachable with an accuracy better than standard ammunition.

Visit Oto Melara at DIMDEX 2012 on stand #N-121