Pantsir-S1 News Thread:

IDK Garry, i since Syria and friends aren't that rich, could upgraded Shilkas be used as point defense, in order to create more time for the Pantsir or whichever system to reload.

If each pantsir unit has 2 Shilkas covering them, it will be extremely difficult for missiles to take said system out.
Especially if they can coordinate with the Pantsir or a nearby TAR providing targeting data.

Shilka is excellent against helos, and quite good against aircraft, but not so great against munitions... it would not be especially good against incoming guided missiles and bombs...

Better with more Pantsir missiles ready to fire.

For the Hermes system they showed a ground launcher that actually looked rather a lot like a Grad, with 40 launch tubes ready to fire... having 4-6 of those on a base able to rotate and point in any direction would make it enormously expensive to defeat with numbers, with just launch tubes and no sensors or equipment... just a rotating launcher it would not be that expensive...

A direct datalink with the local command vehicle would be all it needs.

On more general term serial production of S-350 (a system that IMHO has not received the right consideration) have to start and development of Pantsir-SM and its new family of missiles have to be completed in order to fully match large scale coordinated cruise missiles/swarm drones attack.

Those quad tubes with small missiles design specifically for engaging small targets at relatively short range would be the quickest answer...

It will be the one tasked to area defense segment allowing to both engage large scale cruise missile attacks than keeping launcher planes away.

S-350 would be interesting as it has three missiles... the long range missile with a range of between 120km and 150km, the short range missile with a range of 40-60km, and the ultrashort range IIR guided 9M100 missile with a range of 10-15km or so.

Protecting the S-400 I would say the long range missile is not really needed and that most of the missiles should be the 40-60km range weapons, while the very short range missiles could defend the S-350 and Pantsir from direct attack... the extra layer means any one layer can reload while covered by the other layers...

Perhaps some sort of pallet loading that puts all the missiles in a single pallet loaded as one item... so for Pantsir-S1 it would have two pallets for each vehicle each containing 12 missiles or so to speed up reloading.

Yes, i have heard mention of this as well, even the Wiki page states it's not to effective against Cruise-missiles, yet also mentions new ammo that was suppose to resolve this.

The problem is the physical size of the targets... guided bombs and missiles, when heading straight towards you are tiny (looking at them end on is the worst possible angle but would be the angle the target sees them at as they attack it). If you fire a burst of 200 shells from a Shilka if the target is an aircraft you are likely to get multiple hits, and with the spread of shots even if after the burst has left the guns and before impact if the target turns or climbs or descends or speeds up or slows down it will still likely get hit by some of the projectiles because of their spread and short transit time.

The real problem is that a very small target might never get hit... it is like firing a shotgun... it is only effective to short ranges because at greater ranges the spread of shot means a small target might fit into a gap between the projectiles and not get hit. Picking your shotgun round is critical when hunting and is a combination of heavy enough projectile to injure or kill the animal target and small enough projectile to have more "shots" per shot fired.

For instance a number 9 shotgun shell has tiny little pellets but it has a lot of them, so for small light targets like rats or very small birds it means more pellets per shot and less space between pellet hits at any given range... but the lighter pellets slow down faster and might simply bounce off a heavier animal or not penetrate its skin deeply enough to seriously injure it.

Birds have a very light frame and structure... like aircraft... so you don't need heavy ammo to bring them down... multiple hits of light projectiles can often bring them down.

For rabbit shooting however you want better damage... better penetration... so a number 3 or 4 pellet is larger and heavier and penetrates flesh better to rip through internal organs and bones but there might only be 150 pellets in a number 3 shell compared with 220 pellets in a number 9 shell so there will be bigger gaps in your pattern of pellet hits around the point of aim... rabbits are usually closer than birds so represent a bigger target...

At the other end of the scale is a solid slug which is just one lump of lead, which will kill most things it hits but you have to be accurate with it.

Ball bearing or buckshot rounds have 8-12 ball bearings that act almost like light pistol rounds, so at close range it is the equivalent of hitting the target with 6-8 or so pistol rounds at once... the problem is accuracy... they are randomly placed over the point of aim so you might not hit anything important like heart or head or lungs, but that number of hits should get you blood loss which leads to shock and death.

The point is that at 20m if you draw a circle 1m across and randomly put holes... 12 holes for buckshot... these holes are not evenly spread so there will be large gaps where a rabbit sized target will not get hit. With 220 holes for the number 9 shell it is unlikely a rabbit in that 1m area could get away without being hit multiple times but the number 9 pellets are light and might just injure the rabbit and not kill it. Number 3 pellets offer a reasonable coverage of hits over 20m with enough weight for multiple hits to penetrate right through the rabbit and stop it cleanly... very occasionally it needs a second shot to finish it off but more often than not it is getting hit by dozens of pellets that go right through it for a fairly clean kill.

For an anti aircraft gun the problem is that the rounds you are using need to hit to do damage... just like shotgun pellets... so small targets need more and more shells fired at them for any chance of maybe only a single hit.

23mm or 30mm... the target wont notice the difference as both would likely bring a target down with a hit, but speed and energy and range and rate of fire are different.

New ammo can help... timed fuse rounds means you can set the fuses to explode at about the distance to the target so even a round that misses by a metre could still hit the target with fragments... you would set it to explode early so the incoming threat flys through the shrapnel and gets damaged that way.

The fundamental problem is that 23mm rounds and even 30mm rounds don't have space for super accurate timers and effective fragmentation and HE charges... that is why they are moving to 57mm rounds... you can dump the time fuse and use a proximity fuse to detonate the round at the right time and more HE and more fragments. For very high threat targets guided rounds can be used out to extended ranges too, but most of the time I suspect air burst rounds would be used.

Yes, no doubt a squad of 3 Pantsirs covering each other would be ideal, but money talks.

That is another point too... how are these systems being used... to be used properly they need to be linked together in a battery linked to an IADS sharing info and covering each other as well as avoiding all the platforms engaging the same target and wasting ammo and time.

Ideally you could have Igla-S teams supporting Pantsir units and indeed Kornet-EM teams dealing with UAVs as well... hell even an MG with a decent all weather sight and target warning information could be used...

As much as i am in favor for more missiles, it has become clear that the opponent isn't just gonna throw expensive missiles, but also decoys and smaller bombs.
Overwhelming the sensory of the Pantsir and friends and wasting missiles.

That is where tactics and politics comes in... locate the source and actively engage it... engage enemy platforms before they deploy the weapons...

The whole point of Tunguska... which Pantsir evolved from was to extend the SAM range beyond MANPADS and helicopter missile range so instead of dealing with Hellfires and TOWs it could deal with Apaches and Cobras before they launched their missiles...

I suspect the 40-60km range models of Pantsir being developed is for that very reason too.

For this reason, i see a that there will soon be a need for capable point-defense systems that uses bullets for CIWS, just like on ships.
I was hoping the Shilka could take such a role, but it looks like something else is needed here.

23mm is a bit small... 30mm is marginal... I would go with 57mm with proximity fuses with air burst ammo or timed fuse ammo or a mix.

Ideally a round that explodes several metres before impact with the incoming threat that is designed to blow fragments forward like a giant shotgun blast with a cone of high speed fragments... the distance from the target where the round explodes determines the width of the cone of fragments so the further back the better the spread... but for small targets you would want it close for multiple hits on targets that are small.

For the same reason I thing larger calibre guns at sea will start taking over CIWS duties... a 130mm shells exploding 10m short of impact with an incoming threat blowing 10kgs of fragments forward into the path of the incoming round would ruin any ones day...

The quad pack per launcher is more ideal. Was shown couple years ago.

There gets to a point where low cost missiles make it actually cheaper to bring down a target with one missile than with 500 cannon shells... especially when those cannon shells become more expensive with timed fuses or proximity fuses...

The Tunguska and Pantsir share the same 2A38M 30mm twin barrel cannon.

A close up of the muzzle would show a muzzle sensor to measure muzzle velocity over one gun and a shield/cover over the other (to stop it interfering in the measurement of the other shell from the other barrel.

It would not take much to fit another coil 30cm past both barrels that can be used as an induction coil to set smart fuses.

Very simply you could fire a burst and the first rounds muzzle velocity could be punched in to the calculation for the fire control solution and the flight speed and trajectory of the shells more accurately modelled meaning the flight time to the target minus 5m can be calculated and a signal transmitted via the coil beyond the muzzle that changes with each shot to set the fuse of the projectile as it passes through the coil to detonate 5m in front of the target.

For most aircraft it wont make much difference, but for very small targets it means that rounds that would have missed making contact and otherwise flown past without doing anything will now explode in front of the incoming target and while the main round still wont hit the target the spreading fragments might now hit the threat and do some damage...

Pantsir works fine against cruise missiles. Shilka would work fine too in spreading bullets. Surprised how little of the gun is used on Pantsir unless it is used we just don't know it.

I suspect most of the time the missiles are getting the job done so cannon shells are used as backup... like a special forces guy with an assault rifle and a SMG and a back up pistol... if he can help it he wont need the pistol but it is nice to have the option if you do need it.

Same for your clarification about the different missiles on S-350 so to cover a great range of possible menaces over a given city or area and above all leaving no possible gap to exploit between long range systems like S-400 and point defence ones like Pantsir itself or Tor.

Well developments at sea are interesting... if they are developing the UKSK-M launcher to hold everything then it becomes rather interesting in terms of stacking... the 40-60km range S-350 is smaller than the 120-150km range missile and presumably is also slightly cheaper to make and operate being lighter too... this raises the question... if the S-350 is carrying only the smaller lighter missiles... can it carry more... can it stack them one on top of each other... they seem to be the same diameter... but could an S-350 launcher carry twice as many smaller missiles than bigger missiles... I remember seeing a model of the S-350 where one of the 9M96 missiles is replaced with a quad launcher of the 9M100 small defence missile... so assuming it carries 12 launch tubes does that mean it could carry 12 of the 120-150km range missiles... 24 40-60km ranged missiles or 48 9M100 missiles (with 4 missiles per tube)... or even the 9M100 stacked twice for 8 missiles per tube and 96 missiles per launcher... or any combination... this is the sort of flexibility the UKSK-M will probably need to make it useful... otherwise it would make little sense to carry the smaller missiles if the big missiles give better range and you can only carry the same number of missiles either way.

I have yet to see a Hermes missile. Let alone IIR.

AFAIK SOSNA is entering service now and S-350 is entering service this year too. HERMES is an entire family that is related to the missile the Pantsir uses, so it could be considered an air to ground or ground to ground variant of a surface to air system.

The 9M100 is supposed to have IIR seekers and is intended as a cross military system... its lock on after launch guidance requires a datalink and an imaging IR sensor, but means it can be fired from inside an internal weapon bay like on a stealth fighter or a stealth bomber without first seeing the target. It can also be used as a CIWS for the navy, and short range defence missile for the army and air force... it is supposed to be part of the S-350 system entering service this year and it has been mentioned that this year we will see 14 new missiles from the tactical missile corporation... including new AAMs and new naval (sub) missiles...

Actually with lock on after launch it would be an ideal weapon for the navy for subs and for small ships as a CIWS missile.

It is said but not confirmed that it run out of ammo. Just like the first one last year. That's why it is off.

They should dig out rivetments that they can drive vehicles into with some sort of top cover... so basically an open trench with a fabric roof that is spaced so the if they hit one it does not destroy any others... no level of roof protection can keep the vehicle safe, but you can hide it while it is being rearmed... build a large hangar type structure and put trenches in it so any empty vehicle could be driven into the hangar and down into a trench and be reloaded... even if they hit the hangar they would need to hit the trench to effectively kill the vehicle... and it could have 5 trenches so hit an empty trench and get nothing... the hangar structure will hide which trench the vehicle being reloaded is parked in...

And those israeli attacks are kinda surprise attacks. So they can't have all their air def system working 24/7.

The purpose of an IADS is that it gives early warning of attacks so defences can relax and have down time yet be ready and capable when needed...

Syria needs more mig-29SMT with kh-59 and kh-31 to destroy Patriot along the border.

Well that might be what it comes down to... if Israel attacks Syrian AD units... then Syria will attack Israeli AD units... and they can pick the ones they want to attack... in the Golan heights for instance or around other military facilities in Israel.

A working Панцирь launcher, can defend itself , in fully authomatic mode, against subsonic PGMs (even more low-subsonic optical guided ones like those employed by Israel) with its autocannons with Pk close to 1 for each salvo at range of 2,5 km or less.

If the target is the vehicle itself then as the threat gets closer it becomes easier to hit with cannon fire... within 1km even Shilka should be able to hit an incoming munition as long as it gets a decent targeting system... the new EO system for Pantsir could be put on the Shilka to replace the radar and other bits and bobs and a datalink to the IADS and Pantsir battery should make it cheaper to buy and operate... and of course any ground attack on the base could be obliterated with it too.

With Pantsir it should be able to deal with small air threats to 2.5km with its cannon... but against small targets it will use a lot of ammo per engagement...

Not in this case. They are so closed that israeli can stay all the way at low altitude, behind the mountains and pup up a few sec to launch missiles that will travel no more than a minute.

Such a situation requires higher levels of sensors focused in the directions that have blind spots... including human intel inside the potential launch location areas, and of course careful intel regarding Israeli airforce movements and communications... as well as sensitive equipment capable of detecting terrain avoidance radar that would be used by the Israeli aircraft to avoid flying into mountains...

Most of these weapons are subsonic so the time from detection to when they enter firing range means not all batteries need to be on alert 24/7... of course that could not be achieved in the real world anyway...

The problem is that in the current situation Syria and its partners can´t risk to shoot down an enemy plane outside of syrian airspace. The western "community" would freak out and launch another large stroke to punish "evil assad". That´s why Nazinyahoos planes use the libanese airspace as cover.

Actually I would say if it is clear the shot down aircraft is an Israeli military aircraft the usual sycophants would claim act of war, but who listens to them these days... I would suggest now that Syria has a real IADS system the west would be rather less keen to send aircraft or ships to the region to attack Syria...

But would the west launch 150 missiles?

Syria needs to look at potential launch positions and locations for such attacks and set up ambushes... shoot down a US B-1B and they will sit up and notice...

GarryB wrote:

Pantsir works fine against cruise missiles. Shilka would work fine too in spreading bullets. Surprised how little of the gun is used on Pantsir unless it is used we just don't know it.

I suspect most of the time the missiles are getting the job done so cannon shells are used as backup... like a special forces guy with an assault rifle and a SMG and a back up pistol... if he can help it he wont need the pistol but it is nice to have the option if you do need it

Each Pantsir carries 12 missiles, I wonder are these enough to deal with their targets in most of the time ?   The AA system must be either have a very accurate guide missile or be able to generate a very high density of shots in order to maximize the hit chance.

For me the missiles look more like a Mosin with few ammunition rather than a assault rifle and the autocannon is more like a SMG rather than a pistol.

From what I heard the 30mm ammo of Pantsir and Tunguska are lagging behind in comparison with German 35mm programmed ammo and therefore it may not help much.

From what I heard the 30mm ammo of Pantsir and Tunguska are lagging behind in comparison with German 35mm programmed ammo and therefore it may not help much.

Against aircraft the 30mm rounds are superior and much much cheaper. Against small targets it will largely rely on missiles... which makes it vastly superior to the Gepard.

Each Pantsir carries 12 missiles, I wonder are these enough to deal with their targets in most of the time ?

A battery of 6 vehicles have 72 ready to fire missiles.

A battery does not operate on its own... there are other platforms and systems that work together with it, including both larger and smaller systems...

The last time the US decided to teach a lesson they and their allies managed to launch just over 100 missiles combined, so two batteries would be a good solution to that problem.

We are told those missiles hit two 'Labs' and two airfields... so four targets were attacked by about 103 missiles... the two labs were unused and unprotected, while the two airfields were defended.... a battery each?

Sounds to me like the undefended labs took hits and the airfields were defended with a battery each... note that this was without an IADS so each battery was essentially operating on its own...

In a Russian setting higher level SAMs and other assets would have been used to deal with the launch platforms to reduce the number of weapons launched and to damage the enemy to a degree that prevented any further attacks of that kind...

No defence is 100% perfect and over time even the best systems can be atritted and worn down, so of course it is very important to take the attack back at the enemy to stop the attack and prevent future occurrences.

They have developed a new missile that is slim and fits four missiles to each missile tube in the event of a swarm attack on the battery, where instead of 12 missiles ready to fire each vehicle will have 36 ready to fire missiles, and 6 vehicles in a battery could have up to 216 ready to fire missiles plus guns.

The battery could also include Kornet-EM missiles for hitting slow flying drones cheaply too.