Project 885: Yasen class #2

Sevmash told about the progress of construction of submarines of the Yasen-M project"

MOSCOW, February 17-RIA Novosti. The construction of four multi-purpose nuclear submarines of the Yasen-M (885M) project that have not yet been launched is not lagging behind schedule, now the submarines are on the stocks, the General Director of the Severodvinsk Sevmash plant told RIA Novosti. Mikhail Budnichenko.
The lead submarine "Kazan" started testing back in 2017, and its transfer to the fleet was postponed several times. The next submarine, the Novosibirsk, was launched at the end of 2019 in order to transfer it to the Navy in 2020, but this did not happen either.
"The nuclear-powered submarines Krasnoyarsk, Arkhangelsk and Perm are at different stages of construction. The work is being carried out according to the schedule agreed with the Ministry of defense of the Russian Federation," Budnichenko said.
He explained that now the submarines are at the stage of slipway work. Also on the slipway is another submarine of this project - Ulyanovsk. Work on it is also proceeding on schedule, the source said.
So far, the Russian Navy has only one multi - purpose nuclear submarine of the Yasen type of project 885-Severodvinsk. The remaining submarines are being built according to the improved Yasen-M project.
The seventh and eighth such submarines were laid down on July 20, 2020. They were named "Vladivostok"and " Voronezh". General Director of the United shipbuilding Corporation (USC) Alexey Rakhmanov told RIA Novosti that they will be handed over to the fleet at the turn of 2027-2028.

The developer of the "Sarmatian" patented two rockets for missions to Mars
Multi-purpose nuclear submarines of the improved Yasen-M project have a displacement of 13.8 thousand tons, a diving depth of 520 meters, a crew of 64 people, autonomy of 100 days, and an underwater speed of 31 knots. The submarines are armed with mines, 533 mm torpedoes, and Kalibr and Onyx cruise missiles.
As reported on "Sevmash", changes in comparison with project 885 relate to the element base of electronic weapons complexes and upgraded equipment and materials supplied by Russian manufacturers. In the future, the ship should be armed with a hypersonic missile system "Zircon".

https://ria.ru/20210217/yasen-m-1597773947.html

I think they will switch to Husky class as the Yassen is a pretty complex beast and seems to take at least 7 years to build.

Isos wrote:........There is no link between the two project. If they make a SSGN Husky then they will stop Yasen. But looking at how many they already ordered I doubt they will stop soon.

And they have no reason to stop

Yasen cost a lot but is worth a lot

But due to high cost of 885 subs they cannot build them in numbers like 2-3 dozen. Unlike a SSGN, Husky subs primary role should be countering NATO subs on a 1-1 basis near the Russian borders and to protect the 955 subs from NATO attack subs, hence they would need to bring its cost down to at least 50% of 885 subs to buy them in decent numbers.

lyle6 wrote:

owais.usmani wrote:But due to high cost of 885 subs they cannot build them in numbers like 2-3 dozen. Unlike a SSGN, Husky subs primary role should be countering NATO subs on a 1-1 basis near the Russian borders and to protect the 955 subs from NATO attack subs, hence they would need to bring its cost down to at least 50% of 885 subs to buy them in decent numbers.

Are we sure that the Husky would serve as the low end of the hi-lo combo with Yasen or is it just projection by USN cargo cultists who have to have any development mirror the USN's just for it to make sense in their minds?

It's supposed to be physically smaller and faster to build so it will be on the "low end" in that equation which doesn't mean it will be low quality

Isos wrote:The lead boat costed a lot but now it seems they achieved to reach a fair price.

If it was so much overpriced as media say they wouldn't be buying it.

The Kazan was said to be expensive because stupid people in media and government insisted on including the R&D and retooling costs into the price of the lead boat (rather than seperating the cost and attributing it equally across the eventual series build). 855M isn't a cheap boat cuz its the most potent SSGN on the planet, but only a complete idiot would actually believe they will be $3B equivalent for each unit!!

Isos wrote:Borei is around 800 million.

There is no way on earth a 955A sub would cost 800 million US dollars in 2021, no matter how cheap the labor cost in Russia. It is just too big and too advanced.

That was for Yury Dolguruky the first sub which was built in 90s and early 2000s and I still doubt that it cost 713 million dollars only. I am sure 955A subs would be close to at least 1.5 billion $ in building cost.

owais.usmani wrote:That was for Yury Dolguruky the first sub which was built in 90s and early 2000s and I still doubt that it cost 713 million dollars only. I am sure 955A subs would be close to at least 1.5 billion $ in building cost.

Based on what?

Isos wrote:Borei...That's a shame they don't make a kalibr launcher version

Building Kalibr version from scratch wouldn't make much sense

However continuing construction of Borei-A by 3 extra hulls and converting original 3 to Kalibr version is a very different story

Also original 3 Boreis have more torpedo tubes so that would all come together nicely

Not sure why anyone would want to serve on a sub best described as affordable... it is like buying your condoms from the lowest bidder.

You can talk about the HATO fleet of hundreds of subs but most of the time it is one on one which is a situation where quality and technology and training count more for how much you paid for that sub.

Making large numbers of cheaper simpler subs like Foxtrots didn't mean the sea will be shoulder to shoulder subs to back you up... if you got the cheap sonar with half the detection range having twice the number of subs in the water is no real compensation.

If Russia tries to match numbers with the entire western world then it is doomed to fail... but if you think about it... Russian subs have nothing to protect except Russian shipping and Russian territory... which is substantial area that can't be protected by less than a dozen super subs, but realistically 40-50 subs would be a good number to aim for along with a solid modern but compact surface force.

I would think modern Russian subs will be much much cheaper than US subs simply because now they can't import any electronics it will all be made in Russia... and the companies making it will be owned by the Russian government so instead of paying $10,000 for a toilet seat, it is more likely they will be paying the cost of making the component with a small margin to keep the company running... like 4%.

The bleeding edge is not cheap and some technologies will be enormously expensive and secret and very very effective and a force multiplier.

However continuing construction of Borei-A by 3 extra hulls and converting original 3 to Kalibr version is a very different story

Also original 3 Boreis have more torpedo tubes so that would all come together nicely

Reusing old boats is a good thing but sometimes just making a few extra brand new ones is also good too in terms of support and maintenance it simplifies things and raises the performance bar.

Older subs still have potential... but buying more new ones is a good thing too.

GarryB wrote:
Reusing old boats is a good thing but sometimes just making a few extra brand new ones is also good too in terms of support and maintenance it simplifies things and raises the performance bar.

Older subs still have potential... but buying more new ones is a good thing too.

Which is why I said they should build 3 extra Borei-A first to standardize SSBN fleet before converting orginal 3 Boreis to SSGNs

Isos wrote:

mnztr wrote:I think they will switch to Husky class as the Yassen is a pretty complex beast and seems to take at least 7 years to build.

Yasen is a SSGN.

Husky is supposed to be a SSN (but still with VLS). It will replace and reinforce SSN fleet.

There is no link between the two project. If they make a SSGN Husky then they will stop Yasen. But looking at how many they already ordered I doubt they will stop soon.

Huskey is supposed to create the basis of all classes is my understanding.

Which is why I said they should build 3 extra Borei-A first to standardize SSBN fleet before converting orginal 3 Boreis to SSGNs

Yes, I hear what you are suggesting and I understand but don't totally agree.

I think they should build an extra three so all their SSBNs can be effectively the same design and shape and use the same bits and pieces.

But when you talk about SSGN are you talking about a numbers boat... effectively an arsenal sub that provides extra numbers for an attack particularly in land campaigns where attacking land based targets can use up a lot of missile tubes but you want your ships and subs to have anti ship and anti sub weapons in case the enemy tries a sneak attack... I mean a corvette with 8 UKSK tubes is monitored firing 8 cruise missiles at a target... it might make you confident to send a few ships to attack it with missiles because it should not be able to fire back.

Imagine your surprise when anti ship missiles start coming from the Corvette and the water around it because those land attack missiles were 8 of 400 being carried by an Akula class former SSBN, now arsenal ship.

The older Boreis will be very quiet which makes them even better for sneaky beaky stuff that a "research sub" might get up to.

An Arsenal sub would not benefit a lot from being particularly quiet... the new land attack missiles will have a range of 4,500- 5,000km and their anti ship missiles will be 1,000km plus flight range hypersonic weapons so being quiet is not as important as being big enough to carry a large load of missiles.

With the older heavily double hulled vessels most of the missiles could be located outside the pressure hull and because these weapons wont need access from underdeck you can pack them in and replace a large percentage of the crew. An auto loading torpedo system in the front armed with some exotic weapons or even drones for long range standoff recon, or just anti torpedo weapons...

The Delta IV boats were rather good and the Liner missiles are very good too... it is actually rather a shame to end that line of weapons... maybe take a leaf out of the American playbook and have an arsenal Delta IV with say 50 UKSK launch tubes and two Liner launch tubes where the Liners have conventional warheads... or maybe even make a Delta IV into a satellite launcher and use the Liners for low orbit emergency satellite launch in case an enemy starts shooting down your satellites... it could have a back up role of shooting down enemy satellites too... with the ABM treaty it should be fine... and a back up backup role of sub based ABM system too.

The key factor would be to look at the older vessels and examine the factors that determine their operational costs and see if they can be rectified to make them as cheap to operate and maintain as possible... top speed is no longer critical and crew size should be possible to massively reduce... old equipment could be updated where it might be useful but also eliminated where it is likely not going to be useful or is obsolete.

Typhoons are finished (and were expensive as well) and Deltas have been ridden hard and put away wet

Neither have any mileage left in them and couple of them that do still have their current service to finish because there's nothing to pick up the slack

I also used to think that Deltas would be a good choice but then I checked the dates

Original Boreis are the best choice now, they can haul plenty of missiles and even put up a fight against other ships if push comes to shove