Northrop Grumman Announces the FIRESTRIKE(tm) Laser, World's First Weaponized Solid-State Laser for

>>Photo Release -- Northrop Grumman Announces the FIRESTRIKE(tm) Laser, World's First Weaponized Solid-State Laser for U.S. Military Services

The FIRESTRIKE(tm) laser offers warfighters a 15 kilowatt (kW) fieldable laser as well as a combinable LRU building block for much higher power, based on a laser beam combining architecture validated by Northrop Grumman over many years with the Joint High Power Solid State Laser program, Vesta and Vesta II.



>> FIRESTRIKE(tm) Laser Features

Power 15kW laser
Beam Quality Nominally 1.5 times the diffraction limit
Size Laser head - 12" x 23" x 40' (width, depth, height)
Current source - 9" x 13" x 30"
Runtime Continuous, as long as power and coolant are
provided
Instant Turn-on Zero to full power in less than 1/2 second
Safety Remote operation, customer interlock access,
internal safety sensors
Control Common Command and Control (C2) systems and
Ethernet interfaces
Low Power Setting Provides nominally 100 watt alignment beam
Weight 400 lbs per LRU
Ruggedization Hardened LRUs with compact SSL technology
engineered for mobility and field operations

Star Wars has arrived.

biz.yahoo.com...

[edit on 11/13/2008 by BlackProjects]

They'd be absolutely perfect for static position defense. Gotta camp near hostile territory for the night? Throw up like 7 of these 6-laser boxes surrounding your sleeping position and then wire them to all fire simultaineously upon the flip of a switch.

reply to post by runetang


Even better yet (btw - good suggestion...) how about positioning these outside the perimeter of the enemies base/camp to assist in containing the enemy...?

You would have to give them some good protection (say a steel housing unit or something that can withstand a RPG attack...but if you could maintain their functionality the lasers would be an outstanding deterrent...

Hell, as soon as one of them saw (get it, saw...?) one of their own cut in half in front of them without an explosion, they would turn tail and bail...the psy-ops alone is worth the cost...

Good find!

Originally posted by runetang
They'd be absolutely perfect for static position defense. Gotta camp near hostile territory for the night? Throw up like 7 of these 6-laser boxes surrounding your sleeping position and then wire them to all fire simultaineously upon the flip of a switch.

You'd better pray your teammates are not too trigger-happy
when you're quietly returning from your night-time leak or whatever . . .

We may have seen the results of it being battle tested

here

We are going to be shooting down aliens right/left now.

reply to post by SLAYER69


Slayer - just got through the second part - good post! The Dr. in the first part is very believable but more info needed...other reports on this? Good stuff overall. Thanks.

ColoradoJens

Good find

If I'm reading that right it appears to modular to some extent. (ie, replaceable and the ability to hook more than one together for more power)

I wonder how long it will be before the first use of them is offically acknowledged.

The key is they are combinable. I am not sure what type of damage would be expected from a 15 kW laser..

More on this and other info on Northrop lasers


[edit on 11/14/2008 by BlackProjects]

Couldn't get link in Aviation week to work
Laser Weapons Gain Momentum

Apr 21, 2008
Bill Sweetman/Defense Technology International

A U.S. Defense Science Board report on directed-energy weapons in late 2007 states: “Directed energy suffers from a history of overly optimistic expectations.” This may be the understatement of the century.


Northrop Grumman tested this laser module for the JHPSSL program in December 2007.Credit: NORTHROP GRUMMAN

The report cites canceled or delayed programs, and notes that the biggest U.S. directed-energy (DE) program—the Airborne Laser (ABL), which alone consumes more than half the Pentagon’s DE budget—was little or no closer to its crucial operational test than when the board last reported on DE in 2001.

Similar problems affect high-power microwave (HPM) and other radio-frequency weapons. For instance, the best-known RF weapon, the Area Denial System or “pain ray,” has been demonstrated in a Humvee-mounted configuration, but can’t operate at high ambient temperatures because the millimeter-wave RF source uses superconducting magnets that have to be cooled close to absolute zero. A system capable of operating on a hot day needs an 8 X 8 Oshkosh truck to haul it around.

None of this, though, has squelched the optimism of researchers. In the next 2-3 years, multiple teams and programs expect to demonstrate laser technology that will be practical and accomplish useful military tasks.

In the laser world, the most promising research is aimed at the lowest levels of lethal or damaging power—the 100-150-kw. realm—rather than the multi-megawatt world of the ABL. Two efforts appear to lead the field: the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s (Darpa) High Energy Liquid Laser Area Defense System (Hellads) and the Army-led Joint High-Power Solid-State Laser (JHPSSL) project.

An important element of both is recognition that the size and cost of a system has to be proportional to its military usefulness, and that lasers are only likely to be accepted for use where a speed-of-light engagement is essential.

An important role for Hellads is aircraft self-defense—engaging and destroying incoming missiles. “It’s a game-changer,” says Program Manager Don Woodbury. “Put it on an aircraft, and it does not consume the aircraft—it can still do everything else that it can do—but now you can go anywhere without speed or stealth.”

A 100-150-kw. laser can engage a missile far enough out and disable it quickly enough to allow the system to defend against salvo attacks, given an attainable rate of fire.

Hellads started with the aim of using a liquid lasing medium due to its good thermal management characteristics, and for the first years of the program General Atomics’ Photonics unit was the prime contractor. In September 2007, though, Darpa contracted Textron Systems to supply an alternate laser module based on its “ThinZag” ceramic solid-state technology. The agency plans a “shoot-off in the next year or so,” Woodbury says, before proceeding to the outdoor testing of a weapon-power laser against tactical targets in 2010. The key issue, however, is to test the laser modules. “We’ll know in a year or two if it’s going to work.”

Woodbury is not specific about why Darpa brought Textron into Hellads. The program has been running for some years and was aimed at a full-scale firing in 2007. Woodbury says a big challenge has been the reliability of components as their designs transition from a laboratory to a weapon-type system. However, “the physics are working great.”

Hellads’ goals are written in practical numbers: 150-kw. output and a system mass of 5 kg./kw., leading to a weight of 1,650 lb. (750 kg.). The only inputs are energy—around 1 megawatt, from a shaft or electrically—and air for cooling.

Northrop Grumman and Textron Systems are involved in JHPSSL. The project is aimed at “stacking” eight 15-kw. laser modules into a single package with 100-kw.-plus output. Northrop Grumman claimed a milestone in December 2007, a full-power test on the first Phase 3 module. This represents the design to be used in the first eight-laser stack. The initial two-module test will follow soon, with an eight-module shot due later this year.

The laser modules are stacked like a filing cabinet, in two columns of four. A key to making JHPSSL work is good beam quality—i.e., a flat laser wavefront—in each module, so they form a high-quality beam when ganged together. Beam quality exceeded the specified requirement in the December test, and the laser also ran continuously for 300 sec.—50% better than the target. “Outside Northrop Grumman, I’m not surprised to hear people talk about the challenges of getting good beam quality,” says Dan Wildt, Northrop Grumman’s vice president of directed-energy systems.

A 100-kw.-class JHPSSL stack fits in a 1-meter cube, Wildt says, and with the expected 0.15 efficiency factor, needs 700-800 kw. of input power. The configuration of an operational system will vary by platform, he suggests. “On an all-electric ship, you’d just hook it up to power and cooling. On a smaller platform, you might not need long run times. You could use batteries and a phase-change cooling material, recharge the batteries and re-freeze the coolant between missions.”

The JHPSSL weapon might seem to be large for a short-range—“handfuls of kilometers”—weapon that is useful against smaller targets, but Wildt notes it has unique advantages. The cost per shot is extremely low at less than $1 per target, and the elimination of complex guidance simplifies operator training. In a counter-rocket, artillery and mortar (C-RAM) mission, particularly one that involves protecting a base in a populated area, the laser’s advantage is it kills the target by igniting the explosive fill, minimizing damage on the ground.


A non-chemical, 100-kw. laser could enable a mobile system for defense against rockets, or as a low-collateral-damage defense against UAVs.Credit: U.S. ARMY

Wildt argues that the laser could benefit ships. It is synergistic with kinetic weapons like guns and missiles. If the target weaves, as the Mach 2.8 rocket-powered kill vehicle of the 3M54 Klub missile is designed to, it exposes its side to the laser and is under g-loading, and more likely to break up when hit. “And if it doesn’t maneuver it gives the kinetic weapons an easier shot,” Wildt adds. For defense against small surface craft, the laser’s accuracy and adjustable lethality are an advantage; the laser can immobilize the engine or puncture the hull.

Northrop Grumman is one of several companies involved in the next step beyond JHPSSL, the High-Energy Laser Technology Demonstration. Under contracts awarded in the summer of 2007, Northrop Grumman and Boeing are developing beam-control systems—turret-mounted optical chains—compatible with a pre-production JHPSSL. The goal is to test a vehicle-mounted laser C-RAM system in 2013, capable of performing a military mission that would have required a chemical laser.

Northrop Grumman is advocating similar demonstration programs for airborne and shipboard applications. “We’d like to work toward full-up prototypes, testing and verifying commercial off-the-shelf batteries and building cooling systems,” Wildt says.

The laser team is “very much” working with Northrop Grumman’s Next-Generation Bomber team, as well.

Im glad America is catching up with Russia on laser technology...or at least somewhat. actually no, they are good but compared to the russians they are inferior. The russians have this tech even better but their inability to buy it for their military is the reason they dont have it in their military. They have this technology, since the early days and the aftermath of ww2 and before. and the cold war. Russia has this tech, and know how to apply it. but their economic situation is the problem. so they only have proto types which are complete but no money to put in to production.

reply to post by RussiaUSA

Sorry but I have to shake me head at your comments. Whilst American companies actually produce the proof of working weapons, the Russians have yet to even show a glimpse of their supposed superior weapons. Simply because they don't have any. Of course if some no name Russian scientists makes some vague claims about them being superior to everyone else, it must be true

reply to post by RussiaUSA


Utter spam

This is not a one line post as of now.

Originally posted by RussiaUSA
Im glad America is catching up with Russia on laser technology...or at least somewhat. actually no, they are good but compared to the russians they are inferior. The russians have this tech even better but their inability to buy it for their military is the reason they dont have it in their military. They have this technology, since the early days and the aftermath of ww2 and before. and the cold war. Russia has this tech, and know how to apply it. but their economic situation is the problem. so they only have proto types which are complete but no money to put in to production.

I always love hearing from former Russians who now live outside the former Soviet Union who make outlandish claims we are showing proof here.

where is the proof of the Russian having this tech?

Originally posted by mad scientist
reply to post by RussiaUSA

 

Sorry but I have to shake me head at your comments. Whilst American companies actually produce the proof of working weapons, the Russians have yet to even show a glimpse of their supposed superior weapons. Simply because they don't have any. Of course if some no name Russian scientists makes some vague claims about them being superior to everyone else, it must be true

Had it not been for those video links,and if only a link with written words said "U.S.A. now has soild state lasers" people like YOU (Mad Scientist) would still believe it's true, so don't act as if you only believe it because there was a video link to it.
Here's some old info that the U.S. released even though "publicly" they still were saying Russia didn't have these type of weapons:


"To power the laser system the satellite received two turbine generators, and the laser gun itself was placed in the fairing moved to the fuselage. This fairing was located between the trailing edge of the wing and the fin.

Since late 1960s, the Soviet Union was working on development of ground laser systems for anti-satellite defense and pumping from nuclear explosions. Unlike the Roentgen laser of Teller, such lasers were reusable. One of such lasers was probably built near Dushanbe. In different periods Yu. Babaev and Yu. Ablekov supervised the work on such laser, but due to the unilateral moratorium announced by the USSR, and the followed mysterious deaths of both engineers the work on such lasers was suspended in the mid-1980s.

In 1994-1995, The High Temperatures Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences sold the Pamir-3U mobile electric generator to the United States. The Pamir-3U had an output of 15 megawatt, dimensions of 2.5 x 2.65 x 10 meters, and weighed about 20 tons. The generator could be used in Russia (USSR) on the ground or in outer space for power supply to long-range laser and super high frequency weapon systems.

The Soviet Union also worked on designing of an "orbital fortress" based on a space station of the Mir type. Modules of the aiming system served as the side blocks of the station. The side blocks were attached to the basic module. The blocks were to be delivered to the station in cargo compartments of the Buran shuttle orbiter. The station was intended for killing of warheads of ballistic missiles from outer space when the crew was on board." 1. www.fas.org...

2. www.dia.mil...

3. www.jamesoberg.com...

4. " In 1983 flight trials of the approximately 60t laser device commenced on an Ilyushin Il-76MD heavylift transport. At the same time research was being carried out on the propagation of laser beams in the atmosphere.

Starting at the end of the 1960s, the Russians also developed ground-based nuclear laser systems for combating spacecraft. Unlike the American x-ray lasers, they could be used several times over. The programme was terminated after the USSR announced a unilateral moratorium on trials of the space defence system and the puzzling deaths of the two project managers in the mid-1980s.

The mobile Pamir-SU electro-generator, with an output of 15MW and a mass of around 20t, could supply power to long-range lasers and ultra-high-frequency weapon systems. It could be used both on the Earth and also in space. In 1994/1995 this equipment was sold to the USA. "
www.flug-revue.rotor.com...


[edit on 23-11-2008 by 121200]

Originally posted by 121200
Had it not been for those video links,and if only a link with written words said "U.S.A. now has soild state lasers" people like YOU (Mad Scientist) would still believe it's true, so don't act as if you only believe it because there was a video link to it.

I suggest you do some more research my Chinese friend

Laser tech like this will certainly change the speed & devastation of war!
I wonder if they'll make one the size of a chainsaw, so I won't have to climb the trees I'm taking down, or trimming, anymore!?! just zap the branches outta the sky!!! Then incinerate the ground mess with a sweeping motion!!!

reply to post by chapter29

Good idea...box your enemy in and contain them with a laser type fence(provided by this weapon), then airstrike the hell out of their position

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