(Automated) AA guns have been around for a while with low cost per intercept - no need for missiles.
Edit: looks like Gepard ammunition is actually surprisingly expensive based on some contracts in the press, but still...
Edit: looks like Gepard ammunition is actually surprisingly expensive based on some contracts in the press, but still...
1. Everything you shoot into the air must come down.
2. Active radar is a loud target and stationary targets are difficult to relocate quickly.
3. Automated AA have a larger footprint and are more obvious installations.
Considering the customer who this was designed for was US Special Operations Command, it makes sense that small, light, pinpoint, and easily relocatable were priorities.
Anything that has a successful intercept has stuff falling down. For unsuccessful, only laser etc. have nothing falling down.
Edit: the link doesn't specifically talk about niche special forces, but rather broader air defense.
2. The Roadrunner system doesn't "fall down", it's designed to land if the intercept is unsuccessful.
3. Roadrunner is designed to be "cheap", compact and re-usable, as much as possible.
The linked text talks about defense against cheap drones and cost curves - not about niche special operation air defense.
If you have to defend an installation against a hundred cheap drones a week or so, not sure roadrunner is that cost efficient.
On 2), yes, but only if the intercept fails kind of completely.
The roadrunner nest installations are marginally larger, containing just enough space for a fuel tank (to refuel unsuccessful or cancelled intercept attempts) and power to keep them operating.
So in the space that you can fit a Gepard, you can fit lets say 20 roadrunner nests. You can take those in a truck, drive around and scatter them around the site with some camouflaging. If you are only expecting occasional missile/rocket attacks, you can build a net for intercepts that is far wider than you can realistically with stationary or even mobile AA guns.
But the real value of it for the customer (special operations) is that you can realistically have 2-4 people carry one in a box by hand or in the back of a jeep and in a matter of minutes, set it up, and shoot down an aircraft (or any other moving target).
If you are expecting mass swarms of drones, rockets, and/or missiles, then traditional AA installations make more sense.
But if you are expecting only intermittent intercepts then the cost per intercept is probably going to be lower with something like the what Anduril is offering as cursory searches suggest the Roadrunner is going to be priced around 100k-300k per unit. And this fits in nicely with their far cheaper Anvil-M interceptors (low speed, quadcopter interceptors) where anvil would take the ultra cheap drones while Roadrunner takes the high altitude or jet/rocket powered targets.
This is why they use self destructing ammunition. It's part of what gives some systems the "Firehose" look because every round is a tracer.
C-RAM uses the 20mm HEIT-SD (high-explosive incendiary tracer, self-destruct) ammunition, originally developed for the M163 Vulcan air defense system. These rounds explode on impact with the target, or on tracer burnout, thereby greatly reducing the risk of collateral damage from rounds that fail to hit their target.
Sounds like a good way to equip the enemy. Have you considered that you might be outside your lane here?
What was your MOS?
Also, you’re talking about conventional forces tactics which don’t really apply to this submission much.
Sorry, not US, so no MOS. My impression was that the US took a somewhat different route to air defense than the Europeans back then (and not just in terms of continental air defense).
I don't think we need to accuse each other of "ignorance" anymore, but rather we have had different experiences and a different read on the linked text.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-propelled_anti-aircraft_w...
Also the state of the art for this kind of thing is the phalanx I believe. They have it installed on carriers.
https://www.armyrecognition.com/united_states_us_army_artill...
It can definitely go on vehicles.
I would say China can easily bypass this tech with hyper sonic missiles and even just launching 10 missiles at one carrier at the same time can probably fuck it up.
Just even getting one missile with a system such as this is a miracle. Anduril is far away from having the know how of building any system to the level of the phalanx.
The Swiss have been experimenting with recoilless chain-guns to try and reduce that footprint. Which might be interesting, but recoilless weapons are extremely unpleasant to be near due to the backblast. It still might make sense to mount such a weapon on a remote automated station, and stick it on the roof of any available truck or APC/IFV.
The hype around hypersonic missiles is overcooked. Ballistic missiles are faster. The hypersonic's advantage is supposed to be its manoeuvrability, expecting an heavy anti-ship missile to be more agile than an interceptor is just silly.
And It'd take way more than 10 missiles to overwhelm a carrier groups air defence. The combat system on an American destroyer can track "100+" targets. The carrier group has several destroyers.
In order to overwhelm the systems, you'd be getting close to the point of exhausting their interceptors. So why even bother with the fancy missiles?
So it's doable and that fact is orthogonal to your reasoning. There are tons of AA vehicles that hold missiles and tons that have guns as well. These are real and they already exist.
>The combat system on an American destroyer can track "100+" targets. The carrier group has several destroyers.
Uncharitable response. Obviously tracking targets is easy. Knocking out 100 incoming targets that are simultaneously converging on the same position is a different story. What do these ships have 100 phalanxes or does that thing have to turn and shoot to pick things off one by one. Let's be real. I've seen these things even hitting one missile takes a bit. 10 missiles can overwhelm one carrier, they need a fleet of destroyers to make it work and in that case 10 would still be a high risk scenario.
Heck bump it to 20 and they can pick off the destroyers one by one with salvos of 20 cheap china made hypersonics.
Look it's not about whether it's faster than an ballistic. You just need something cheap and efficient to take out a carrier. That's all I'm saying here.
The carrier model is obsolete, it's easy to destroy. It's basically a painted target. Anduril is going in the right direction here but the company is nowhere near china. Anduril is trying to operate technologically from the same perspective as china. Speed and hacking everything together for cheap is the mantra and compared to china and they are building things that are lower quality for a higher price and taking longer to it.