This year, the U.S. Navy will field the first acquisition program to deploy the High Energy Laser with Integrated Optical-dazzler and Surveillance, or HELIOS, a laser weapon system with high-energy fiber lasers for permanent fielding by the U.S. Department of Defense.
This will be the only deployed laser system integrated into an operational Flight IIA DDG. This follows the Lockheed Martin and U.S. Navy’s recent demonstration of full laser power in excess of the 60 kW requirement.
“The scalable laser design architecture spectrally combines multiple kilowatt fiber lasers to attain high beam quality at various power levels. Lockheed Martin completed the Critical Design Review and Navy Factory Qualification Test milestones in 2020, demonstrating the value of system engineering rigor and proven Aegis system integration and test processes on the way to delivering operationally effective and suitable laser weapon system that meets the Navy’s mission requirements.”
Dr. Rob Afzal, Senior Fellow, Laser Sensors and Systems at Lockheed Martin said:
“Our fiber lasers operate with an efficiency that generates less heat and exists in a smaller package allowing easier incorporation into various defense platforms. Our ALADIN laser has operated in the field for two years with no need for realignment, proving both the lethality and the reliability of our solutions.”
“Our adversaries are rapidly developing sophisticated weapons and the threats to the U.S. Navy’s fleet are getting more challenging,” said Hamid Salim, vice president, Advanced Product Solutions at Lockheed Martin Rotary and Mission Systems.
Before the Star Wars laser death ray discussion starts here is the US Congress report figures on Laser weapons
A 60-100Kw laser is capable of Countering small and slow low flying UAVs, EO guided missiles , enemy ISR systems, and swarm boats out to about 1- 2 kms in range.
It is not going to be capable of doing hypersonics, cruise missiles , aircraft or much else.
We discussed this a while back. Yet…..
https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/starwars/images/5/50/Superlaser2.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20111104205236
No, but once you have the principle and a power source it is just normal engineering development to miniaturise and improve the offering. Its 100kW today, in 10 years its 500kW and that will be a different game.
It’s not that straight forward.
The laws of Physics are the limiting factor
Fibre optic and slab lasers have a power ceiling of around 500kw, possibly a mega max.
If you want big time multi Mega and Giga watt lasers you are into the realms of free electron lasers that needs an LPD sized vessel to mount it. As I have said before the Navies of the world have issues recruiting basic techs and engineers. They would really struggle to find particle physists to manage the particle accelerator needed on a free electron laser.
Even with big lasers the range is only ever going to be in the 10 to 50km range …again the laws of physics are the limiting factor.
Anyone know what the cost of these systems is relative to other legacy solutions? If they are only targeting ribs and uavs would a phalanx or boffers offer better value for money?
But there is zero time to target once acquired. So the range issue vs a missile defense system is mute to a large extent.
Let me start by saying I am in no way underestimating the barriers in developing a truly useful weapon/defence and certainly not claiming that you are wrong in what you say I don’t have the expertise to do so. However I have heard similar claims over the years in many and various technologies that have subsequently and often reasonably quickly come to be solved.
A few years back I read a very convincing argument about the total impracticality of the Hyperloop concept which certainly seemed come to rock solid conclusions that it would though it could work that in so doing at best be a potential deathtrap to those using it especially if an accident occurred of a scale common in other transport systems. Yet various companies are going ahead with it and recently the first if very limited human test was carried out and I am no longer convinced at all that it won’t become a practical means of travel in next decade or two even though those concerns still seem to be relevant. I will be interested to see (if Im lucky) an answer to the practicality of this technology or indeed that of (true level 5) self driving cars which I am rather cynical about too.
And equally I will be interested to see just how quickly and successfully lasers of this nature take to be an effective weapon of defensive measure for warships and elsewhere. I guess (as with those other examples) it all depends on how high you place your expectations and what timescale you place upon it. However presently I feel more confidence (right or wrong in my gut feeling) in lasers becoming effective before those other two but things may change I guess.
OK, in Gunbuster’s defence. A laser will always suffer issues with atmospherics. This is due to the very small nano-metric wavelength of the laser, being attenuated by airborne molecules such as water, CO2, NO etc. Therefore on a clear sunny day in the Gulf or on the test range in Arizona, a laser will have no major issues. Now put it in the North Sea where it’s blowing a gale and you can’t see more than 10ft due to the rain. The laser’s effective range will have dropped significantly.
You can get round this problem to a degree, by using brute force. This is where you use something like a fibre laser and collimate the beams together, but rather than focusing to a pinpoint beam, the beam has a wider cross circular area (CSA). This help reduce the attenuation, as parts of the beam miss the small molecules. However, it also means the beam’s spot will have to spend more time on target, as more of the energy is shared across the larger CSA.
Lasers have come a long way since the early ruby lasers. For instance the LED laser is a significantly more efficient than most other methods of producing a beam of coherent light. However, as power ramps up, then the cooling must also. Realistically we still need cryogenic temperature control for cooling very high power lasers. At some point the material used in the LED will get better at handling greater power, but we aren’t there yet! So currently the best method of scaling a laser is via the fibre optic method where multiple laser are combined. But the larger you go the more expensive and complex the focusing becomes, plus you need more electricity to power it.
The benefit though once you have sorted that out, is unlimited ammo. Compared to say a conventional CIWS, if its Phalanx it has to be reloaded after a few 10s of seconds. It can’t be reloaded from undercover, as its a plug and play system. So if you are under attack, a team has to go out to replenish the magazine. I can honestly see lasers being used to complement traditional CIWS. Replacing it will be some time in the future.
Davy Fully agree with all of that.
On the Pro side,
A Ram/ESSM missile cost around 1.5 mil a shot so massive cost saving through using lasers which means more money to other projects over the longer term.
A laser has a deep/infinite magazine unlike Phalanx and no through life cost for ammunition use.
Collateral damage is reduced if say a civvy pleasure craft is in the firing line because a suicide boat is maneuvering around it to use as a shield.
Cost maybe 15-20mil a system
SSL fibre lasers dont collimate beams into phase . They use the number of fibre lasers they have to focus all of the individual beams on the same spot making the optic system far simpler.
Cons
Atmospheric contaminants affect the beam along with mist, fog . rain.
Thermal Blooming where the air is heated and distorts the beam occurs for a straight down the throat target coming inbound. Crossing targets dont have this issue because you dont heat the same column of air.
Swarm attacks need time for the laser to destroy/disable a target, in some cases several seconds. So you can only engage one target every several seconds where as a missile system does many targets simultaneously
Swarm boats will start to carry thermal masking smoke generators to stop the laser.Similar to smoke generators/ launchers on AFVs
Cooling systems usually are 4x the size of the laser in use for 100kw systems . after this level it starts to require 5 or 10 times the cooling power.
Lasers dont exactly hit the atmospheric sweet spot for IR windows so some of the power is absorbed by the atmosphere.
As I said Physics is a bitch and has these inconvenient fixed laws that will limit what can be done until a smaller and far more powerful FEL is possible.
Yep, totally agree. You can diffuse the effectiveness of a beam through obscurants, like smoke etc. But it will also depends on the type of obscurant, range to target and the lasers power. If its powerful enough a portion will get through. Though how much that is effective is the million dollar question.
You can’t argue with lead, or in this case tungsten sabot rounds from a 20mm Phallanx. I know a lot of people are deriding it as having a short effective range and being obsolete. But as the last resort, I defy anything that can survive flying through a hail of tungsten. Yes, the ship may get hit by shrapnel and debris, but better that then having the warhead explode within the ship!
My use of “collimating” is a generalisation. As collimation in laser terms, means the focusing of beam to provide a more parallel beam rather than one that diverges. This is the term normal used with as single source laser that have been produced from gases, dyes and exotic materials (to produce X-ray lasers). Then that need a series of lenses to manipulate the beam.
With fibre lasers, the laser medium is not the issue, but the fibres themselves and the method of “focusing” the array of beams on to a particular target. Because the optical fibres used in lasers are generally a lot thicker than those found for communications use. When they are bound together, it is difficult to cool them. The fibre’s attenuation is quite low to begin with, however, at higher power levels, the fibre will heat up, which increases the attenuation. They normally use forced air to blow over the fibres, but this isn’t really sufficient, liquid cooling is the answer. But by running cooling channels in and around the fibres increase its overall size. This becomes problematic if the lasing medium is not contained within the aiming system, but below decks so to speak. The longer length of the fibres that transfer the light to the focusing system and cooling system within the aiming device will still need to be flexible as the device rotates etc. It is obviously doable, but adds bulk to the device.
There has been very little public information released recently on Dragonfire, although the word on the street is that they are having technical issues. The trials they did back in 2019 was at 50kw, so suspect the issues they are having are due to an increase in power. generating 75kw should not be a problem especially as Dragonfibre is a fibre laser, so is scalable. It is probably issues with heat management.
It would be nice to see longer more detailed articles. Something more like Navy Lookout (previously Save the Royal Navy)
Hi Kevin, we’re volunteers doing this in our free time I’m afraid.
Fair enough, I wasn’t aware 🙂
For those who want a good technical read i suggest you look at the US CONGRESS report on Lasers and Rail guns. It cuts through the manufacturers hype and puts it in a reaslistic perspective.
https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R44175/67
A lot of the previous reports detail range predictions and target destruction ability. basically its going to be slow low UAVs and small swarm boats for many years yet.
As i said Physics is a bitch!
as is typing on a small mobile phone….why will CAPS not work!
A point of clarification. This is not an official report of the US Congress but a product of the Library of Congress which provides, through the Congressional Research Service, staff analyses of various issues to Congressional Committees and members. That’s not to endorse or reject of any of its opinions but these reports are just that, opinions of Library of Congress analysts who may or may not have an expertise in the matters they are analyzing, and have no official Congressional authority.