Navy asks Lockheed Martin to upgrade sonar subsystem in Mark 48 submarine-launched torpedo
WASHINGTON, 8 Sept. 2015. U.S. Navy submarine warfare experts are asking Lockheed Martin Sippican Inc. in Marion, Mass., to help upgrade the Navy submarine-launched Mark 48 torpedo under terms of a $20 million contract modification announced last week.
Officials of the Naval Sea Systems Command in Washington are asking Sippican to provide sonar upgrade kits for the Mark 48 Mod 7 torpedo, which is standard armament for the Navy's fleet of Los Angeles-, Virginia-, and Seawolf-class fast attack submarines, as well as Ohio-class ballistic- and cruise-missile submarines.
Sippican will provide Common Broadband Advanced Sonar System (CBASS) Functional Item Replacement (FIR) Kits and related engineering services, Navy officials say. The order includes foreign military sales to Canada and The Netherlands.
The Lockheed Martin Corp. Mission Systems and Training segment is building the Mark 48 Mod 7 CBASS heavyweight torpedo with advanced common broadband advanced sonar system for expanded operational capabilities for shallow waters along coastlines and inside harbors, as well as in the deep-water open ocean.
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The CBASS broadband sonar enhancement makes the torpedo more effective against emerging submarine classes in the harshest of acoustic environments, Lockheed Martin officials say.
The Mark 48 Mod 7 CBASS torpedo uses modern commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) technologies in an open-architecture computing environment, and can be upgraded with regular hardware and software upgrades, Lockheed Martin officials say.
The Mark 48 Mod 7 CBASS kit’s evolutionary design and modular nature makes the upgrade of older version Mark 48 torpedoes to the Mod 7 CBASS capability a relatively straightforward effort without requiring significant torpedo redesign and certification, Lockheed Martin officials say.
The goal of this contract modification is for Sippican to supply the Navy with upgrade kits consisting of a guidance and control box, broadband analog sonar receiver, preamplifier, cable assemblies, and guidance and control assembly materials, Navy officials say.
The CBASS torpedo also has the ability of multiband operation with active and passive homing; advanced counter-countermeasure capabilities; effectiveness against low-Doppler shallow submarines, fast deep diving submarines, and high-performance surface ships; autonomous fire-and-forget operation or wire-guide capability to enable post-launch monitoring and updates via the submarine combat system; and running Otto Fuel II as the propellant.
The Mark 48 Mod 7 CBASS provides the ability to transmit and receive over a wide frequency band and use broadband signal processing techniques to improve the torpedo’s search, acquisition, and attack effectiveness, Lockheed Martin officials say.
The Mark 48 torpedo is 19 feet long, 21 inches in diameter, and weighs 3,500 pounds. It can be used as deep as 1,200 feet at distances as far as five miles. The torpedo can travel at 28 knots and has a 650-pound high-explosive warhead.
On this contract modification, Sippican will do the work in Marion, Mass., and Syracuse, N.Y., and should be finished by May 2018. For more information contact Lockheed Martin Sippican online at www.sippican.com, or Naval Sea Systems Command at www.navsea.navy.mil.
John Keller | Editor
John Keller is editor-in-chief of Military & Aerospace Electronics magazine, which provides extensive coverage and analysis of enabling electronic and optoelectronic technologies in military, space, and commercial aviation applications. A member of the Military & Aerospace Electronics staff since the magazine's founding in 1989, Mr. Keller took over as chief editor in 1995.
