Excalibur has revolutionized cannon artillery, making it possible to engage targets precisely at long ranges while avoiding collateral damage, and Raytheon [RTN] is moving on more precise projectiles and a potential Navy variant, a company official said.
Excalibur was originally fielded in the mid-2000s to meet an urgent need in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The earlier 1a1 and ia2 versions have had successful deployments and met with “rave reviews,” said Paul Daniels, Raytheon Excalibur Business Development manager.
Photo: Raytheon
The latest variant, ib, developed over the past couple of years, was approved in June for full rate production.
With ib in full rate production, the Army is looking beyond current theaters of war and how this weapon will be employ in future, Daniels said. The program is exceeding all its key performance parameters in range, performance, reliability and lethality.
“We’ve heard government employees in the acquisition business, OSD level and the Army, call it a ‘model’ program,’” he said. Not because it’s perfect but because there’s a strong government industry team that when challenges are encountered, they are quickly and effectively prevented from knocking the program off track.
While the first Excalibur projectiles were required in a hurry, the Army accepted lower reliability, within 10 meters of the target, and the shell could reach out about 24 km, Daniels said. “Since then, were are now averaging less than 2 meters miss distance from the target, if not hitting it directly. Reliability is 94 percent according to the most recent estimate from the Army and reaching out over 40 km. At same time, costs have not risen. “They’ve been reduced by 60 percent from beginning of the program.”
What Excalibur does is a huge change for field artillery, he said. The accuracy means one projectile is fired and the mission is accomplished. In the past, fire had to be adjusted, taking time and multiple projectiles. Meanwhile targets rarely stay still and wait. For high value targets that can move quickly, the Army wants to respond fast with immediate effects further out. “A huge change, he said.
The precision means it can hit one building in an urban environment not several, reducing potential civilian and infrastructure damage. The maneuverable projectile can be shot off-set, not directly at a target, so it can go around friendly forces or villages and it will maneuver back to the target.
Logistics are “tremendously reduced” when prosecuting a mission with one or two projectiles instead of 10-30.
Raytheon today is “not resting on its laurels, but thinking about what kind of capability is needed next, and developing an Excalibur S and a Navy variant, the N5,” he said. Both are internal R&D funded programs.
The Excalibur S program is working on a laser guided variant, which will allow the user to redirect the flight of the projectile with a laser designator, either on the ground or airborne. If the target moves the laser can put a spot on the target and still achieve the mission, he said.
Successful Yuma tests in early May saw the projectile fired to a grid location, and then if the target wasn’t where expected, it had to hand off from GPS guidance and maneuver via laser guidance to the target. This is something that has to happen very fast, particularly if shooting over a short distance.
The semi-active laser guided projectile also addresses Defense Department concerns over the availability of GPS and the proliferation of jammers. If GPS is lost, there is still the laser alternative.
Raytheon is still doing some internal work to make sure of the design and technology, and now is having discussions with potential customers about the next step, Daniels said. There’s a lot of interest on the international side to have the ability to employ a precision munition. Another benefit of the dual mode projectile is that it can get close enough so when the seeker turns on it can see the energy spot on a target and provide the needed precision.
“This allows you mitigate target location error,” he said.
Additionally, Raytheon is working on Excalibur N5. The Navy has five inch guns on destroyers and cruisers, but they don’t have a precision projectile in the inventory. The guns also are short range. While an M45 suffer short range…M4 5 inch gun can reach out 13 nautical miles, but it’s maximum effective range is much less. Raytheon is leveraging all the work it’s done for the Army and Marines and max effect range is much less. The Excalibur N5 can leverage all the work done for Army and Marines and bring it to the Navy to give same kinds of ranges–out to 50 km, Daniels said.
“There’s a tremendous amount of reuse that can go forward with in Navy, to reuse over 70 parts and components” already used by the Army and Marines. The projectile is in production, all the suppliers are up and running, the team is established, and production lines can be leveraged. There’s a lot of commonality, especially on guidance and navigation—the brains of the projectile.
It’s a huge deal to get electronics to survive the environment of gunfire, he said. It’s incredibly difficult. But all that work is done and the investment has been made. The Navy can leverage what the Army has done, save money and time and field the capability. Safety and environmental testing will carry over from previous work, though there may be some additional testing to be done, but it’s not “extravagant,” he said. Actually, the G forces and pressures in a Navy gun are not as harsh as Army weapons.
“We’re talking to the Navy about what we’re doing, we want to make sure that we’re headed in the right direction to meet the kind of capability that s in their interest,” Daniels said.
The Excalibur N5 conducted a successful first development test in June at Naval Surface Warfare Center Dahlgren, Va.
“We were very pleased with it and the Navy engineering team was able to see first-hand what we’re doing,” he said. Some additional tests will be held for the rest of the year, with the goal of a full live-fire demonstration by the end of the year.
Beyond the near term, Raytheon is finding a lot of interest in different terminal guidance options, he said.
Potential adversaries are not standing still; they’re looking at different capability development to defeat what the U.S. brings to the battlefield, so Raytheon is always working with its customers to understand the next evolution.
For example, there’s work being done in industry and in government on scalable effects, the ability to vary the level of effects, depending on the mission.
In recent tests, all projectiles scored direct hits on their intended targets. The projectile’s reliability, lethality and range are in excess of Army requirements and at all-time highs, while the unit cost has dropped significantly during the program’s lifetime