5 ms·
> suicide drone swarm is non-economical and is a pure waste of high tech electronics in an explosion. You state that very confidently, but give no reasoning at
by tablespoon 4y ago
> suicide drone swarm is non-economical and is a pure waste of high tech electronics in an explosion.
You state that very confidently, but give no reasoning at all.
A Javelin missile costs (IIRC) something like $100k. A Tomahawk cruise missile costs $2m. If you shoot more than one at a target (which I'm sure happens), you've got yourself a suicide drone swarm.
If you strap warheads to 5 COTS $1000 drones, and kill a tank with the swarm, that could be both 1) more economical than a Javelin, and 2) may even defeat some countermeasures (e.g. active ones optimized to attack a single threat, reactive armor designed to protect against a single hit).
- samplatt 4y agoNo COTS drone that can carry a realistic payload is going to cost $1000. They'll cost $5000-$15000 so will still be 6x cheaper than a Tomahawk ^_^
- kragen 4y agoAn RPG-7V1 PG-7VR has 750 mm penetration in RHA and weighs 4.5 kg, including the rocket motor. How expensive is a COTS drone that can carry 4.5 kg? It looks like a Carbon Cub with a 15-cc engine and a 90-inch wingspan costs US$400: https://www.horizonhobby.com/product/carbon-cub-15cc-arf-90/HAN5065.html https://www.horizonhobby.com/product/carbon-cub-15cc-arf-90/... It has 1170 square inches of wing area and a claimed wing loading of "22.4 oz/sq in" which probably means 22.4 oz./sq ft. That would mean it weighs 5.1 kg, and the manual https://www.manua.ls/hangar-9/carbon-cub-15cc-arf/manual https://www.manua.ls/hangar-9/carbon-cub-15cc-arf/manual confirms it weighs 5.2 kg. The Carbon Cub surely can't carry nearly its own weight in payload. You'd probably have to scale it up by a linear factor of about 1.7, which would probably bring the cost to about US$1000. Or you could launch the drone with compressed air or put a couple of solid-fueled rocket engines on it. You probably won't sink an aircraft carrier with a Carbon Cub firing an RPG (retrofitted with guidance systems) but you should have a pretty good chance of blowing up a tank.