The origins of Oto Melara dates back to 1905 when it was established to produce guns of various calibre. It has since then been involved in artillery programmes including heavy guns for battleships. Their 76/62 gun is in service with more than 50 navies of the world including the Indian Navy where it is fitted on many classes of frigates including Godavari, Brahmaputra, Shivalik and many classes of corvettes including Kora and Kamorta. With their vast experience in the field of artillery guns and its ammunition, it was but natural for them to develop path-breaking technologies for the ammunition to match the ever changing operational environment. The result has been the Vulcano programme and Oto Melara is the prime contractor of the programme. The scope and the status of the programme were unveiled during a media briefing by representatives of the company at their factory location at La Spezia, Italy. CEO Carlo Alberto Iardella chaired the meeting. After a brief introduction of the company by their Senior Vice President Marketing and Sales, Marco Brogi, Head of Research and Development, presented the Vulcano technologies followed by a presentation on Vulcano 76 by Massima Gualco, Head of Naval Business Line.

Vulcano Technologies

The concept for the future Vulcano ammunition family being developed is based on sub-calibre with the guided version having aerodynamic controls, inertial/global positioning system (GPS) navigation with a longrange and high degree of accuracy. Terminal guidance is also being provided in certain configurations. Two types of ammunition i.e. guided and unguided are being developed both in the extended-range and long-range category. The calibre selected is 155mm for the land version and 127mm for the naval version. Projected ranges for the unguided version is up to 70 km, while the range of the guided version is expected to be of up to 100 km when fired by the 127/54c gun and of 120 km when fired by the new 127/64LW. The expected range for the 155mm calibre is of up to 100 km. These ranges are achieved by duel means of providing a very high muzzle velocity and keeping the aerodynamic coefficient low. The programmable multifunctional fuse is based on microwave technology.

Ballistic Extended Range (BER) Ammunition: The BER ammunition has a multifunctional fuse which has many features like bursting on impact, delayed impact, timed and self destruction. Only the 127mm has proximity feature. These are normally standard features and even in the earlier days, time fuse could be provided by an explosive powder train and fuse time setting was done manually. The challenge has been in fitting so many features in one fuse to perform accurately in a very challenging environment. Pre-fragmented warhead adds to its lethality and the stabilising tail adds to its accuracy. Most of its development is over and the first 50 numbers have already been produced in February this year and the second lot of 50 is expected by the first half of 2012. Stringent production line criteria have been applied to include functioning of all fuse features, range and dispersion.

Guided Long-Range (GLR) Ammunition: The sensor has a fuse, IR (only for 127mm), sabot, stabilising tail, canard section and it is roll stabilised. The warhead is pre-fragmented.

Compatibility: Vulcano is compatible with any Oto Melara 127mm naval system. The Vulcano module is required for the programming of Vulcano ammunition to include guidance unit and fuse.

Production: Production of extendedrange unguided ammunition both for 155mm and 127mm is likely to start in 2013. Low rate initial production for longrange guided ammunition is likely to start in 2013 for the 127mm naval gun and 2014 for the 155mm artillery gun.

Vulcano 76

The 21st century naval warfare is changing in a big way with fleet engagements between carrier or battleship groups giving way to focusing on littoral warfare and supporting the land war. This has made all modern navies operate close to the shore in shallow waters to support land forces with accurate and lethal firepower both from the sea as well as the air. The US is providing the fire support with cruise missiles, which is a very costly option and all navies may not be able to afford it. Thus Oto Melara’s option of providing long-range ammunition in unguided and guided configuration comes at the right time.

Vulcano 76/62

Based on the experience of Vulcano 127mm, a new family of guided ammunition named ‘Vulcano 76’ has been planned, which is a guided ammunition for providing naval gun support and anti-surface warfare and complements driven ammunition reduced time of flight (DART) guided ammunition designed for anti-air warfare. The gun mount configured to Vulcano capability has been designated as 76/62-V naval systems.

Configurations: Vulcano 76

• In Ber configuration, it can provide naval fire support, anti-ship and anti-air firing capability. In fire support role, the range goes up to 30 km while circular error probable (CEP) remains the same as that of the standard ammunition. The other features are fin stabilisation, pre-fragmented war head and RF microwave fuse.
• The guided long-range autonomous GPS guided ammunition can provide long-range naval fire support up to a range of 40 km with a CEP less than a decametre.
• The guided long-range autonomous GPS guided ammunition with IR sensor for terminal guidance can provide anti-surface warfare role up to a range of 40 km with a CEP less than a metric. Both the long-range versions have a stabilising tail, canard guidance section which is roll stabilised, GPS antenna, fuse or IR sensor, inertial measurement unit, GPS guidance unit, control actuation system, sabot and pre fragmented warhead.

Time schedule: Qualification and low rate initial production of the ammunition is likely to start in 2015.

Multi-feeding ammunition selection kit for 76/62: This provides automatic handling and selection of four or more types of ammunition with a maximum capacity of 80 rounds. It is applicable to all in service guns and is compatible with Strales guided ammunition kit with no change in the overall gun weight.

Vulcano ammunition programmer: It can be set to Vulcano 76 with ammunition GPS initialisation data, target coordinates, trajectory parameters and fuse modality and settings.