Posted on 03/14/2008 7:03:09 AM PDT by Blood of Tyrants
Northrop Grumman has demonstrated exemplary performance capability of a laser chain, the first major building block of a solid state demonstrator laser designed to reach a power level of 100kW. The Joint High-Powered Solid State Laser (JHPSSL) Phase 3 program exceeded all target requirements of its second major demonstration milestone, including excellent beam quality.
The JHPSSL system is designed to accelerate solid-state laser technology for military uses, including force protection and precision strike missions for air-, sea-, and ground-based platforms.
"Northrop Grumman's JHPSSL will demonstrate the laser technology for the next generation of protection for the nation's warfighters on the ground, in the air, and at sea," said Dan Wildt, vice president of Directed Energy Systems at Northrop Grumman's Space Technology sector. "With the successful demonstration of a complete laser chain -- the building block of the fully integrated solid state laser -- the hardest part is over."
The first laser chain (LC1) is a key component to the JHPSSL scaleable architecture, which is designed to combine eight laser chains of four gain modules each. Each laser chain is a compact 15kW solid state laser and the entire system configuration has the potential to achieve greater than 100kW, the ultimate goal of the Phase 3 JHPSSL program. The company's scaleable approach achieves higher power as more chains are added.
The laser chain milestone was demonstrated on Dec. 20, 2007, two days ahead of schedule. Power reached 15.3kW, exceeding the target requirement of 12.7kW; vertical beam quality was measured at 1.58x diffraction limit, surpassing the 2.0 target; turn-on time was 0.8 seconds, below the 1.0 second target; LC1's run time was more than 300 seconds, far beyond the target of 200 seconds; and the Electo-Optical Efficiency was 19.5 percent.
DID BOEING GET TO BID ON THIS??!!
toggle/PattyMurrayMode/off/run
How does a “solid state” laser generate its power? From what?
Can understand chemicals being depleted upon each firing.
Will a solid state deplete also?
Holy crap 300 secs is a long time to have 100kW of laser focused on you.
However, it likely requires in excess of 10 GIGA-watts or so of electrical power to produce 100kW of laser.
“Northrop Grumman is a foreign company”
They’re not a foreign company.
Solid state lasers are typically diode-pumped rods. The diodes where out over time, easily replaced.
Listen for a second. Grumman got the contract for 2 reasons. 1. it is a political payoff to france for electing a USA friendly president. Just deal with it, these things have to be done from time to time.
2. Boeing basically tried to rip off the govt. with the tank leasing deal. 3 exec.s are serving time in federal prison for it. Boeing has the majority of the military contracts and it was a way of the military to B!tch-slap Boeing for trying to pull it. These things have to also be done from time to time.
NOC is an American company.
Northrop Grumman Corp.
1840 Century Park East
Los Angeles, CA 90067
Web Site: http://www.northropgrumman.com
No it isn't. It's headquartered in Los Angeles and listed on the NYSE. It has something over 100,000 employees and the vast majority of them are in the US. Aside from military aircraft they even build most of our nuke carriers and submarines.
Where do you get the idea they are foreign owned?
Products: F4F Wildcat; F6F Hellcat; TBF Avenger; A-6 Intruder; F-14 Tomcat; Apollo Lunar Module
Northrop
Products: P-61 night fighter, Flying Wings (B-35 and YB-49), F-89 interceptor, Snark intercontinental missile and F-5 jet fighter
Northrup Grumman est 1927
Products B2
The B2 ain't French
Correction Northrup est 1927
Nortrup Grumman merged 1994
Actually, it looks like the electrooptical efficiency is in the 20% range, which means the input power should be 500 kW or so. Me want!
Will my Mr. Fusion power down low enough to run this new laser, without burning it our, or will I need the Mr. Fusion Jr.? :-)
You forgot the EA-6B Prowler & EA-18G Growler.
http://www.is.northropgrumman.com/systems/ea6bprowler.html
http://www.fas.org/irp/program/collect/ea-6b_prowler.htm
http://www.is.northropgrumman.com/systems/ea18growler.html
“Can understand chemicals being depleted upon each firing.
Will a solid state deplete also?”
No, it’ll require external power. I understand they want to fly this on the F-35. Must have a heck of a generator... ;-)
It will probably fire off a bank of capacitors that will recharge over a period of time. How long, I have no idea.
It will probably fire off a bank of capacitors that will recharge over a period of time. How long, I have no idea.
Yes, I studied plasma physics in college and know that the efficiency of gaseous lasers is low, about 2% or less. I am not sure what the efficiency of diode lasers is. I’ll bet it is much higher than gaseous lasers, maybe as much as 10-20%. If it required 10 GW of power, that would be the equivalent of 5 large nuclear reactors (5 X 2,000 MegaWatts).
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