Laser tank compression. "stiletto" and "compression" - laser self-propelled guns that will "give a light". What it is
SELF-PROPELLED LASER COMPLEX 1K17 "COMPRESSION"
SELF-PROPELLED LASER COMPLEX 1К17 «SGATIE»
18.12.2013
NEW - WELL FORGOTTEN OLD
In addition to the A-60, many other interesting programs were conducted in Russia. In the early 90s, a prototype of a mobile laser gun based on the Msta-S self-propelled howitzer was created. The project called 1K17 "Compression" used a multi-channel solid-state laser. According to unconfirmed reports, an artificial cylindrical ruby crystal weighing 30 kilograms was grown specifically for the "Compression". There is also a version that the body of the laser was yttrium aluminum garnet with neodymium additives.
In 1993 the project was stopped. Given the now increased interest of the Ministry of Defense in promising developments, many ground and air laser systems may well receive a second life. For similar purposes, in October 2012, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin initiated the creation of the Advanced Research Fund. Apparently, he will not spare money for high-risk research and development.
Vasily Sychev, Military Industrial Courier No. 49 (517) of December 18, 2013
Self-propelled laser complex 1K17 "Compression" is designed to counter enemy optoelectronic devices. Not serially produced. The first working sample of the laser was created in 1960, and already in 1963, a group of specialists from the Vympel design bureau began to develop an experimental laser locator LE-1. It was then that the main backbone of scientists of the future NPO Astrophysics was formed. In the early 1970s, the specialized laser design bureau finally took shape as a separate enterprise, received its own production facilities and a bench test base. An interdepartmental research center of the Raduga Design Bureau was created, hiding from prying eyes and ears in the numbered city of Vladimir-30.
When creating the 1K17 "Compression" complex, the self-propelled howitzer 2S19 "Msta-S" was used as a base. The turret of the machine compared to 2S19 was significantly increased in order to accommodate optoelectronic equipment. In addition, an autonomous auxiliary power unit was located at the rear of the tower to power powerful generators. In front of the turret, instead of a gun, an optical unit was installed, consisting of 15 lenses. On the march, the lenses were closed with armored covers. In the middle part of the tower, there were operator jobs. A commander's turret with a 12.7 mm NSVT anti-aircraft machine gun was installed on the roof.
1K17 "Compression" was a new generation complex with automatic search and aiming at a glare object of radiation from a multichannel laser (a solid-state laser based on aluminum oxide Al2O3) in which a small part of the aluminum atoms was replaced by trivalent chromium ions, or simply - on a ruby crystal. To create an inverse population, optical pumping is used, that is, illumination of a ruby crystal with a powerful flash of light.
The body of the combat vehicle ("object 322") was assembled at Uraltransmash in December 1990. In 1991, the complex, which received the military index 1K17, was put to the test. SLK 1K17 "Compression" was put into service in 1992 and was much more advanced than the similar Stiletto complex.
The first difference that catches the eye is the use of a multichannel laser. Each of the 12 optical channels (upper and lower row of lenses) had an individual guidance system. The multichannel scheme made it possible to make the laser installation multirange. As a countermeasure to such systems, the enemy could protect his optics with light filters that block radiation of a certain frequency. But against simultaneous damage by rays with different wavelengths, the light filter is powerless.
Powerful generators and an auxiliary power unit occupied most of the enlarged cabin of the 2S19 Msta-S self-propelled artillery mount (already rather big), on the basis of which the Compression SLK was built. Generators charge a bank of capacitors, which, in turn, gives a powerful pulsed discharge to the lamps.
CHARACTERISTICS
Combat weight, t 41
Case length, mm 6040
Hull width, mm 3584
Clearance, mm 435
Engine - V-84A supercharged diesel, max. power: 618 kW (840 hp)
Highway speed, km/h 60
Suspension type independent with long torsion bars
Overcome obstacles:
- rise, hail. thirty
- wall, m 0.85
- ditch, m 2.8
- ford, m 1.2
Type of armor homogeneous steel
WEAPONS:
Laser machine with 12 optical channels
Machine guns 1 x 12.7 mm NSVT
Sources: www.dogswar.ru, www.popmech.ru, www.otvaga2004.narod.ru, www.militarists.ru, etc.
Most people, when they hear about a laser tank, will immediately remember the many fantastic action movies that tell about wars on other planets. And only a few experts will remember about 1K17 "Compression". But he really existed. While people in the United States were enthusiastically watching Star Wars films, discussing the possibility of using blasters and explosions in a vacuum, Soviet engineers were creating real laser tanks that were supposed to protect a great power. Alas, the state collapsed, and innovative developments ahead of their time were forgotten as unnecessary.
What it is?
Despite the fact that most people find it difficult to believe in the very possibility of the existence of laser tanks, they really did exist. Although it would be more correct to call it a self-propelled laser complex.
1K17 "Compression" was not an ordinary tank in the usual sense of the word. However, no one disputes the fact of its existence - there are not only many documents from which the stamp "Top Secret" was only recently removed, but also equipment that survived the terrible 90s.
History of creation
Many people call the Soviet Union the country of romantics. And indeed, who, if not a romantic designer, would come up with the idea of creating a real laser tank? While some design bureaus struggled with the task of creating more powerful armor, long-range guns and guidance systems for tanks, others were developing fundamentally new weapons.
The creation of innovative weapons was entrusted to the NGO "Astrophysics". The project manager was Nikolai Ustinov, the son of the Soviet Marshal Dmitry Ustinov. No resources were spared for such a promising development. And as a result of several years of work, the desired results were obtained.
First, the laser tank 1K11 "Stiletto" was created - in 1982 two copies were produced. However, rather quickly, experts came to the conclusion that it could be significantly improved. The designers immediately set to work, and by the end of the 80s, the 1K17 Compression laser tank, widely known in narrow circles, was created.
Specifications
The dimensions of the new car were impressive - with a length of 6 meters, it had a width of 3.5 meters. However, for a tank, these dimensions are not so great. The mass also met the standards - 41 tons.
Homogeneous steel was used as protection, which during the tests showed very good performance for its time.
A ground clearance of 435 millimeters increased cross-country ability - which is understandable, this technique was to be used not only during parades, but also during military operations on a variety of landscapes.
Chassis
Developing the 1K17 "Compression" complex, the specialists took the proven Msta-S self-propelled howitzer as a base. Of course, it has undergone some refinement to meet the new requirements.
For example, its turret was significantly enlarged - it was necessary to place a large amount of powerful optoelectronic equipment to ensure the operability of the main gun.
To ensure that the equipment received enough power, the rear of the tower was dedicated to an auxiliary autonomous power plant that feeds powerful generators.
The howitzer gun in front of the turret was removed - its place was taken by an optical unit consisting of 15 lenses. To reduce the risk of damage, during marches, the lenses were closed with special armored covers.
The chassis itself remained unchanged - it had all the necessary qualities. The power of 840 horsepower provided not only high cross-country ability, but also good speed - up to 60 kilometers when driving on the highway. Moreover, the fuel supply was enough for the Soviet 1K17 Compression laser tank to travel up to 500 kilometers without refueling.
Of course, thanks to the powerful and successful undercarriage, the tank easily overcame slopes up to 30 degrees and walls up to 85 centimeters. Ditches up to 280 centimeters and fords 120 centimeters deep also did not present problems to the technique.
Main purpose
Of course, the most obvious use for such a technique is to burn enemy vehicles. However, neither in the 80s, nor now, there are sufficiently powerful mobile energy sources to create such a laser.
In fact, his purpose was quite different. Already in the eighties, tanks were actively using not ordinary periscopes, as during the Great Patriotic War, but more advanced optoelectronic devices. With their help, guidance became much more effective, and the human factor began to play a much less important role. However, such equipment was used not only on tanks, but also on self-propelled artillery mounts, helicopters, and even some sights for sniper rifles.
It was they who became the target for SLK 1K17 "Compression". Using a powerful laser as his main weapon, he effectively detected the lenses of optoelectronic devices by glare at a great distance. After automatic guidance, the laser hit precisely this technique, reliably disabling it. And if at that moment the observer used a weapon, a ray of terrible power could well burn his retina.
That is, the function of the "Compression" tank did not include the destruction of enemy techniques. Instead, he was entrusted with the task of supporting. Blinding enemy tanks and helicopters, he made them defenseless against other tanks, accompanied by which he had to move. Accordingly, a detachment of 5 vehicles could well destroy an enemy group of 10-15 tanks, while not even being particularly endangered. Therefore, we can say that although the development turned out to be rather highly specialized, but with the proper approach, it was very effective.
Combat characteristics
The power of the main weapon was quite high. At a distance of up to 8 kilometers, the laser simply burned out the enemy's sights, making him practically defenseless. If the distance to the target was large - up to 10 kilometers - the sights were disabled temporarily, for about 10 minutes. However, in the fast-paced modern combat, this is more than enough to destroy the enemy.
An important advantage was the ability not to take corrections when shooting at moving targets, even at such a great distance. After all, the laser beam hit at the speed of light, and strictly in a straight line, and not along a complex trajectory. This has become an important advantage, greatly simplifying the guidance process.
On the other hand, it was also a disadvantage. After all, it is quite difficult to find an open place for battle, around which there were no landscape details (hills, trees, shrubs) or buildings that would not worsen the view within a radius of 8-10 kilometers.
In addition, atmospheric phenomena such as rain, fog, snow, or even ordinary dust raised by a gust of wind could cause unnecessary problems - they scattered the laser beam, sharply reducing its effectiveness.
Additional armament
Any tank sometimes has to fight not against enemy armored vehicles, but against ordinary vehicles or even infantry.
Of course, using a laser that has enormous power, but at the same time slowly recharges, for this would be completely inefficient. That is why the Compression 1K17 laser complex was additionally equipped with a heavy machine gun. Preference was given to the 12.7 mm NSVT, also known as the Utes tank. This machine gun, terrible in terms of combat power, pierced any equipment at a distance of up to 2 kilometers, including lightly armored ones, and when it hit the human body, it simply tore it apart.
Operating principle
But there is still fierce debate about the principle of operation of the laser tank. Some experts say that he worked thanks to a huge ruby. Especially for the innovative development, a crystal weighing about 30 kilograms was artificially grown. It was given an appropriate shape, the ends were covered with silver mirrors, and then saturated with energy using pulsed gas-discharge flash lamps. When a sufficient charge was accumulated, the ruby threw out a powerful stream of light, which was a laser.
However, there are many opponents of such a theory. In their opinion, they became obsolete soon after their appearance - back in the sixties of the last century. At the moment, they are used only to remove tattoos. They also claim that instead of ruby, another artificial mineral was used - yttrium aluminum garnet, flavored with a small amount of neodymium. As a result, a much more powerful YAG laser was created.
He worked with wavelengths of 1064 nm. The infrared range turned out to be more efficient than the visible one, which allowed the laser installation to work in difficult weather conditions - the scattering coefficient was much lower.
In addition, the YAG laser, using a nonlinear crystal, emitted harmonics - pulses with waves of different lengths. They could be 2-4 times shorter than the length of the original wave. Such multi-band radiation is considered more effective - if special light filters that can protect electronic sights help against ordinary radiation, then here they would be useless.
The fate of the laser tank
After field tests, the Compression laser tank was found to be effective and was recommended for adoption. Alas, the year 1991 broke out, the great empire with the most powerful army collapsed. The new authorities drastically reduced the budget for the army and army research, so the "Compression" was successfully forgotten.
Fortunately, the only developed sample was not scrapped and taken abroad, like many other advanced developments. Today it can be seen in the village of Ivanovsky, Moscow Region, where the Military Technical Museum is located.
Conclusion
This concludes our article. Now you know more about the Soviet and Russian self-propelled laser complex 1K17 Compression. And in any dispute, you can reasonably talk about a real laser tank.
The design of the Soviet supermachine began in the eighties at the Astrophysics Research and Production Association. The general designer of the enterprise was Nikolai Dmitrievich Ustinov, who was the son of Defense Minister Dmitry Ustinov. Perhaps that is why the party spared no resources for the most daring projects of Astrophysics. So, already four years after the appointment of Ustinov to the post, a prototype of the Stiletto self-propelled laser complex appeared.
Fans of science fiction can relax - the laser tank did not burn out opponents with deadly beams. The task of the complex was to provide countermeasures to optical-electronic systems for monitoring and controlling weapons of the battlefield in harsh climatic and operational conditions imposed on armored vehicles. Under the guidance of specialists from Uraltransmash, the laser system was installed on a well-tested GMZ chassis, on which some self-propelled artillery mounts and anti-aircraft missile systems were already based by that time. "Stiletto" was built in two copies. The laser complex had outstanding tactical and technical characteristics for that time, "Stiletto" and today meets the basic requirements for conducting defense-tactical operations (formally, by the way, the complex is in service to this day). The car of the future, although it was put into service, the serial production of the Stiletto was never launched. It is worth noting, however, that potential opponents were greatly frightened by Soviet laser tanks. There is evidence that representatives of the US Department of Defense, knocking out money for the "defense industry" from Congress, showed terrible photographs of the Soviet super-laser.
But the history of Soviet laser tanks did not end with the Stiletto. Very soon, Astrophysics and Uraltransmash began a new project, and the self-propelled laser complex 1K17 Compression became the follower of the stylet. The Msta-S platform, the latest howitzer at that time, was used as a chassis. The complex was equipped with an automatic search and guidance system for objects that glare from the radiation of a multichannel ruby solid-state laser. Especially for the "Compression", scientists have grown an artificial ruby crystal in the form of a cylinder weighing 30 kg. The ends were polished, covered with silver and served as mirrors for the laser. Around the ruby rod in the form of a spiral, xenon pulsed gas-discharge flash lamps were twisted to illuminate the crystal. All this cost a lot of money and required a huge amount of energy to work. The laser gun was powered by a powerful generator, which was driven by an autonomous power plant. But the result fully justified the resources expended - such technologies were unthinkable for the rest of the world, at least another ten years ahead.
Who knows where the further development of laser systems could lead. But with the collapse of the USSR, like many other defense programs, the Compression project was decided to be closed due to prohibitively high cost. The only instance of the 1K17 laser complex remained lying in military hangars. In 2010, the restored tank was brought to the Military Technical Museum in Ivanovsky near Moscow, where it can still be seen today.
The last Cyclops of the Empire or lasers in service with Russia.
Posted by Hrolv Ganger
Dec 24 2010In the late 70s and early 80s of the 20th century, the entire world “democratic” community dreamed under the euphoria of Hollywood Star Wars. At the same time, behind the Iron Curtain, under the strictest secrecy, the Soviet "Evil Empire" slowly turned Hollywood dreams into reality. Soviet cosmonauts flew into space armed with laser pistols - “blasters”, battle stations and space fighters were designed, and Soviet “laser tanks” crawled across Mother Earth.
One of the organizations involved in the development of combat laser systems was the NPO Astrophysics. The General Director of Astrophysics was Igor Viktorovich Ptitsyn, and the General Designer was Nikolai Dmitrievich Ustinov, the son of that same all-powerful member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU and, concurrently, the Minister of Defense - Dmitry Fedorovich Ustinov. Having such a powerful patron, "Astrophysics" practically did not experience any problems with resources: financial, material, personnel. This was not long in affecting - already in 1982, almost four years after the reorganization of the Central Clinical Hospital into an NGO and the appointment of N.D. Ustinov, the general designer (before that, he led the Central Design Bureau for laser location), the first self-propelled laser complex (SLK) 1K11 "Stiletto" was put into service.
The task of the laser complex was to provide countermeasures to optical-electronic systems for monitoring and controlling weapons of the battlefield in harsh climatic and operational conditions imposed on armored vehicles. The co-executor of the topic on the chassis was the Uraltransmash design bureau from Sverdlovsk (now Yekaterinburg), the leading developer of almost all (with rare exceptions) Soviet self-propelled artillery.
Under the guidance of the General Designer of Uraltransmash, Yuri Vasilievich Tomashov (Gennady Andreevich Studenok was then the director of the plant), the laser system was mounted on a well-tested GMZ chassis - product 118, which traces its "pedigree" from the chassis of product 123 (SAM "Krug") and products 105 (SAU SU-100P). At Uraltransmash, two slightly different machines were manufactured. The differences were due to the fact that, in the order of experience and experiments, the laser systems were not the same. The combat characteristics of the complex were outstanding at that time, and they still meet the requirements for conducting defense-tactical operations. For the creation of the complex, the developers were awarded the Lenin and State Prizes.
As mentioned above, the Stiletto complex was put into service, but for a number of reasons it was not mass-produced. Two experimental machines remained in single copies. Nevertheless, their appearance, even in the conditions of terrible, total Soviet secrecy, did not go unnoticed by American intelligence. In a series of drawings depicting the latest models of Soviet Army equipment, presented to Congress for "knocking out" additional funds to the US Department of Defense, there was also a very recognizable "Stiletto".
This is how the Soviet laser complex was imagined in the West. Drawing from the magazine "Soviet Military Power"
Formally, this complex is in service to this day. However, nothing was known about the fate of the experimental machines for a long time. Upon completion of the tests, they turned out to be virtually useless to anyone. The whirlwind of the collapse of the USSR scattered them across the post-Soviet space and brought them to the state of scrap metal. So, one of the cars in the late 1990s - early 2000s was identified by BTT amateur historians for disposal in the sump of the 61st BTRZ near St. Petersburg. The second one, a decade later, was also found by BTT connoisseurs at a tank repair plant in Kharkov (see http://photofile.ru/users/acselcombat/96472135/). In both cases, the laser systems from the machines were dismantled long ago. The "Petersburg" car retained only the hull, the "Kharkov" "cart" is in the best condition. At present, by the forces of enthusiasts, in agreement with the management of the plant, attempts are being made to preserve it with the aim of subsequent "museification". Unfortunately, the “St. Petersburg” car, apparently, has been disposed of by now: “What we have, we don’t store, but we cry when we lose it ...”.
The remains of SLK 1K11 "Stiletto" on 61 BTRZ MO RF
The best share fell to another, no doubt unique apparatus, jointly produced by Astrophysics and Uraltrasmash. As a development of the Stiletto ideas, a new SLK 1K17 "Compression" was designed and built. It was a new generation complex with automatic search and aiming at a glare object of radiation from a multichannel laser (solid-state aluminum oxide laser Al2O3) in which a small part of aluminum atoms is replaced by trivalent chromium ions, or simply - on a ruby crystal. To create an inverse population, optical pumping is used, that is, illumination of a ruby crystal with a powerful flash of light. The ruby is given the shape of a cylindrical rod, the ends of which are carefully polished, silvered, and serve as mirrors for the laser. To illuminate the ruby rod, pulsed xenon gas-discharge flash lamps are used, through which batteries of high-voltage capacitors are discharged. The flash lamp has the shape of a spiral tube wrapped around a ruby rod. Under the action of a powerful light pulse, an inverse population is created in the ruby rod, and due to the presence of mirrors, laser generation is excited, the duration of which is slightly less than the duration of the flash of the pumping lamp. An artificial crystal weighing about 30 kg was grown especially for the "Compression" - the "laser gun" in this sense flew "a pretty penny". The new installation also required a large amount of energy. To power it, powerful generators were used, driven by an autonomous auxiliary power unit (APU).
SLK 1K17 "Compression" on trials
The chassis of the latest 2S19 Msta-S self-propelled gun (item 316) was used as a base for the heavier complex. To accommodate a large number of power and electro-optical equipment, the Msta felling was significantly increased in length. The APU was located in its aft part. In front, instead of the barrel, an optical unit was placed, including 15 lenses. The system of precise lenses and mirrors in field conditions was closed with protective armor covers. This unit had the ability to point vertically. Operators' workplaces were located in the middle part of the felling. For self-defense, an anti-aircraft machine gun mount with a 12.7-mm NSVT machine gun was installed on the roof.
The body of the machine was assembled at Uraltransmash in December 1990. In 1991, the complex, which received the military index 1K17, was tested and the next year, 1992, was put into service. As before, the work on the creation of the Compression complex was highly appreciated by the Government of the country: a group of Astrophysics employees and co-executors was awarded the State Prize. In the field of lasers, we were then ahead of the whole world by at least 10 years.
However, on this, the "star" of Nikolai Dmitrievich Ustinov rolled up. The collapse of the USSR and the fall of the CPSU overthrew the former authorities. In the context of a collapsed economy, many defense programs have undergone a serious revision. The fate of this and "Compression" did not pass - the exorbitant cost of the complex, despite the advanced, breakthrough technologies and a good result, made the leadership of the Ministry of Defense doubt its effectiveness. The super-secret "laser gun" remained unclaimed. The only copy was hiding behind high fences for a long time, until, unexpectedly for everyone, in 2010 it turned out to be truly miraculous in the exposition of the Military Technical Museum, which is located in the village of Ivanovskoye near Moscow. We must pay tribute and thank the people who managed to pull this most valuable exhibit out of the top secrecy and made this unique machine public - a clear example of advanced Soviet science and engineering, a witness to our forgotten victories.
Stories about the development of laser weapons in the USSR are overgrown with a mass of legends and conjectures. Starting from its alleged first use in the conflict with the PRC in 1969 and ending with a fantastic laser superweapon on the platform of the A-60 aircraft. Against this background, little is said about the real work of the NPO Astrophysics enterprise, which since 1979 has created several full-fledged laser systems Stiletto, Sanguin, Akvilon, Compression.
An uninitiated person, seeing these machines, will certainly call them "laser tanks". After all, outwardly it is so: a caterpillar chassis from a tank or a self-propelled artillery system, a rotating block of laser weapons instead of the usual guns. One “but”: the “laser tanks” of the Soviet Empire did not burn the advancing enemy as in Hollywood comics and could not do this, since their main purpose was “countering the potential enemy’s optoelectronic surveillance systems” and “weapon control on the battlefield”. True, then it nevertheless turned out that the eyes of the enemy weapons operators, when laser radiation hit them, still lost (or could have lost, because history is silent about the specific results of the tests). This is confirmed by the Chinese, who already in the early 2000s managed to introduce a number of our developments of 25 years of freshness in one of the types of armored vehicles. Politely silent, how many of their comrades were left without sight, portraying a potential enemy in the exercises ...
So, the beginning of development in the USSR of this type of weapons falls on the 1970s. In 1979, the 1K11 Stiletto laser complex was first born on a special seven-roller chassis developed on the basis of the SU-100P self-propelled guns with a 400-horsepower V-54-105 engine. To provide power to the laser, a second 400 hp engine was installed in the engine compartment. Additional armament is a 7.62 mm machine gun. According to various sources, only 2 such vehicles were produced, which were adopted by the Soviet army. It is quite possible that there were a little more of them, but after the collapse of the USSR, the remains of exactly two Stilettos with dismantled weapons were found.
Complex 1K11 "Stiletto". USSR, 1979.In 1983, another self-propelled laser complex appeared from NPO Astrophysics, this time on the ZSU-23-4 Shilka platform, the Sanguin SLK. It used the "Shot Resolution System" (SRV) and provided direct guidance of the combat laser (without large-sized guidance mirrors) on the optical-electronic system of a complex target. On the tower, in addition to the combat laser, a low-power probing laser and a guidance system receiver were installed, which fixes the reflection of the probe beam from a glare object. The complex made it possible to solve the problems of selecting a real optoelectronic system on a mobile helicopter and its functional defeat, at a distance of more than 10 km - blinding the optoelectronic system for tens of minutes, at a distance of less than 8-10 km - irreversible destruction of optical receiving devices. Despite the outstanding performance, Sanguine was allegedly not mass-produced. There is no way to verify this official statement.
Sanguine complex. USSR, 1983.In 1984, NPO Astrophysics handed over to the customer another combat laser system, this time for the Navy, Akvilon. The system was intended to destroy the optoelectronic systems of the enemy coast guard. This complex was mounted on a project 770 large landing ship converted into an Experimental Ship-90 (OS-90). The first firing began in the same year, the test results are not completely known. It is possible that another naval project of a combat laser, launched earlier, based on the converted dry cargo ship Dikson (1978-1985), left its negative mark here. An attempt to create a combat laser led to extremely high costs, an abundance of technical problems and became the source of numerous tales back in the late USSR.
The carrier of the laser complex "Akvilon" - "OS-90". USSR, 1984.
"Dixon" - an experimental ship for testing a combat laser. USSR, 1985.On land, things were going very well, and by 1990 the development of the 1K17 Compression complex on the chassis of the Msta-S self-propelled artillery mount was completed. Created in cooperation between Astrophysics and Uraltransmash, this apparatus really became a breakthrough for many years to come. In 1992, according to the test results, the Compression was already adopted by the Russian army, releasing about 10 vehicles, one of which today can be seen as an exhibit of the Military Technical Museum in the Moscow Region. In 2015-2016, it was photographs of this complex that began to appear frequently on the Internet, however, with various obscure data about what it really is.
1K17 "Compression" had an automatic search for and guidance of a multichannel laser radiation on a glaring object in which a small part of the aluminum atoms was replaced by trivalent chromium ions (on a ruby crystal).
Museum exhibit 1K17 "Compression" built in 1990-91.As described by domestic technical publications, an artificial ruby crystal weighing about 30 kilograms was grown especially for Compression. Such a ruby was given the shape of a cylindrical rod, the ends of which were carefully polished, silvered, and served as mirrors for the laser. To illuminate the ruby rod, pulsed xenon gas-discharge flash lamps were used, through which batteries of high-voltage capacitors are discharged. The flash lamp has the shape of a spiral tube wrapped around a ruby rod. Under the action of a powerful light pulse, an inverse population is created in the ruby rod, and due to the presence of mirrors, laser generation is excited, the duration of which is slightly less than the duration of the flash of the pumping lamp. Such an apparatus required a lot of energy, and therefore, in addition to the main 840-horsepower V-84 engine, an auxiliary power unit (APU) and powerful generators appeared on the machine.
A powerful and efficient machine had only one drawback: ahead of the general level of technological development at that time, it was very expensive. Taking into account the fact that in the early 1990s Russia was going through the dark years of Yeltsin's destruction of factories and the sale of secret technologies to the West, the project was curtailed at the stage of production of the first military batch of 1K17 "Compression". At the same time, the accumulated experience and knowledge could not disappear, and as soon as money began to return to the military-industrial complex in the early 2000s, work was resumed on the creation of new laser weapon systems. Given the seriously changed overall technological level: the size of many components has decreased, and the characteristics have increased.In 2017, Russian specialized publications and blogs talk about the creation of the MLK, a “mobile laser complex”. It is planned to be installed on the standard chassis of conventional tanks, infantry fighting vehicles and even armored personnel carriers. It is assumed that this will be a compact complex that provides reliable protection of motorized rifle or tank units in combat formation from enemy aircraft and high-precision weapons. The characteristics of the MLK have not yet been given.