Shershen class

Project 206

Shershen class Egyptian boat without torpedo tubes

Ship data Ship type Torpedo boat Shipyard Shipyard 363 "Sredne-Nevsky", Leningrad Shipyard 640, Sosnowka shipyard 345, Jaroslawski licensee Construction period 1960 to 1968 Units built 80 (Soviet Union) ? Licensee period of service 1961 to 2010s

Ship dimensions and crew length 34.6 m ( Lüa ) width 6.74 m Draft Max. 1.72 m displacement Standard / full: 129 t / 161 t   crew 21st

Machine system machine 3 × M503A diesel engine Machine performance 3 × 4,000 PS (2,942 kW) Top speed 45 kn (83 km / h) propeller 3 × three-leaf

Armament 4 × 1 torpedo tubes ∅ 53.3 cm 2 × 2 30 mm L / 63 AK-230 2 × settler for depth charges 2 × drainage rails for sea ​​mines

Project 206 with the code name Schtorm ( Russian "Шторм" ) (German: " Sturm "), later referred to by NATO as the Shershen class , was a class of torpedo boats that were constructed in the Soviet Union during the Cold War and their boats, alongside used in the Soviet Navy , were exported to several countries.

development

In 1955, the Soviet Navy determined that a new type of torpedo boat was needed. The boats were to have a greater range and significantly more powerful armament than the small wooden boats of Project 183 that had been used until then. The planning office 5 (later known as "Almas") was commissioned with a corresponding development work, which was carried out between 1957 and 1959. The planned steel hull was similar to that of the rocket boats of Project 205 , the machinery was identical in both classes.

In addition to four torpedoes, two towers were with machine guns installed whose weapons fire also by the first time in such a small boat of the Soviet Navy radar could be steered. The range was 800 nautical miles at 30 knots , and the autonomous deployment time was around five days.

When designing the superstructures, care was taken to ensure that decontamination could be carried out more quickly if the surfaces were contaminated by warfare agents or nuclear particles . The edges were rounded off so that washing water or special cleaning fluids could easily run off.

technology

drive

Three diesel engines of the type M-503 with 4,000 hp each at 2,200 revolutions per minute were installed in the fuselage. Each of these 5.4-ton in-line radial engines drove a shaft . The propellers on these waves could accelerate the boats up to 45 knots.

The range was 800 nautical miles at 30 knots or 460 nautical miles at 42 knots. The ships were only of limited seaworthiness and were primarily intended for operations in the coastal apron. Their weapons could only be used effectively up to level 5 seas .

Armament

Four Project 206 boats on a Soviet cargo ship in 1986.

Drawing from Project 206. The rounded edges of the superstructure and deck are clearly visible here. At the stern two short rails for the use of sea mines.

Project 206 boat HQ-305 had been delivered to Vietnam in October 1980 and was still in service at the time of this recording, September 2009.

The primary armament consisted of four individual 533 mm torpedo tubes of the type OTA-53-206. The pipes could not be reloaded with on-board resources, so that a supply facility had to be started after the four weapons were fired. The pipes were installed on deck, two on either side of the superstructure, with the firing point forward.

Two towers, each with two axially parallel mounted 30 mm automatic cannons of the type AK-230 , were installed for close-range defense. One was placed on the forecastle before the superstructure , the other stood on a superstructure on the aft ship. The weapons had a cadence of 500 rounds / minute and a range of about five kilometers.

A scaffold was mounted on port and starboard to accommodate 6 depth charges each. Project 206, however, had no sonar to search for submarines , so these depth charges could only be used in a targeted manner in cooperation with appropriately equipped units. The boats could also store eight Soviet KMD-500 or four KMD-1000 sea ​​mines via two rails on deck and set them down via the stern.

electronics

Project 206 was a MR-102 - Radar (NATO designation: "Pot Drum") equipped to search for air and surface targets, which was installed on the mast. It worked in the X-band .

The MR-104 “Rys” guidance radar (NATO designation: “Drum Tilt”), the sensor of which was mounted amidships on the roof of the superstructure, was installed to direct the gun fire of the two AK-230 turrets.

A system known by NATO as “High Pole A” with a sensor was installed on the mast to identify friend and foe .

variants

Project 206M

→ Main article : Turya class

Project 206M and its export version, Project 206ME, were hydrofoils with more armament than Project 206. Project 206M also had a sonar device and could therefore also be used actively to search for submarines.

modernization

One measure to increase the combat value of Project 206 was the installation of a launch device for originally portable anti-aircraft missiles of the type 9K32 Strela-2 . For this purpose, a swiveling bracket was installed in which four Strela launch tubes could be clamped next to each other. The weapons could be used against planes and helicopters at distances of up to about 4,000 meters from the ship.

Conversions

The widespread use of the boats in Project 206 meant that, even after their original main mission, the torpedo attack on surface ships, had become obsolete, they were converted and continued to be used in other functions.

The conversion to a patrol boat with rocket artillery was particularly striking: the Egyptian Navy removed the torpedo tubes and equipped some of their Project 206 boats with two sets of eight 122 mm tubes each for unguided BM-21 rockets and others with one set to 24 240 mm tubes for BM-24 . The Navy of Cape Verde took similar measures and installed two sets of 20 122 mm launcher tubes on their boats.

Ships of Project 206

More than 80 boats of Project 206 were built at various Soviet shipyards. In addition, Yugoslavia received the license to build six more boats. Project 206 was comparatively inexpensive with a market value in 1966 of around one million US dollars and was accordingly widely used.

Egypt, six boats

Angola , six boats

Bulgaria , six boats

German Democratic Republic , eighteen boats

Guinea , three boats

Guinea-Bissau , two boats

Yugoslavia , fourteen boats

Cape Verde, two boats

Congo, two boats

North Korea , four boats

Vietnam , sixteen boats, some armed with the older 25mm L / 79-2M -3 system.

Evidence and references

Remarks

1. ^ According to AE Taras: Torpedo - go! The history of the small torpedo boats. Chapter 6, while Apalkow on p. 68 of Ships of the Soviet Navy. - Part II “Submarine Ships”, Section 2 “Small Missile Ships and Boats”. Specifying 5,000 horsepower for the M-503 engine. According to the documentation of the engine series on propulsionplant.ru, however, there was no M-503 variant with 5,000 hp, but the M-503A was the most powerful version of the engine with almost 4,000 hp.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ M-503 at propulsionplant.ru, viewed on February 25, 2012 ( Memento of the original from April 26, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
2. ↑ Kenneth M. Currie, Gregory Varhall: The Soviet Union: what lies ahead? - Military-political affairs in the 1980s. 1985, Council on Foreign Affairs, ISBN 999739366XS.

literature

• А.Е. Тарас: Торпедой - пли! История малых торпедных кораблей. (For example: AE Taras: Torpedo - Go! The history of the small torpedo boats. ) Харвест, 1999, ISBN 985-433-419-8 (Russian).
• Юрий В. Апальков: Корабли ВМФ СССР. Том II. Ударные корабли. Часть II. Малые ракетные корабли и катера. (For example: Yuri W. Apalkow: Ships of the Soviet Navy. - Part II “Submarine Ships”, Section 2 “Small Missile Ships and Boats”. ) Galea Print, 2004, ISBN 5-8172-0087-2 ( Russian).
• Manfred Röseberg: Ships and boats of the People's Navy of the GDR. 2nd revised edition, Ingo Koch Verlag, Rostock 2002, ISBN 3-935319-82-7 .

Nato designations for electronic systems:

• Norman Friedman: The Naval Institute guide to world naval weapon systems. US Naval Institute Press, 1997, ISBN 1557502684 (English).

Web links

Commons : T-3 class  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Ship list on russian-ships.info (English)