Weapon system of the future: Laser for the Bundeswehr

Rheinmetall has been commissioned by the Procurement Office of the German Armed Forces to develop a key component for a future laser weapon system. At the end of the second quarter of 2020, the Federal Office for Equipment, Information Technology and Use of the Bundeswehr (BAAINBw) signed a contract with Rheinmetall Weapon Munition GmbH for the production of a laser source demonstrator, with a volume in the lower double-digit million euro range.

The laser source demonstrator can be used in various projects to further explore laser source technology for military applications. The first project will see the laser source demonstrator used in a one-year testing phase on the Fregatte Sachsen of the German Navy.

From 12 beams to one

The laser source demonstrator is based on the technology of spectral coupling that Rheinmetall has been intensively researching for years. Key data of the demonstrator include a scalable output power of up to 20 kW with very good beam quality. At its core, the demonstrator consists of twelve nearly identical 2 kW fiber laser modules with nearly diffraction-limited beam quality. The twelve fiber laser modules are coupled through a beam combiner, an assembly for merging the beams of multiple laser sources into a single overall beam based on dielectric grating technology, to produce a laser beam with very good beam quality.

Installed on a ship

The spectral coupling technology offers a variety of advantages compared to other coupling technologies such as Geometric: low complexity, high modularity, growth potential into the laser power class of 100 kW, and the ability to operate as a passive system with extremely low control effort.

In 2015, Rheinmetall successfully deployed a functional model of a laser weapon system from a ship during a testing campaign in the Baltic Sea, targeting land-based objectives. In 2018, BAAINBw and Rheinmetall successfully tested a laboratory model of a 20 kW laser source. The planned tests in a military environment and under near-operational environmental conditions are therefore the next stage in the transition from the laboratory to practical application - all within just three years. This is a significant, necessary, and challenging step towards the introduction of future laser weapon systems.

RHEINMETALL on the Internet: www.rheinmetall-defence.com

...something like this.