Mark 50 torpedo
Lightweight ASW torpedo
The Mark 50 torpedo is a U.S. Navy advanced lightweight torpedo for use against fast, deep-diving submarines. The Mk 50 can be launched from all anti-submarine aircraft and from torpedo tubes aboard surface combatant ships. The Mk 50 was intended to replace the Mk 46 as the fleet's lightweight torpedo. Instead the Mark 46 will be replaced with the Mark 54 LHT.
01Propulsion system
The torpedo's stored chemical energy propulsion system uses a small tank of sulfur hexafluoride gas, which is sprayed over a block of solid lithium, which generates enormous quantities of heat, which generates steam. The steam propels the torpedo in a closed Rankine cycle, supplying power to a pump-jet. This propulsion system offers the very important deep-water performance advantage that the combustion products, sulfur and lithium fluoride, occupy less volume than the reactants, so the torpedo does not have to force these out against increasing water pressure as it approaches a deep-diving submarine.
02General characteristics, Mk 50
- Primary function: air and ship-launched lightweight torpedo
- Contractor: Alliant Techsystems, Westinghouse
- Length: 9.5 ft (2.9 m)
- Weight: approx. 800 lb (360 kg)
- Diameter: 12.75 in (324 mm)
- Speed: > 40 kn (74 km/h)
- Power plant: Stored Chemical Energy Propulsion System
- Propulsion: Pump Jet
- Guidance system: Active/passive acoustic homing
- Warhead: 100 lb (45 kg) high explosive
03Comparable weapons
Sources and credits
This article is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Mark 50 torpedo”, written by its contributors and licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Fathomly has changed the layout, removed citation markers, navigation and maintenance notices, and adjusted punctuation. This adapted version is shared under the same license. For references, see the original article.
Images, from Wikimedia Commons:
- US Navy 040626-N-5319A-006 An Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) MK-50 Torpedo is launched from guided missile destroyer USS Bulkeley (DDG 84).jpg by U.S. Navy photo by Photographer’s Mate 1st Class Brien Aho, Public domain
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