Page 38 - Australian Defence Magazine Sep-Oct 2022

38 DEFENCE BUSINESS HANWHA DEFENSE
SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2022 | WWW.AUSTRALIANDEFENCE.COM.AU
successful defence product, with artillery systems overall comprising 55.6 per cent of the company’s defence income. Hanwha places particular emphasis on the K9’s ability to ‘shoot and scoot’, which is a tactical necessity on the modern battlefield (as is evident in Ukraine). The unit can fire its first round within 30 seconds of adopting a station- ary position (60 seconds if it’s moving), and can pack up and leave the position within minutes. Even if enemy units conduct accurate counter-battery fire almost immediately, the K9 can move out of the way before the incoming shells
have travelled the distance.
The K9 can fire up to eight rounds per
minute out to over 54 kilometres, with a burst rate of three rounds in fifteen seconds and a carrying capacity of up to 48 rounds. It uses an Added Inertial Navigation System (INS) and GPS System, a 1000 hp diesel engine, and has armour to protect the crew against incoming 155mm shell fragments and 14.5mm armour piercing shells.
Hanwha Defense Australia is leading the company’s ef- forts to introduce autonomy into the howitzer fleet through its development of the AX10 autonomous ammunition re- supply vehicle, revealed at the Army Robotics Expo 2022. More information on the AX10 is available through Epi- sode 27 of the ADM Podcast (found through our website).
As reported in our story on page 84, Australia is seeking an additional 30 SPHs later this decade and has expressed interest in greater autonomy in the next tranche of guns. If Hanwha Defense achieves its long-term strategic goal,
“HANWHA PLACES PARTICULAR EMPHASIS ON THE K9’S ABILITY TO ‘SHOOT AND SCOOT’”
and the Commonwealth and Army are sup- portive, the current tranche of self-propelled howitzers being acquired under Land 8116 Phase 1 may well be the last crewed artillery systems in Army’s history.
The second product of interest to Aus- tralia, of course, is the Redback IFV, which Hanwha Defense developed from the ground up within six months to meet the re- quirements laid out by the Commonwealth for Land 400 Phase 3.
At Hanwha’s Changwon Plant 1, produc-
tion of one K9 self-propelled gun takes 100 days from start to finish, and the plant churns out one howitzer every three days as units progress through production. End users in- clude Turkey, Poland, Finland, India, Norway and Estonia. Egypt placed an order earlier this year.
In a briefing to Australian media at Plant 1 in August, Hanwha representatives outlined their ambitions for the K9. These include a longer barrel to push the range out to 80+ kilometres for the K9A3 model, which when used with guided munitions would begin to put self-propelled artil- lery in a similar operational role to high-mobility multiple rocket launchers such as the M142 HIMARS. The K9A3 could even achieve ranges of 100+ kilometres with rocket- propelled guided rounds.
Another ambition is an autonomous driving system, in line with the company’s longer-term strategic goal of de- veloping a fully autonomous and networked self-propelled howitzer prototype by 2029, with production to begin in the early 2030s.
If successful, Hanwha expects production to start in 2029 in Australia with deliveries from 2030. Nine variants have been designed, and the company expects to be able to produce 35 vehicles simultaneously, though it could not comment on an exact rate of production.
Additionally, work has been successfully undertaken to fit the Redback with rubber tracks, which engineers de- scribed as ‘challenging’ given the vehicles’ weight.
As international interest in the Redback increases – par- ticularly in Norway, Poland and Egypt – Hanwha says it intends to meet local build requirements whilst also pro- viding opportunities for Australian industry to contribute to overseas programs.
Notably, the company expects to utilise Bisalloy steel in the Egyptian and Polish programs. The Egyptian K9
ABOVE: The K10 ammunition resupply vehicle and the K9 self-propelled howitzer
HANWHA DEFENSE