RuAviation

Serial production of the S-8OFP Armor Killer (Broneboischik) unguided high-power aircraft missile (NAR) has been launched, Alexander Kochkin, deputy general director of the Techmash Concern, said.

“The armor-piercing missile has been adopted for service and has already gone into mass production, the first orders are in place. This year we will already be able to see its application in the air defense zone,” he was quoted as saying by RIA Novosti at the MILEX-2023 exhibition in Minsk.

The S-8OFP missile, unofficially referred to as the Broneboischik, is designed for use from standard B8M-1 and B8B20-A units. The distinctive feature of S-8OFP is a small-size engine using high-energy fuel. Its energy output per unit mass of fuel has doubled in comparison with previous generations of rockets of this type, while the engine itself has become much lighter and more compact.

With a starting weight of about 17 kilograms, the warhead weighs 9-9.5 kilograms, including more than 2.5 kilograms of explosive, the hardened casing has an internal notch for shrapnel formation. The dual-mode contact fuse can be set to detonate on contact with the target or with some deceleration – to penetrate the obstacle and detonate behind it. The maximum firing range is increased from 3-4,000 m with the S-8 to 6,000 m with the S-8OFP due to the use of “blended rocket solid propellant” instead of the previously used “balistite”.

“The C-8OFP’s engine is smaller than the C-8’s, and the weight of the warhead has been increased by a factor of 1.5. As a result, the efficiency has increased five to ten times,” Nikolai Makarovets, general director of NPO Splav, told TC Zvezda in 2017.

The S-8OFP unguided aviation missile is a new version of the S-8 line of aviation ammunition developed in the mid-1960s. Broneboischik was created at NPO Splav, a part of Techmash Scientific and Production Corporation. The family now consists of more than 15 models of NARs with different characteristics. The main purpose of creating an updated version of the missile was to increase its range and create a new penetrating warhead. The project was presented to the public in 2014. In 2018, state tests began, which were successfully completed in February 2019.

The S-8OFP is designed to engage single and group targets. Depending on the settings of the fuze, is capable of penetrating obstacles facing set targets, can explode in front of the obstacle, or behind it, or, without destroying, continue to fly. Ensures combat missions by front-line army aircraft and helicopters capable of carrying ballistic missile launchers. In the area of the special war operation on the Ukrainian front NAR Broneboischik can be used with Su-25 aircraft, Mi-8, Mi-24, Mi-28NM, Mi-35 and Ka-52 helicopters.