BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS

DATE:

24/01/2006

Osa-1T upgrade boosts combat capability

By Miroslav Gyurosi

Belarus company Tetraedr has completed its 9K33M3-1T OSA-1T upgrade for the 9K33M3 Osa-AKM (SA-8 'Gecko') mobile surface-to-air missile system.

The upgrade adds new guidance modes and includes the optional replacement of some displays and control consoles with more sophisticated hardware. Air conditioning can also be provided.

Almost 80 per cent of the existing computing, command-coding and functional test hardware is replaced by new solid-state-based equivalents. As a result, the time needed for technical maintenance is reduced to 25 per cent of the original, while the number of spare parts has fallen by more than half.

The 9K33M3-1T Osa-1T upgrade faces competition from modernisation proposals offered by Poland and Russia. Large-scale promotion of the system started in October 2005, with a live-fire presentation at the 174th training range of the Belarus Air Force and Air Defence Forces in Domanovo.

Two successful KDU-mode missile firings were watched by more than 100 invited guests from 10 countries, including representatives of six potential customers - Algeria, Azerbaijan, Ecuador, Eritrea, Iran and Ukraine. The first firing achieved a missile miss distance of 1.7 m in elevation and -0.3 m in azimuth; the second scored -0.1 m in elevation and 3.6 m in azimuth.

Tetraedr is now working on a further upgrade that will create real-time datalinks between all the components of an Osa-1T missile battery.

Source:

http://www.janes.com/defence/land_forces/news/jmr/jmr060124_1_n.shtml