November 13, 2019

Further Estimated Propulsion Details for the Future KSS-III Batch 2 Submarines

On November 8, 2019 Anonymous provided further estimated propulsion details for South Korea’s future KSS-III Batch 2. This follows Submarine Matters’ article "South Korean Lithium-ion Batteries for Submarine use Estimates" of November 8, 2019.

Anonymous writes:

Interesting energy technologies likely to be used in the future KSS-III Batch 2 submarines are as follows.

1 Lithium-ion Batteries (LIBs)

Use of the NMC type LIB. Full formula is Lithium Nickel Manganese Cobalt Oxide (LiNiMnCoO2).

Experimental and estimates cycle lives of SAMSUNG SDI 94Ah battery cell are 3,600 (red circles) and for 4,600 cycles (red dotted line, capacity 80%), respectively. 120Ah will be achieved soon [1].

Total energy for the future DSME 2000 submarine using 94Ah/111 battery cells is 8.6/10.1/11.0 MWh and KSS-III Batch 2 submarine using Ah/120Ah battery cells is 12.9/15.2/16.4 MWh.

2 Propulsion motor [2]
Propulsion motors consist of two motors (blue big one, silver small one) connected directly to each other. This system is different from Siemens’ PERMASYN and Jeumont Electric’s MAGTONIC. A small motor rotates at low speed while two motors rotate at middle/high speed.

3 Diesels engines [2]
The appearance of the diesel is different from the 12PA4 V200 SMDS (MAN Diesel & Turbo). The positions of DM-185 (UDMZ) ? compressor are different as is the MTU 12V 4000 U83 generator which has twin turbos. Has South Korea succeeded in developing a new diesel for submarine?

4 Hydrogen sources in Fuel Cell AIP: patent issue.
As DSME has no full patent rights to use metal hydride for hydrogen in a KSS-III Batch 2’s FC AIP, the use of metal hydride would be difficult without Siemens’ permission. Such permission would be expensive. Another hydrogen sources such as a carbon nanotube might be used, but there are still patent barriers.

[1] For display photos, data and tables on Samsung SDI 94Ah LIB cells 
“Samsung SDI is presenting at the 2018 Energy Storage Europe in Germany its latest high-energy density 111 Ah battery cells for energy storage purposes along with its 94 Ah cells used in all-electric cars.” And, see page 5/5, Figure “Samsun 94Ah battery cells”.

[2] starting at https://youtu.be/SWIBOmw9VRQ?t=5m50s (help to read the "CC" closed captions)  the diesel generator and propulsion motor (depicted as a gray ring?) can be seen 6 minutes 52 seconds in. 

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

In the video, submarine model (backside black model) is illustrated smaller than generator and motors (front model). The smaller propulsion motor is between generator (“Generator” plate) and blue larger motor. Grey ring is frame of a part of pressure hull.