Some very early concepts for the AIP SSK we have at the moment:
The idea is to:
- have an integrated power-plant of some sort.
- adequate armament.
- large aperture bow/flank array, a spherical is replaced with a large conformal array in the bow.
Current options for the power-plant that are under consideration:
- integrated boiler+turbogenerator and main electric motor (with batteries). In this configuration boiler+turbine replace the normal reactor+turbogenerator set up found in SSNs. The other way to view this is an electric transmission.
- integrated boiler+turbine+reversable electriv motor (with batteries). Here the electric motor is used both for primary propulsion and for generating power.
- all turbine set up, which mimics the SSNs with the conventional boiler replacing the nuclear reactor.