SUBSIM Radio Room Forums - Rusting at anchor (Nice pictures of Typhoon)

The "General/Primary/Main Command Point/Post", the Russian name for the control room on the newer subs. According Article 16 to the 2001 Russian Naval Regs, it is defined as:

Quote:

The control center of the craft commander is primary ship control center and is named [GKP], and aboard the ships of 4 ranks, where there is only one control center - KP

On the older subs, it apparently was the TsKP, the "Central Command Post".

These days, however, the TsKP is defined a bit differently in the Russian regulations:

Quote:

On the specific designs of ships is created the central control center ([TSKP]), intended for the collection, processings also of the data analysis of situation and headed by the executive officer.

Which makes one wonder about its relation to the BIP (Battle Information Post". (By the way, I've read of the American CIC described as the GKP-BIP, probably because the Captain fights his ship there according to American practice). Then there is sometimes the FKP "Flagman/Admiral Comand Post".

Aah, the confusing world of Russian naval terminology!

But the Typhoon's reactor is "water-water", which is to say PWR. As are most Soviet Naval Reactors. They played around with lead-bismuth (not sodium) with the Project 645 (a Modified November) and then the Project 705 (the famous Alfas). In the latter case, the problem seems to be more logistics than anything wrong with the plants (once they got the kinks out) - the plant was intended to be shut down, but the base backup wasn't good enough to keep the plant warm, and that was that.