BAE Systems Land & Armaments L.P., Minneapolis, Minnesota, was awarded a $26,069,645 firm-fixed-price modification to previously awarded contract N00024-20-C-5300 to procure three additional 57mm MK 110 Mod 0 gun (internationally known as the Bofors 57 mm L/70 naval artillery gun) mounts and associated hardware. BAE Systems’ 57mm Mk110 provides high survivability and tactical freedom at all levels of conflict. Work will be performed in Karlskoga, Sweden and Louisville, Kentucky, expected to be completed by May 2024. The U.S. Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington, D.C., is the contracting activity.
The Bofors 57 mm L/70 naval guns are a series of dual-purpose naval guns designed and produced by the Swedish arms manufacturer AB Bofors (since March 2005 part of BAE Systems AB), designed in 1964 as a replacement design for the twin barreled Bofors 57 mm L/60 naval artillery gun. The gun is remotely controlled by a fire-control computer; as a redundancy measure, however, the crew can also operate the gun using instrument panels that are either on or in direct contact with the gun. Although the Swedish Navy is the primary user of the gun, it has been exported widely by Bofors Defence for use by the navies of Brunei, Canada, Croatia, Finland, Indonesia, Ireland, Malaysia, Mexico, Montenegro, Singapore, Thailand, and the United States.
The latest development is the Mark 3, which was designed in 1995 but introduced into service with the Visby-class corvette—fitted on HSwMS Visby in 2000. This new design retained the Mark 2 gun mount, rate of fire and ammunition capacity and has another 1,000 rounds stowed in the standby rack beneath deck. A small radome has been added above the gun barrel and is used for measuring the muzzle velocity of the departing projectiles for fire-control purposes, usually but not necessarily with the new Bofors 57 mm 3P all-target programmable ammunition. Also, a new optional low radar profile (also known as low radar cross-section, or RCS) stealth mounting was developed, this allows the gun to be hidden from radar and plain sight when not in use.
In American service, the United States Navy has designated the Mark 3 as the Mark 110 Mod 0 57mm gun. According to a BAE Systems press release dated 1 August 2005, the Mark 110 would be manufactured at the BAE Systems facility in Louisville, Kentucky.[1] BAE Systems has been awarded a contract by General Dynamics to provide two additional Mk110 Naval Gun Systems for the Independence variant of the US Navy’s (USN’s) Littoral Combat Ship (LCS). While the 57 mm cannon may not seem as powerful as larger naval guns, such as the OTO Melara 76 mm, some of its performances are comparable; given its rate of fire and amount of explosive per shell, the Bofors gun actually achieves a higher amount of “explosive fired per second” than the 76 mm.
