Description
The ships are equipped for acoustic, magnetic and mechanical mine clearance. There is also an underwater vehicle type ''Uven'' and a Towed array sonar on board. It is also possible to manoeuvre the remote controlled mine clearance system ''SAM'' from the ships. The ''Styrsö'' class ships have very good manoeuvring properties and are used for hunting bottom mines, traditional mine sweeping and operates in coastal waters. They carry underwater ROVs of the type ''Uven'' and are prepared for the next generation of rovs called ''ROV S''. The class is built exclusively with civilian technology, so called ( COTS), everything from diesel engines to the computers on board have been bought from the civilian market. This method simplifies the procedure of upgrading the system, it is also very cost effective eliminating the need to develop new expensive military systems. The ships have a completely integrated command and navigation system with computer communication and projection of charts in a 3D environment.History
The class consists of four ships that were built from 1996 to 1997. They are among the most modern mine countermeasures ships in the world and an important addition to the Swedish mine clearance ability. In 2004 HMS ''Spårö'' and HMS ''Sturkö'' were modernised, pulling out some of their capability for traditional mine clearance in favour of extended human dive support, the modified vessels are occasionally called ''Spårö'' class.Units
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