Turkey’s First National, ‘Grenade Launcher Drone Songar’

SONGAR, originally developed by the defense industry company Asisguard, entered the inventory of the Turkish Armed Forces as the first domestic and national armed drone. 

The grenade launching system that adds an important power to SONGAR, which is known as the first domestic and national armed drone system,has been developed by Akdaş Arms Industry, which produces domestic weapons in the Huğlu Town of Konya’s Beyşehir district. Dilan Yılmaz Çakmak, Asisguard System Engineer and Songar’s Technical Project Manager, stated that “We continue to develop the system and add payload models in SONGAR, which was first an automatic machine gun and later added the “bomb throwing” feature. Military technological system SONGAR has features that differ from armed drone systems. SONGAR operates within a range of three kilometers radius, equipped with an automatic machine gun. SONGAR, which has a real-time image transmission system, performs many critical tasks such as determining the target area, neutralizing the threat, recording data and video for post-operative analysis with its single or multiple drone system.”
Çakmak stated that “As Asisguard, we are working with Akdaş Arms Industry at the grenade launching phase and our project is still going on. We are pleased to develop an innovative and effective grenade launcher system for our defense industry with Akdaş. We continue to make progress in SONGAR. After the addition of the grenade launcher feature, we have finally provided 4X4 ground vehicle integration. SONGAR can now be used more effectively for attack purposes against ambushes and threats in border and cross-border operations.”
Metin Çankaya, Akdaş Arms Industry Weapon Consultant who added ‘Songar’ a system for Asisguard to throw bombs, stated that “We coupled our AKDAŞ AK-40GL grenade launcher gun that we produced to SONGAR developed by Asisguard Company. Today, Turkey’s the only domestic grenade launcher is on SONGAR. The field trial of the system is still carried out. We strengthened SONGAR’s power with its bomb-throwing feature and presented an innovative product to our local defense industry together with Asisguard.” 

Barrel Life: 5000 Shots 

Çankaya stated that “The AK-40 GL grenade launcher, which is integrated into the SONGAR drone system, has a barrel life of 5 thousand shots. Our product has superior features compared to the grenade launchers in the inventory of the existing world armies in terms of technical features and other capabilities. Since it is a domestic defense industry product, it stands out with its cost-effective structure. With this feature, we are preferred by the major players of our domestic defense industry. We have many projects that continue as the only approved main contractor of the Ministry of National Defense in the field of weapon production in the Konya Region and that will eliminate the dependence of the Turkish Armed Forces on foreign countries and make weapons and weapon systems completely domestic and national.”