Comments on: Friday Linkzookery – 30 May 2008

By: Dfens

Dfens — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 08:34:00 +0000

I hear ya', James. It's hard to tell your boss you should do things differently, though, when all the defense companies continue to make money doing things the stupid way. I was looking at the damage to that Dauntless airplane Murdoc posted the picture of in the Midway thread and thinking, they don't make them like that any more. Then I ran across this article this morning and realized they still do.

On June 1, 1972, the plane took a mortar round through the No. 3 engine while parked on the tarmac at Kontum Air Base. A maintenance team changed out the engine, but the new one failed to start. Pilots had to force the plane to take off with only three engines under 'heavy mortar attack,' the citation reads. The aircraft was hit with several more mortar rounds during takeoff, puncturing the wings and damaging the other engines. The plane could climb to only 1,000 feet but made an emergency landing at Plieku Air Base, where mechanics determined it needed two new wings and four new engines.

Can you imagine those maintenance guys swapping out an engine under mortar fire, not to mention the crew that flew the airplane to safety needing 4 new engines and 2 new wings (the wings have a joint outboard of the 2 inner engines)? We try to make sure our soldiers have the best stuff, but realize that ultimately it is our fighting men that make the difference. Of course, it would be nice if we were all pulling the same way when it came to giving our guys the best stuff. They deserve it.

By: James

James — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 23:52:00 +0000

Yes new=risk only in the mind of the short sighted. Sure you can insure your job by not taking a risk on new techs and procedures, but when your job is to equip our soldiers, yous failure to take a risk results in dead soldiers. Sure reactive materials and metastable explosives are a risk, but what happens if we run into an opponent who is willing to take a risk. So far we are getting by the superior skills of our soldiers, I would prefer to augment those superior skills with superior weapons.

By: coolhand77

coolhand77 — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 22:55:00 +0000

wait, did the ground just get colder? Has hell frozen over? You mean Dfens and I ACTUALLY AGREE ON SOMETHING? wow

By: Dfens

Dfens — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 11:12:00 +0000

Exactly, coolhand! Look at all the sorts of things they shoot out of a 12 gauge combat shotgun. They have buckshot, slugs, grenades, paint, rubber slugs, bundles of fletchetts, and who knows what else? The problem is, the shotgun has a very limited range. The infantry rifle could be the long range version of the shotgun if the Army would let it. There’d be no more argument about what size bullet is best. Use whatever turns your crank or fits the bill for the mission of the day.

By: coolhand77

coolhand77 — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 10:06:00 +0000

I’ve always wondered why they didn’t try ’straight walling’ the 5.56 cartridge. IIRC you would have up to a 9mm (or there abouts)diameter case mouth, which would be great for high power CQB. Add a sabot for your lighter weight, high BC/SD pills (5.56 to 7mm) and you get nearly 0 barrel wear, lower bullet/barrel friction heat gains, and you don’t even have to swap the barrel to go from hard hitting, close range rounds to something with a bit more range. Honestly I have a preference for calibers ending in .4 and ending in 5, but with as much case capacity as you would have behind that 9×45mm cartridge, I think it would fit the bill just fine for close quarters. Of course this is my uninformed amature opinion.

By: Dfens

Dfens — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 23:47:00 +0000

There is no incentive to do anything new, James. New = risk. Today’s military contractors have no incentive to take risks. I know I sound like a broken record, but we get paid for process, not results. Usually next generation technology is addressed in bloated, F-22 style development contracts. You see the same thing in satellites. Most are rehashes of 1970s birds. Then every now and then you’ll have something that’s completely different and costs a fortune. Any time one of these programs comes along the GAO issues a report about how programs do not do enough to mature new technologies before incorporating them into programs. Back to the reactive projectiles, though, I really think it would be great if the Army developed a whole range of weapons using a common bore. Actually, maybe .50 cal might be right size. You could have everything from a pistol to the current massive sniper rifle based on this bore size. If you want to shoot a small bullet at high speed, encase it in a sabot. This would form the basis for launching some really high tech projectiles, everything from a full metal jacket classic bullet to these reactive fletchetts to smart projectiles. The only difference between a pistol and a rifle would be the length of the case. Carbines might have an intermediate length case. Seems to me this approach would give you no end of options.

By: Dfens

Dfens — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 23:24:00 +0000

The use of these 'hollow point' sniper bullets has been in the news a lot lately. I found a copy of an offical letter describing the US Army's position on these hollow point bullets. Here is an excerpt:

The purpose of the small, shallow aperture in the MatchKing is to provide a bullet design offering maximum accuracy at very long ranges, rolling the jacket of the bullet around its core from base to tip; standard military bullets and other match bullets roll the jacket around its core from tip to base, leaving an exposed lead core at its base. Design purpose of the MatchKing was not to produce a bullet that would expand or flatten easily on impact with the human body, or otherwise cause wounds greater than those caused by standard military small arms ammunition.

- The Gun Zone There are some reasons this hollow tip helps that are not explained by classical aerodynamics. Frankly, I am not at all sure why this kind of copper jacketed bullet would be ok, if a 100% copper bullet would not, so I'm not saying this proves those copper bullets you found the video of are not legal under international agreement, but what I've always understood was that bullets which exhibit that kind of mushrooming deformation are not allowed. I could be wrong. Maybe someone like Bram could jump in on this.

By: James

James — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 23:12:00 +0000

Reactive materials & metastable nanophase explosives along with advances in nanocomposite materials hold tremendous promise in developing relatively lightweight man portable weapons with effects comparable to todays 30-40mm cannons. If we were smart, we would apply these techs to 16 inch cannons, to make some truly formidable artillery. With some off the shelf work tech added to some of the work already done, we could deliver a 16inch gun system with a range of 150 miles with impact effects on the order of 5-10 times the power of existing 16inch rounds. This could be done in a matter of months if the will was there. This has always been a source of frustration to me. In the labs we have some the best stuff you can imagine. The problem has always been converting the work done in the labs to something that actually sees the light of day. Take the reactive materials, the Navy is pushing this tech for use with its rail gun tech. That is all well and good, but rail guns have a lot of issues, and will not be viable for decades. Would it not make more sense to incorporate this tech into the Navy’s 127mm pop guns. Anything to make them a bit more effective.

By: Vitor

Vitor — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 19:22:00 +0000

Mushroom is not forbidden, any bullet can theorically mush, so its very hard to make bullet forbidden unless its a very explicit hollow point. Hence the explicit, because the snipers use a .308 (that 175 grains one) with a slight hollow point to improve accuracy and nobody bitches about that. Also the Mk262 is slightly hollow point. And, those bullets are being used against terrorists, its not like any country will denounce the USA for using HP bullets. But im sure some idiot would reply saying ‘But then the terrorists will feel in the right to use HP stuff too’, no they wont, since HP ammo would be totally useless against the body armor used by the troops.

By: Dfens

Dfens — Sat, 31 May 2008 17:22:00 +0000

While that’s a great video, Vitor, it also shows why those bullets would not be acceptable per whatever that international treaty on bullets allows. In other words, the copper bullets mushroom, which as I understand things, is not allowed. Copper is great because it has a higher density than steel, so the bullets maintain their energy better than steel cored, copper jacketed bullets, but they’re not as dense as lead cored. Notice the cavity that mushroom tipped bullet drags through that gelatin? That somewhat illustrates what I was talking about with regard to the shockwave the bullet drags through a body. In this case what you see is really a cavitation chamber produced by the flat, mushroomed tip of the bullet, but it is shaped very much like the shockwave that preceds it slightly. The problem is, with a small bullet there is very little shockwave, because a small bullet that created a big shockwave inside an enemy would also create huge drag on the way to the enemy and lose most of its energy to the air seperating the good guy from the bad guy. While it is possible there could be bullet shapes that would cut through air with very little wave drag and through flesh with high wave drag, they would be very unconventional shapes. It would be fun to do some research on that problem. My demonstrated obtuseness, or as I like to think of it, political incorrectness, in what I post here is not an act. I am well known as a pain in the ass, and as such would not wish a boss like me on anyone. We used to have a technical track where people like me, many engineers are, could be promoted and recognized for their technical abilities. Like I say, since we get paid for process and not results, that system long ago fell by the wayside.