Fire for effect: western developments in self-propelled artillery.
Armada International › Vol. 14 Nbr. 2, April 1990
Linked as:
Summary
Includes related articles
See the full content of this document
Extract
Fire for effect: western developments in self-propelled artillery.
Fire for Effect
After nearly 50 years of domination by the Soviets, the artillery world is now on the brink of some radical changes wrought by western engineers. The first of these is the decision by the United States, Britain, Germany, Italy and France to adopt barrels with a length of 52 calibres, and a chamber volume of 23 litres, for their future 155 mm self-propelled howitzers. These will provide effective ranges of at least 40 km with standard, unassisted projectiles, a startling increase of 62 percent over the 24.7 km ranges achieved by NATO's current 39-calibre 155 mm weapons with standard HE shells. If the 52-calibre 155 mm howitzers are used to fire standard HE rounds fitted with drag-reducing base bleed units, they should achieve 50 km ranges. And if they fire Extended Range Full Bore (ERFB) projectiles with bore-riding nubs, plus base bleed, they may go to 55 or 60 km. The new, long-barrel artillery weapons are likely to start entering service with the western allies by the mid-1990s. They have been preceded, mainly in South Africa and the Arab world, by a proliferation of 155 mm towed weapons with 45-calibre barrels. Almost all of them are derived from the pioneering work of one man, the brilliant but maverick Dr. Gerry Bull, and his design team at the Brussels-based Space Research Corporation (SRC). With ERFB projectiles - also originally designed by SRC - and base bleed, the 45-calibre tubes achieve ranges up to...See the full content of this document
Sponsored links
