Mark_K
Super Anarchist
Was, maybe not is. Same thing happened to us in Nam. Remember "peace with honor"?
Ukraine
- Thread starter dogwatch
- Start date
A working maintenance system helps a lot.
After some improvements the reports about PzH2000 breakdowns basically ended. They now steadily rotate through the shop in Lithuania based on operating hours.
Crews learning which parts of the machine definitely need field maintenance and that there are things that just don't work more a very few times also keeps problem under control.
If just one 155mm howitzer is fired once in every 10 minutes (on average) it uses 1008 shells a week. I wouldn't be surprised if the need for all the Ukrainian 155 mm artillery would be at least hundred times that much. And that is most likely still less than russians are using.France and Australia announced Monday plans to jointly produce and send several thousand 155-millimeter artillery shells to Ukraine, starting in the coming weeks.
Lecornu said they aim to send the first shells in the first quarter of this year, and that the project is meant to secure a steady supply of shells to Ukraine over time.
France, Australia to supply Ukraine with artillery shells
PARIS (AP) — France and Australia announced Monday plans to jointly produce and send several thousand 155-millimeter artillery shells to Ukraine, starting in the coming weeks. The multimillion-dollar plan is the latest offer of support for Ukraine by both countries, and comes amid growing...apnews.com
If they can ramp up to several thousands a week, with other countries sending thousands a week too, it solves a problem.
Of course when talking about Ukrainian needs, I mean for winning the war, not just preventing further russian occupation of Ukrainian land.
Anybody know how many times can 155 mm howitzer be fired before a major overhaul is needed?
Monster! Wow...
6000 - 7000 before the barrel goes, but that same article I quoted says they were firing more than that and almost all the rifling in the barrel was gone.
I suspect (with no knowledge just WAG/gut feel) that 2x that amount before you need to do some work on it. They're not that complicated but the recoil mechanism probably takes a bit of wear and tear.
Does anyone here have ideas about how a toy DJI drone might be able to Active Track a POI (they call it Point Of Interest) and derive what the GPS coordinates of that POI are, in time increments? Like for example if you are filming an AC75 flying past going faster than the toy (or recon boat too, often) can keep up with, without being able to fly directly above or alongside?
edit: am guessing that the monster drone above can Active Track things and supply run-time coordinates.
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Never heard of HVAPDS rounds made of steel before, only depleted uranium or tungsten (also known as wolfram), both having more than double the density of steel, allowing less diameter for the same mass and length, thus focusing the impact for less target area for better penetration. Is steel for that kind of use something that belongs to the history rather than present time?
A shaped charge forms copper in a solid state by explosives to form a thin high velocity projectile. It's not even melted to liquid, not vaporized to gaseous form, and most certainly not even anywhere close to temperatures where a gaseous form of hot copper would become a plasma. Thus it does not melt through any armor, just penetrating through like any high velocity impact would. The change of shape of the copper during the penetration does heat it up more than the forming explosion in to liquid state, and melts the copper afterwards, leaving some marks of melted armor in to the hole it already created.
The problem with ceramics is it brakes up by the first impact, allowing second impact to penetrate if hit at the same damaged area before it is fixed. A metal armor would absorb the projectile making it part of the armor if it's thick enough to prevent a penetration. The advantage of using ceramics is significantly lighter weight than an all metal armor capable of the same protection level.
EDIT: added a link and a quote for well sourced facts.
Shaped charge - Wikipedia
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dogwatch
Super Anarchist
- Thread starter
- #7,950
I'm baffled why, given modern anti-tank weapons, anyone with a choice can be persuaded to lock themselves into one on a battlefield. Risk is one thing but it's also the apparent lack of agency that would drive me crazy. I have read that in WWII, proportionally more tank crew survived than infantry. Would that still be true?
enigmatically2
Super Anarchist
Probably not, though it all depends on the nature of the opposition. I wouldn't want to be in a tank facing NATO infantry held AT weapons, NATO tanks and NATO aircraft. But hopefully NATO tanks will stand up better to RU weapons
FWIW I recall reading a long time ago the life expectancy figures for various parts of the armed forces during the cold war. The ones I think I can remember were:
- Intelligence corps minus 2 hours (they were stationed in observation towers which would be flattened as the red army attacked, 2 hours before they declared war)
- Strike pilots +20 minutes
- Artillery +2 hours (counter-battery fire would eliminate most artt on both sides quite quickly).
- The safest place would have been a nuclear submarine
dogwatch
Super Anarchist
- Thread starter
- #7,952
UK poll on UK support for UKR. 45% should maintain current level, 13% reduce, 24% increase. Somehow this got contorted into a piece fretting that British support is decreasing.
https://yougov.co.uk/topics/economy/survey-results/daily/2023/01/18/3cc7d/1
https://yougov.co.uk/topics/economy/survey-results/daily/2023/01/18/3cc7d/1
- Moderator
- #7,953
Which tanker crews have a choice?
AnIdiot
Sock
My un-informed conclusion (which I'm advertising in the hope that it'll be corrected!) is that this is where combined arms comes in- the tankers rely on infantry to supress man-portable antitank units, while the infantry rely on the tanks to supress heavy weapons, machine-gun "emplacements" etc and both rely on air-support to reach the targets they can't see and the aircrews rely on the ground troops to keep manpads under control...
So the tankers are high value targets but relatively safe from small-arms fire... whereas the infantry need the tankers to deal with bigger stuff.
Hence, lots of training and the criticality of battlefield comms.
enigmatically2
Super Anarchist
Interesting take on views of different strata of russia
rusi.org
Russia Through the Kremlin’s Eyes
Although Russian elites are highly pessimistic about the war, polling of the Russian population likely gives the Kremlin confidence that it can sustain losses in Ukraine.
rusi.org
Another interesting take
“They need to conduct really rigorous training. What’s a mystery to me… is that they had months during which they were assembled on the borders of Ukraine… and as far as I can tell they did nothing in the way of training… [Gen. Gerasimov’s] options at this point are not particularly attractive… Putin’s overall objectives are still tied up with the notion that Ukraine doesn’t have a right to exist.” – Gen. David H. Petraeus
“They need to conduct really rigorous training. What’s a mystery to me… is that they had months during which they were assembled on the borders of Ukraine… and as far as I can tell they did nothing in the way of training… [Gen. Gerasimov’s] options at this point are not particularly attractive… Putin’s overall objectives are still tied up with the notion that Ukraine doesn’t have a right to exist.” – Gen. David H. Petraeus
The Russians have been using tanks wrong. You never go in with tanks in the lead without infantry to find the bad guys with AT missiles in the bushes.
We will soon see how good the top armour of Western tanks is. I'm sure the Russians have figured out drones to drop AT grenades by now right?
estarzinger
Super Anarchist
- 7,716
- 1,140
at least in syria, the turks did have significant infantry, but isis was using atgm's with 4 or 5 km range - somewhat hard to screen every possible LOS in 5 km radius (without us style airpower).
Now ofc the turks were not so skilled at this. Put their tanks in positions with great lines of fire to support the assault, but also where ISIS had great sight lines on them. And they got hit by IED's and mines, having moved into some positions that ISIS had prepared as kill zones.
My only point is that it is more subtle and needs more skill than just 'some infantry beating the bushes to screen the tanks'. Even the US in Iraq had 'By March 2005, approximately 80 Abrams tanks were forced out of action by enemy attacks', and the US is 'the expert' on combined arms.
Less terrific news from one of my friends in Ukr - I will simply quote his comment this morning to me. "We've got a terrible thing going on in town today. A lot of military are grabbing people on the streets and dragging them to war. Not really knowing what's going on. I had to cancel all my business for the morning. And stay home... That's how they came home, banging on the door. This is everyday life in Ukraine." First time I have heard him sound depressed about Ukr. He is 'fortunate' in that he is already working with the Ukr military building computers for them, so not going to be sent for cannon fodder. In an existential war you can't really fault the government press gang, but it is hard on people who viewed themselves as western/free/democratic.
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slug zitski
Banned
- Banned
- #7,959
He is a failure
Yikes. Interesting to me also in this one is how they show the exact same drone I am playing with; perhaps by using the Android phone attached to the RC controller (instead of using the standalone builtin-screen RC version) they are able to run an app on that phone to calculate lat/long data for the targets, presumably at the center focus of the camera.
Went down to a nearby park, filmed for a few minutes, found a created .SRT file on the SD disk along with the matching .MP4 with 10's of thousands of lines of that include data like this:
5
00:00:00,133 --> 00:00:00,166
<font size="28">SrtCnt : 5, DiffTime : 33ms
2023-01-23 12:49:16.683
[iso : 100] [shutter : 1/250.0] [fnum : 170] [ev : 0] [ct : 5049] [color_md : default] [focal_len : 240] [dzoom_ratio: 10000, delta:0],[latitude: 47.902249] [longitude: -122.187583] [rel_alt: 1.100 abs_alt: -42.069] </font>
edit: sucking that data into an Excel or database table would be simple enough but it does not seem to include the necessary data you'd need, to derive lat/long/alt for the camera-centered target.
Went down to a nearby park, filmed for a few minutes, found a created .SRT file on the SD disk along with the matching .MP4 with 10's of thousands of lines of that include data like this:
5
00:00:00,133 --> 00:00:00,166
<font size="28">SrtCnt : 5, DiffTime : 33ms
2023-01-23 12:49:16.683
[iso : 100] [shutter : 1/250.0] [fnum : 170] [ev : 0] [ct : 5049] [color_md : default] [focal_len : 240] [dzoom_ratio: 10000, delta:0],[latitude: 47.902249] [longitude: -122.187583] [rel_alt: 1.100 abs_alt: -42.069] </font>
edit: sucking that data into an Excel or database table would be simple enough but it does not seem to include the necessary data you'd need, to derive lat/long/alt for the camera-centered target.
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