Tank Guns & Ammunition | World Defense

Tank Guns & Ammunition

Scorpion

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We will be talking about Tanks armament, mounted guns and ammunition.


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Scorpion

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Rheinmetall L44 120mm Tank Gun

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The Rheinmetall 120 mm gun is a smoothbore tank gun designed and produced by the West German Rheinmetall-DeTec AG company, developed in response to Soviet advances in armor technology and development of new armored threats. Production began in 1974, with the first version of the gun, known as the L/44 as it was 44 calibers long, used on the German Leopard 2 tank and soon produced under license for the American M1A1 Abrams and other tanks. The American version, the M256, uses a coil spring recoil system instead of a hydraulic system.[3] The gun has also been exported to South Korea and Japan for their indigenous tank designs, as well as other nations that have procured the Leopard 2 and the M1 Abrams. The 120-millimeter (4.7 in) gun has a length of 5.28 meters (17.3 ft), and the gun system weighs approximately 3,317 kilograms (7,310 lb).

By 1990 the L/44 was not considered powerful enough to deal with the future Soviet armor, which stimulated an effort by Rheinmetall to develop a better main armament. This first revolved around a 140-millimeter (5.5 in) tank gun named Neue Panzerkanone 140 ("new tank gun 140"), but later turned into a compromise which led to the development of an advanced 120 mm gun, the L/55, based on the same internal geometry as the L/44 and installed in the same breech and mount. The L/55 is 1.3 meters (4.3 ft) longer, giving an increased muzzle velocity to ammunition fired through it. As the L/55 retains the same barrel geometry, it can fire the same ammunition as the L/44.

This gun was retrofitted into German and Dutch Leopard 2s, and chosen as the main gun of the Spanish Leopard 2E, the Greek Leopard 2HEL, and South Korean K2 Black Panther battle tank. It has been tested on the British Challenger 2 as a potential replacement for its current weapon, the rifled L30 120 mm cannon.

A variety of ammunition has been developed for use by tanks with guns based on Rheinmetall's original L/44 design. This includes a series of kinetic energy penetrators, such as the American M829 series, and chemical energy anti-tank warheads. Recent ammunition includes a wide range of new anti-personnel rounds and demolition munitions, giving tanks armed with the L/44 and its derivatives greater versatility on the modern battlefield. The LAHAT, developed in Israel, is a gun-launched missile which has received interest from Germany and other Leopard 2 users, and is designed to defeat both land armor and combat helicopters. The Israelis also introduced a new anti-personnel munition which limits collateral damage by controlling the fragmentation of the projectile.

Calibre 120 mm
Breech type Vertical sliding breechblock Semi automatic/hand operated
Firing mechanism Electrical
Ordnance length 5300 mm
Ordnance mass 3,780 kg.
Barrel life 400 -500EFC
Max Chamber Pressure ?

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LEO-2A4

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Tanks for posting this ;). Most of them seem to be aimed at penetrating the armor with an arrow like piece of metal. Is there any footage somewhere showing what happens inside a tank when one of these shells manage to beat its defenses? Also, what's the deal with the 5th shell from left to right? It seems to be completely different than any of the other ones.
 

Scorpion

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Rheinmetall L55 120mm Tank Gun.

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The appearance of new Soviet tanks such as the T-80B during the late 1970s and early 1980s demanded the development of new technologies and weapons to counter the threat posed to Western armor. The T-80B had increased firepower and a new composite ceramic armor. The T-72 also went through a modernization program in an attempt to bring it up to the standards of the T-80B. In 1985 the new T-72B version entered production, with a new laminate armor protection system; its turret armor,designed primarily to defeat anti-tank missiles, surpassed the T-80B's in protection.

The German government began the development of the Leopard 3, although this was canceled after the fall of the Soviet Union.[38] On 29 October 1991, the governments of Switzerland, Netherlands and Germany agreed to cooperate in the development of a modernization program for the Leopard 2. Part of this program included the introduction of a longer 120 mm tank gun, a cheaper alternative to a brand new tank gun, increasing the maximum range of the gun by an estimated 1,500 m (1,600 yd). Although the gun is longer, allowing for a higher peak pressure from the propellant, the geometry remains the same, allowing the gun to fire the same ammunition as that fired from the shorter version. The longer barrel allows ammunition to attain higher velocities; for example, with new kinetic energy penetrators ammunition can reach velocities of around 1,750 m/s (5,700 ft/s). The new barrel weighs 1,347 kg (2,970 lb).

The longer tank gun has been retrofitted into the Leopard 2, creating a model known as the Leopard 2A6.[40] Both the Spanish Leopard 2E and the Greek Leopard 2HEL, as derivatives of the Leopard 2A6, use the 55 caliber-long tank gun


Calibre 120 mm
Breech type Vertical sliding breechblock Semi automatic/hand operated
Firing mechanism Electrical
Ordnance length 6600 mm
Ordnance mass 4,160 kg.
Barrel life 1500EFC
Max Chamber Pressure 7,600bars

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Scorpion

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Tanks for posting this ;). Most of them seem to be aimed at penetrating the armor with an arrow like piece of metal. Is there any footage somewhere showing what happens inside a tank when one of these shells manage to beat its defenses? Also, what's the deal with the 5th shell from left to right? It seems to be completely different than any of the other ones.

Its canister cartridge provides rapid, lethal fire against massed assaulting infantry at close range.

 
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I've never seen those before. They look fairly effective against infantry that's for sure. How many balls does each canister hold? What range are they able to penetrate bullet proof vests at? Are any armies currently regularly equipping their tanks with such canisters?
 

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I've never seen those before. They look fairly effective against infantry that's for sure. How many balls does each canister hold? What range are they able to penetrate bullet proof vests at? Are any armies currently regularly equipping their tanks with such canisters?

Canisters are mostly used for training purposes these days and are only effective in urban warfare not in the open. How many balls are in their that Im not sure of but around thousand I would say. They penetrate buildings let alone bulletproof vest.
 

Scorpion

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Canisters are mostly used for training purposes these days and are only effective in urban warfare not in the open. How many balls are in their that Im not sure of but around thousand I would say. They penetrate buildings let alone bulletproof vest.

Thanks you beat me to it.
 

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I didn't know they contain that many balls. But why are they superior in urban fighting rather than open field?
 

orangesunset

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I've never seen those before. They look fairly effective against infantry that's for sure. How many balls does each canister hold? What range are they able to penetrate bullet proof vests at? Are any armies currently regularly equipping their tanks with such canisters?

It is like a huge shotgun shell, usually the round is filled with short steel rods.

Usuage of cannister stems back to the days if cannons, picture Napoleonic type wars, men marching in ranks. With the invention of shrapnel, the use of cannister for cannons declined.

For tanks it isn't used since it isn't that effective, unless the men would be grouped together. Tanks usually have a coaxle machinegun next to the main gun to take out personal. Also the canister round will take up space that can be used for other rounds.

I might be mistaken, but cannister might damage the rifling in the barrel. In the case of a smoothbore this would not be a problem.
 

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Artillery Jammers

The artillery radio jammers for single use are intended to create active barrage jamming in tactical units of the enemy within the frequency range from 1.5 to 120 MHz. The frequency range covers the frequencies for work of all tactical military HF and VHF radios, regardless of which army is the user. The frequency range is completely covered by 8 pieces of the product, each of which creates jamming in a different frequency band with determined frequency bandwidth which overlap.

The carrying of the products in the determined enemy area for jamming is done by means of artillery cargo shells with caliber 122 mm, 130 mm, 152 mm and 155 mm. Samel-90 develops also the possibility for using of the cargo mine with 120 mm caliber as carrier of the radio jammer.

http://www.samel90.com/en/products/...ipment-surveillance-systems/artillery-jammers

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The Army Is Looking For A Special Artillery Shell That Can Totally Paralyze Enemy Cities

If the Army has its way, America’s next secret weapon may be an electromagnetic pulse artillery shell that paralyzes an enemy city. These special shells won’t carry high explosive.

These special shells won’t carry high explosive. Instead, they will emit EMP bursts, or some other non-kinetic technology, to disrupt the computers, radio communications, Internet links and other ties that bind modern societies. And do so without creating any physical damage.

This is sort of a twenty-first-century version of the neutron bomb, that notorious Cold War weapon designed to kill Soviet soldiers through a burst of radiation while inflicting little damage to property — except this weapon targets the radio frequency networks that keep a nation functioning.

The concept is expressed in a single paragraph in a new Army research proposal:

Extensive use of wireless RF [radio frequency] networking for critical infrastructure and communications systems provides an alternative attack vector for the neutralization of an adversary’s underlying industrial, civil, and communications infrastructure without the destruction of the hardware associated with those systems. Advances in munitions-based microelectronics and power technologies make possible the implementation of non-kinetic cyber and electromagnetic – or electronic warfare (EW) – attacks that could be delivered via artillery launched munitions. The precision delivery of the non-kinetic effects (NKE) electronics payload close to the target allows low power operation which limits the geographical extent of impacted systems, and reduces the overall impact on the electromagnetic spectrum.


In addition, the weapon must fit in a 155-millimeter artillery projectile, with the eventual goal of shrinking the weapon’s size so that a single shell can carry multiple submunitions, each capable of creating electronic havoc.
However, the proposal does not specify how all this is to be accomplished. A query to the Army didn’t shed much light. In an email response, the project scientist said that the project is “open to a broad range of non-kinetic effects.” In fact, the artillery shells don’t even have to be 155-millimeter, but “maybe any other caliber that has the space to place an electronic subsystem that can be used to neutralize an enemy infrastructure and computer-based systems.”

Nonetheless, some kind of electromagnetic pulse shell would appear to be a likely candidate. EMPs, those short but intense bursts of radiation that fry electronics, are generated by nuclear weapons. The United States has long been concerned that a nuclear device, especially one detonated at high altitudes, could massively disrupt the electronic fabric of American society.

However, conventional weapons, such as bombs and missiles, can also generate EMP bursts. North Korea allegedly has such devices, and Russia claims to have equipped aircraft and drones with them, while the Pentagon has been working on high-power microwave weapons for years.

Whether such microwave weapons are effective or reliable is another matter. But regardless of how the artillery shell disables electronics, what’s interesting is that artillery will be the delivery system.

Nuclear and nonnuclear EMP bombs, delivered by aircraft or missiles, can be launched at targets hundreds or thousands of miles away. But a shell launched from a 155-millimeter howitzer suggests the targets will only be ten or twenty miles away.

In other words, what the Army wants is a battlefield weapon for U.S. troops in fairly close proximity to enemy forces. Except that the research proposal isn’t asking for devices that would disrupt, say, Chinese or Russian military command-and-control systems.

Instead the Army speaks of paralyzing “an adversary’s underlying industrial, civil, and communications infrastructure.” This sounds more like some form of strategic bombing. Or perhaps, it could be used to cripple an enemy city prior to an assault or a siege by U.S. ground troops.

The fact that the Army also desires a low-power weapon that precisely targets a small geographic area and a specific portion of the electromagnetic spectrum also suggests that the Pentagon is aware of the possibility of collateral damage. An artillery shell that fries the power supply for a government ministry is one thing, but frying the power supply to a hospital or water-treatment plant is another.

This article originally appeared at The National Interest.

http://taskandpurpose.com/army-electromagnetic-pulse-shell/
 

Atalay

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Qatar’s Leopard 2A7+ main battle tank

Qatar’s Leopard 2A7+ tanks are the most advanced of the breed built to date and will be optimised to meet the high ambient conditions encountered in the Middle East.

According to the contract signed in 2013 with an overall value of USD2.2 billion, Qatar ordered 62 Leopard 2 tanks. The Leopard 2A7+ battle tank is built based on the Leopard 2 MBT and employs digitised technology and multifunctional user concept for improved sustainability. The turret and chassis of the Leopard 2A7+ are fitted with a cooling system.
The Leopard 2A7+ MBT is powered by an MTU MB 873 diesel engine, which generates a power of 1,500hp. The Leopard 2A7+ equipped with the Rheinmetall 120mm L/55 smoothbore gun, a computerised fire control system coupled to day and thermal sights for the commander and gunner, the latest armour package, an air-conditioning system and a roof-mounted FLW 200 remote weapon station (RWS) armed with a .50 M2 HB machine gun (MG) to provide a close-in self-defence capability.

http://defence-blog.com/army/photos-qatars-leopard-2a7-main-battle-tank.html
Qatar’s Leopard 2A7+ main battle tank. Source: Abdul Moiz
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