| From: | ROBERSON@***.EDU |
|---|---|
| Subject: | ROunds |
| Date: | Tue, 6 Apr 93 03:40:27 CET |
mean, I'm assuming that you still need to provide radiation to "recharge" it.
I'm curious now; feel fre to expand this, but privately as I don't think we
need to waste public bandwidth on it.
As for tank rounds today: I believe someone asked what all of this stuff is,
means, and does. I used to play Twilight:2000 a lot while I lived in Germany
(for four years) and watched the tanks go rolling by; I naturally took an
interest in military equipment and read up on quite a bit of it at the time.
Here's what I remember:
Sizes
The smallest tanks (and I do mean tanks, in the sense of heavily
armored vehicles designed to destroy each other, not souped-up battle-taxis
like the M2 Bradley) have guns about 75mm in calibre; this is a medium sized
gun. The big tanks (M1A1, Challenger, T-80) have 120mm guns. Soviets use
125mm with autoloaders, while most NATO tanks still have human loaders (they're
about the same speed and don't jam).
Rounds
The most basic type is the High Explosive. Real tanks typically don't
use thes because they don't accomplish a real tank's primary mission: destroy
another tank. The HE warheads will kill people and take out soft targets
(bunkers, trucks, and lightly armored vehicles) but will usually just scorch
the paint of a real tank.
High Explosive Anti-Tank (HEAT) is now a misnomer. This is the famous
shaped-charge warhead that comes with a funnel to focus the blast at a
concentrated point and burn a hole through the armor. I say it's a misnomer
because most HEAT rounds will barely hurt a real tank. HEAT warheads on
missiles, which are considerably more powerful, will hurt a tank, but the
payload of a 105-125mm round just doesn't cut against modern armor.
AP rounds come in a variety of forms. The most common now has a sabot
(say-bow). The round itself is sub-calibre; it's smaller than the bore of the
gun. The sabot (French for "show" is molded around it to give it the width
needed (oops. It's French for "shoe". I'm in a hurry). Anyway, this results
in a small object being propelled at very high force, resulting in greater
penetration than a standard round.
AP rounds may also be fin-stabilized (FS), resulting in a more stable
flight path. Not all are made of Depleted Uranium. So, to pierce armor you
have APDS, APDSFS, and APDSFSDU. The military just loves acronyms.
There are also FASCAM rounds for artillery (Field Artillery Scatterable
something-or-other mines). These drop mines from an artillery round. Another
cute option for artillery is Cannon Launched Guided Projectiles (CLGP). These
are artillery rounds with tiny microprocessors and servo-mounted stabilizers
hooked up to a sensor that reads a laser designator fired by someone else (a
soldier, or a helicopter hiding behind trees). It homes in on the painted
target. Very precise.
But I digress from useful information. The above should give you
enough ideas about how modern tank rounds work to figure out how to apply it
to Shadowrun balistics. But then, I'm sure most of you were aware of the above
information already. Enjoy.
J Roberson
