"U.S. Army to develop new 120mm GPS-guided mortar " Topic
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| Tango01 | 29 May 2015 11:47 a.m. PST |
"The U.S. Army hopes the 120mm Guided Enhanced Fragmentation Mortar further improves Soldiers' ability to put artillery on target. During U.S. Dept. of Defence Lab Day at the Pentagon, May 14, multiple researchers from throughout the U.S. Army were available to demonstrate their projects, the 120mm Guided Enhanced Fragmentation Mortar, or GEFM, program. The GEFM is a GPS-guided mortar that will make it easier for soldiers to put a round on target.
"With [a] conventional mortar you are at the mercy of the ballistic calculations," Nickolas B. Baldwin said. Baldwin is a researcher and mechanical engineer working on this project. "With a conventional non-smart round, you really have to bracket in your target. There is a certain dispersion, or round-to-round variability in shooting a conventional munition. What happens sometimes is, based on the weather for the day, or the aiming error or the weapon, there is a certain error associated with it. So you adjust fire after your first round down range and hopefully get fire for effect." A precision-guided mortar takes that variability out of the equation, Baldwin said…"
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| Noble713 | 29 May 2015 1:46 p.m. PST |
I was just thinking about GPS mortar rounds the other day. What sort of per-round cost is expected? 155mm Excalibur rounds are ~$70,000 each (down from $150,000 USD when first introduced). Google suggests $7 USD-10k (in articles from 2012)… |
| Mako11 | 29 May 2015 2:06 p.m. PST |
I'm sure their sales/marketing people will come up with a nice, round, fair number, like $50,000 USD, or so, per shell. |
| Jamesonsafari | 29 May 2015 2:25 p.m. PST |
I know with COIN ops you need a lot of precision to avoid civilian casualties, but isn't a benefit of mortar fire it's dispersion?
Just like you don't want an LMG to be too accurate either? |
| 15mm and 28mm Fanatik | 29 May 2015 3:33 p.m. PST |
Unless you look at it as a precision no-line-of-sight-required assassination (decapitation) tool, which might not be money badly spent. |
| Lion in the Stars | 29 May 2015 6:18 p.m. PST |
Guess the US finally cranked out a guided HE-frag round. Was wondering when that was going to happen. Large dispersion is an advantage when you're pounding a large area. Pinpoint accuracy is an advantage when you're trying to put a round in *that* window to get the sniper. |
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