"Question on artillery barrages " Topic
6 Posts
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Korvessa | 01 Sep 2018 4:03 p.m. PST |
I know how spotter rounds work, but have always wondered on fire for effect. How do they get the rounds to spread out so they aren't all hitting (relatively) the same place. Does the movement of the gun from recoil plus wind, etc. make sure that happens? Is each gun zeroed to a slightly different place? How close do the rounds actually land? What about mortars? What kind of spread does say a 60mm mortar have? |
wpilon | 01 Sep 2018 6:53 p.m. PST |
The guns are all a good ways apart from each other so when the entire battery fires there's a fair amount of dispersion from that, in addition to the natural variation (wind, minute differences in powder charge, etc) from round to round. |
Rudysnelson | 01 Sep 2018 7:38 p.m. PST |
My unit, Armored scout did spot for artillery but we had mortars organic. I was also the XO of an armored Bn HQ which had 4,2" mortars attached. With the mortar platoon we could fire the entire platoon rather than a single gun. Based on the terrain, determined whether one or multiple tubes were fired. Adjustments called in all the b s were reset regardless on whether ne tube or more were used. Terrain determined how the mortars were deployed. It was not always in a line nor was the distance between tubes the same. You could fire a concentrated or spread fire zone for both mortars and artillery. |
RedLion281 | 01 Sep 2018 11:41 p.m. PST |
Google "Converged sheaf" image results. There are several diagrams on how artillery / mortar fire is spread out. All the calculations are done by the Fire Direction Center. The "spread" is based on the burst radius of the shell and the number of guns firing. |
Dn Jackson | 02 Sep 2018 12:04 a.m. PST |
Back in the day when you were ready to fire for effect all the guns were given the same direction, elevation, and powder charge. The result was that the rounds landed approximately the same way the guns were positioned. For example Y equals guns and x equals shot: Y Y Y Y Y Y x x x x x x With the advent of computers things changed making special shell landing patterns very easy. The standard when I was in the USMC was for the rounds to land in a circle around the target. However, we could shoot them so that they followed the twists and turns of a road, along a ridge line, etc. This was something that could be done in the past, but took a lot longer. |
foxweasel | 02 Sep 2018 8:49 a.m. PST |
It's a thing called "The Beaten Zone" it's caused by tiny variations in the charge that propels the explosive, the guns/mortars being laid (the firing information put on the sight, then firing bubbles levelled) at small variations to each other, wind and a lot of other variables. If guns/mortars are positioned 40m from each other in a line, in theory the rounds will land 40m apart and in a line dependent on the direction of the line to the target. They don't because of the reasons stated. |
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