The anti-americanism on Top Gear is a bit ridiculous. I know he was trying to make a joke regarding the lack of rifling in American tanks, but it gets old.
Well he once criticized American roads for not having any corners. It is pretty much a cornerstone of the show. That is fine, ask him where Beckham is playing this year.
Even funnier since the M256 gun is produced by General Dynamics under licence from Rheinmetall. The gun was originally designed by the Germans. I've always thought he dropped those barbs just to provoke a reaction.
If you're designing a discarding-sabot round with a length-to-width ratio in excess of about 10, spin stabilization doesn't work; the only effective option is fin stabilization.
Finned rounds are degraded in effectiveness by spin, so finned rounds designed to be fired from rifled guns require a mechanism in the round to prevent spin from being imparted by the rifling.
So, rifled tank guns require that you use a more complicated armor-piercing round with greater chance of failure, or a armor-piercing round with an inferior length-to-width ratio. Thus, the countries that actually make tanks for armored combat (the U.S., Germany, China, and Russia) all use smoothbore guns.
The British use rifled guns because of a bizarre fetish for HESH rounds, which is the next thing to useless against composite armor.
The result is that a rifled gun disadvantages a tank against its most dangerous foes (other MBTs), while giving it unnecessary additional range from which to plink at poorly-armored targets. This is, of course, stupid with a capital S.
Fortunately, this idiocy is going to be corrected in future Challenger 2 tanks by the "Challenger Lethality Improvement Programme", which will be using the same gun as the Leopard 2 A6, the smoothbore Rheinmetall L55.
I wouldn't take his comments too seriously, his role on the show is basically to be the most annoying bastard possible. He constantly bitches about Americans and American cars and then buys a Ford GT...
If he thinks American roads have no corners he should come to the Santa Cruz Mountains where Randy Mamola and others learned to play on a bike. Oh well it's always good to compare a truck and a tank.
Anonymous said... I wouldn't take his comments too seriously, his role on the show is basically to be the most annoying bastard possible. He constantly bitches about Americans and American cars and then buys a Ford GT...
The Challenger is NOT going to get the L/55 smoothbore gun, as the whole turret has to be re-designed for one-piece ammo.
instead new ammo is being developed.
note also that the Abrams has the L/44 canon (25% shorter than the L/55 which DOES make it less accurate and gives it a lower range and less kinetic energy, but makes it easier to maneuver in urban areas) the L/55 has 33% more kinetic energy than the rifled gun on the CHR, but half the range.
whats more: CHR2 is now fitted with a 1700 hp engine, more and better armor (level 2 dorchester and cage armor at the back), remote weapons station, EMP countermeasures, mine detection systems, hunter/killer capability at night, new sights, new communications system (gps, etc)...
14 comments:
The sabot rounds used in smooth-bore guns are fin stabilized, so no need for rifling.
The anti-americanism on Top Gear is a bit ridiculous. I know he was trying to make a joke regarding the lack of rifling in American tanks, but it gets old.
Well he once criticized American roads for not having any corners. It is pretty much a cornerstone of the show. That is fine, ask him where Beckham is playing this year.
Even funnier since the M256 gun is produced by General Dynamics under licence from Rheinmetall. The gun was originally designed by the Germans. I've always thought he dropped those barbs just to provoke a reaction.
If you're designing a discarding-sabot round with a length-to-width ratio in excess of about 10, spin stabilization doesn't work; the only effective option is fin stabilization.
Finned rounds are degraded in effectiveness by spin, so finned rounds designed to be fired from rifled guns require a mechanism in the round to prevent spin from being imparted by the rifling.
So, rifled tank guns require that you use a more complicated armor-piercing round with greater chance of failure, or a armor-piercing round with an inferior length-to-width ratio. Thus, the countries that actually make tanks for armored combat (the U.S., Germany, China, and Russia) all use smoothbore guns.
The British use rifled guns because of a bizarre fetish for HESH rounds, which is the next thing to useless against composite armor.
The result is that a rifled gun disadvantages a tank against its most dangerous foes (other MBTs), while giving it unnecessary additional range from which to plink at poorly-armored targets. This is, of course, stupid with a capital S.
Fortunately, this idiocy is going to be corrected in future Challenger 2 tanks by the "Challenger Lethality Improvement Programme", which will be using the same gun as the Leopard 2 A6, the smoothbore Rheinmetall L55.
The newest Challenger 2 tanks are switching to a 120mm smoothbore -- just like those notoriously inaccurate Leopard 2s and M1-A2s.
I wouldn't take his comments too seriously, his role on the show is basically to be the most annoying bastard possible. He constantly bitches about Americans and American cars and then buys a Ford GT...
- Nicholas
If he thinks American roads have no corners he should come to the Santa Cruz Mountains where Randy Mamola and others learned to play on a bike. Oh well it's always good to compare a truck and a tank.
Anonymous said...
I wouldn't take his comments too seriously, his role on the show is basically to be the most annoying bastard possible. He constantly bitches about Americans and American cars and then buys a Ford GT...
- Nicholas
25 March 2008 01:31
...and then bitched about it too!
Hey! You got linked by Instapundit!
Good job!
(And I thought the barb was funny.)
I took no offense over his shot at slouchy, smoothbore American guns. With a 120mm shell, "somewhere out there" is usually close enough.
I love Range Rovers. I winch them out of mud and rock obstacles all the time with my Jeep.
British and Americans have been trading good-natured barbs ever since 1776. Lighten up.
Oh, and if you're British, buy a toothbrush for God's sake!
*wink*
The Challenger is NOT going to get the L/55 smoothbore gun, as the whole turret has to be re-designed for one-piece ammo.
instead new ammo is being developed.
note also that the Abrams has the L/44 canon (25% shorter than the L/55 which DOES make it less accurate and gives it a lower range and less kinetic energy, but makes it easier to maneuver in urban areas) the L/55 has 33% more kinetic energy than the rifled gun on the CHR, but half the range.
whats more: CHR2 is now fitted with a 1700 hp engine, more and better armor (level 2 dorchester and cage armor at the back), remote weapons station, EMP countermeasures, mine detection systems, hunter/killer capability at night, new sights, new communications system (gps, etc)...
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