knightrider4
Active Member
I believe that the Mk44S, can accept both Rheinmetall and ATK etc etc. Whereas the Mk30-2 can only fire the soft case German rounds.
FormerDirtDart
Well-Known Member
You are talking about two completely different 40mm rounds.
The K21's K40 cannon was developed from the Bofors 40/70. So it's firing your old classic 40x365.
While the Redback's 30mm Mk44 can be altered to fire the "Super 40mm" 40x180 round derived from the 30x173 round. Hence the ability to modify the weapon.
Side note, no one to my knowledge has fielded the Mk44 in S40mm, so no one is actually producing ammo
Terran
Well-Known Member
K21 uses uses the SNT Dynamics K40 automatic cannon. It’s a fork of the 40mm L70 twin barrel naval gun.
SNT Dynamics it fires essentially the same 40x365mm Rimmed as the Bufors L70 anti aircraft guns found on a number of naval ships old Skool anti aircraft artillery and the CV90-40 IFV.
The Bushmaster chain gun family has two primary 30mm versions the weaker M230 series firing 30x113mm which is best known under the nose of the Apache helicopter and the bigger Mk44 Bushmaster III with the magnificent 30x173mm. The later can be rechambered to 40x180mm aka Super40.
Super 40 is a compromise. It’s a semi teliscoped round meaning it’s packed in more HE and KE. It’s kinda an equivalent to a 35mm shell but you don’t have the size of the big 35mm requiring a bigger turret. To date no one has signed up for the upgrade.
Why pick the 30 vs the 40/L70? Probably more logistics, higher magazine capacity, better rate of fire.
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I think there is a case to argue that ballistic computers have given a accuracy and greater chance of first round hits compared to days gone bye.
Magazine and logistics I acknowledge, but feel in the balancing act the benefits of the larger 40mm calibre out weigh the attributes of the 30 mm round.
The trend is to go bigger rather than smaller
25mm to 30 mm has benefits for sure but not confident it is the way forward.
40 x 365mm round not super 40
Cheers S
Ammunition natures for the Mk 44 Bushmaster (Redback) and Mk30-2 ABM (Boxer) are significantly different due to which rounds have been qualified on which gun.
No reason a ”standard” supply of ammunition natures couldn’t be provided but Army (and perhaps RAN with their upcoming Typhoon Mk.30C weapons) would have to undertake an expensive qualification / integration process to adopt a ‘standard’ nature and that may not even be possible with the programmable rounds due to the different systems employed in ‘programming’ the rounds as they travel through the respective barrels.
Might be easier to simply buy a metric shipload of each ammunition and produce locally the most common / used round (probably the natures for the Mk.44)?
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40mm Super Shot only, it’s not a “true” 40mm round and has seen a spectacular lack of interest among world armies…
Army looked at this extensively during LAND 400 Ph.2 when they had 30mm x 173mm armed Boxers shooting off against 35mm x 228mm armed AMv-35’s, with the option of incorporating the same 35mm x 228mm gun into Boxer if Army wished for same.
Army’s conclusion was the additional ammunition carrying capacity of the 30mm variants was more useful than the improved (but not hugely) range and penetration offered by 35mm systems.
Hence we have standardised on 30mm medium calibre gun systems.
Terran
Well-Known Member
I was simply clarifying the differences between them.
As yet only the ROK and Sweden (by extension Ukraine now) have chosen to field IFV with such a cannon. In cases where it was desired to pack something bigger that 30mm the default has been 35mm.
Though it seems now that CTA 40mm is becoming a popular research option (PRC, ROK, UK/Fra) for potential future use and has been adopted by the British and French.
Well the US is looking at 50x228mm for the XM30 MICV (OMFV).
Generally though as this is an IFV in support of infantry of an armored unit and not a medium weight infantry unit. If they feel the need for that extra force they probably have a MBT a radio call away.
120x570mm>40x365mm.
And what are the things that actually might be better / more efficiently engaged by 30mm? Drones? Infantry?
Yep an interesting conversation.
A big driver will be engaging flying things.
Army and Navy.
.....................
Support from a MBT.
Fair call.
I make the assumption that the combined arms script for all good intentons and planning will at times fall apart in the chaos of conflict and you will be that digger in vehicle having fired your two Spike ATGM and your left with your vehicle cannon and your wits.
Seems to be the reality in Ukraine at the moment.
We plan and want the big scale manoevour stuff but it breaks down quickly to the troop individual vehicle bit very quickly.
Think the ADF will be any different?
40 mm thanks
Cheers S
Yes we have watched the evolution, but if you said let's get two or three different types of rounds in the same calibre for army and navy in a few years time, the logical response would be a please explain........... Why?
Perplexed S
Targets at range primarily. They also have better penetration effects of course, but it’s primarily the ultra long distance shots where the difference is stark.
However be that as it may, you can’t engage any targets when you’ve fired off your available ammunition and the ‘what if once you’ve fired your Spike LR2’s” applies equally to medium cannons.
Through testing Army found 30mm in greater availability was more useful than 35mm in less. I suspect it would be the same in larger calibres as well.
There was a quite extensive article in defence tech review about 4 years ago on this subject. Behind paywall now but if you are a subscriber there you can read some of the reasoning . Was around carried payload vs target range vs potential target. Vs range of spike Missile. Short range use gun with lots of ammo and spikes long range.
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The UK chose years ago to field two IFVs with a 40mm gun (CTA), one new & one upgraded, before cancelling the Warrior upgrade. It's still going ahead with the new IFV, the Ajax.
ADF NH90 appears to have gone down just off Hamilton Island 4 crew on board have not been located and are feared deceased
John Newman
The Bunker Group
Actually it would have been an Army MRH-90.
ADF NH90 appears to have gone down just off Hamilton Island 4 crew on board have not been located and are feared deceased
The RAN ceased using them in March last year, last I read those six airframe were put into storage.
I do wonder if the Army aircraft were fitted with the flotation kit that is fitted for over water ops?
Certainly sad news for the crew onboard who appear to have been lost in the accident.
Low, over water at night, with aircrew who possibly hadn’t done that much of it. Easy to lose situational awareness in that situation; although it might have been a mechanical of course. We do dangerous things as part of the job, and sometimes they come unstuck. RIP.
Redlands18
Well-Known Member
Helicopter wreckage found after Taipan crash, search continues to locate four-person crew - ABC News
Some wreckage has been recovered, but any hope of finding survivors would have to be fading fast.
Some wreckage has been recovered, but any hope of finding survivors would have to be fading fast.
Bluey 006
Active Member
Thing is though. Many of the newer IFVs arriving on the scene will have protection that approaches or exceeds STANAG 6, which as I understand it affords protection for 30 mm at 500 meters. It might be unlikely that we are facing off against advanced IFVs anytime soon, and if we are you'd hope that we were detecting and engaging them at long range but we will likely have the Redback for many decades. No one thought there would be major ground war happening in Europe in 2023, but here we are. Anything could happen in the current environment. The ability to upgrade to a larger calibre weapon should it be required to defeat rival IFVs without using missiles can only be a good thing.
For the current threat scenarios the ADF is likely to face, having more ammunition over larger calibre does make sense. Understandable why they reached that conclusion.
More broadly on the Redback decision. I think once Labour got in and Marles become the Defence minister it was a given. It does make sense to have two suppliers of amoured vehicles supplying the Army, but my personal preference would have been to have gone with the Lynx for commonality with the Boxer and give Hanwha an additional contract at the Geelong factory; to build a fleet of Amphibious Combat Vehicles based of the Tigon 6x6 to support our developing Amphibious capability.
Does anyone know if there is a plan for Hanwha develop and produce a family of vehicles around the Redback? Combat Support Variants and the like. I haven't seen anything around this. One the Lynx had going for it was it is shaping to be a family of systems and much of the development work was already done.
One can only hope that the cutback from the original number 450 to 129 is a temporary budget measure as one thing the conflict in Ukraine has highlighted (despite all the initial dripple by the uneducated that armour is dead) is that war still follows the fundamentals of war established in World War I. Troops on the ground conducting offensive manoeuvres against masses of enemy troops or fortified positions in an effort to advance forward and take control of ground. Advanced missiles, airpower, cyber and drones have yet to undo the armour-infantry-artillery triad....
Though they might shift the balance in one direction or another. Conflict it is still a war of attrition, numbers matter.
All major advances during the conflict have made use of the traditional armour-infantry-artillery triad. It remains the most effective combined arms system to conduct a structured offensive to seize territory, at least when all of the pieces work together as they should.
In the Australian context despite preparing for a maritime conflict should the unthinkable happen we will still need to confront hardened and possibly dug in enemy land forces to seize territory and deny freedom of movement on the ground to take control of strategic terrain. Missiles and ammunition will be used at an unsustainable rate in any high intensity conflict (as we have seen in Ukraine), and never will win a war alone. At some point the troops will have get their hands dirty get and flush out an adversary or occupy key areas so that the enemy doesn't. Important we give them the tools to do the job.
Anyway, both the Boxer and Redback are a quantum leap in capability great to see the ADF finally!! moving on from the M113 and ASLAV, served us well they did. DSR aside we are seeing militaries all over the world expand their armoured forces, hopefully the 129 Redbacks are the start of the ADF doing the same.
N.B: Thoughts go out to the crew of MRH-90 that when down. Hope you ok boys.
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