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I never have quite goten the concept of this totaly.


Can anyone explain?

it is when your hull and tracks are behind cover but your turret and main weapons are clear to fire. If your gunner can see the enemy through his main gunsight, but your driver's vision is still blocked by the cover, you're in Hull Down. Therefore you're taking the least risk possible being exposed to enemy fire when you're getting ready to engage a target.

Hope this helps paint a better picture of this tactic.

So more or less your finding a geographical foxhole for your tank?

Exactly, a tatic that works very well unless you have superior Air support as proven in Desert Storm, by the number of hull down destroyed tanks in the Iraq army curtousy of Allied air strikes.

I was just about to say that.


With the advent of modern air power those wouldnt be that usefull anymore.



I thought the Iraqis built their own "hull down" postions with a little spade work?

the Iraqi's created their hull down positions with sand bags and berms (think that's the correct term?) that they shovelled or bulldozed into "U" shaped firing positions.

And, as Gmenfan eluded to, that was fine to ward off frontal strikes from the level/lower ground infront of these firing positions...but were useless against ATM's / laser guided weapons launched from aircraft and attack helicopters that were coming in from higher elevations to the rear or from the sides...or directly above!

Another advantage is that almost every tank has its strongest armor in its turret...except the roof.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't some of the M1A1 rounds go right through of the Iraqi sand berms?

I think it was in an issue of TIME when the fighting had just ended. If that story is true, then those 120 smoothbores packed a bigger wallop than I thought!

Originally posted by Randy
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't some of the M1A1 rounds go right through of the Iraqi sand berms?

I've always considered this a fable...that penetrator would most likely deform and deflect quite a lot when it hits that sand berm and thuse lose most of it's effectiveness.

Voriax

In Tom Clancy's book Armoured Cav there is a description of A M1 killing a T-72 with a 120mm shell through a berm.

Back in the M1, the crew saw through their Thermal Imaging Sight (TIS) the hot plume of the T-72's engine exhaust spewing up from behind the berm. Aiming carefully through the TIS, the M1's crew fired a third 120mm round through the berm, into the tank, destroying it.

The incident is occured during Desert Storm when a M1 from the 24th Mech Inf Division got stuck in a mud hole and was assaulted by three Iraqi T-72's while waiting for a recovery vehicle.
P.S. final score M1 -3 T-72 - 0
True or not?

If that story is true, then those 120 smoothbores packed a bigger wallop than I thought!

Smoothbore?

Those arnt rifled at all?

well.....I also thought the gun was 128mm too.......

In Tom Clancy's book Armoured Cav there is a description of A M1 killing a T-72 with a 120mm shell through a berm.

Tom clancy probaly didnt write it............:rolleyes:

Just to clarify ... Armoured Cav is a non fiction book, so the incident described is purported to be a true story. I'm just wondering if anyone out there can verify or support this tale ... (Larry Bond nonwithstanding)

that's the problem..only source for that incident is Tom Clancy, which immediately lowers credibility value somewhere around zero or below.

Back when Tanker's Forum was still alive this subject came up now and then and if my memory serves me right no-one was able to comfirm this..including those M1 crew members that resided in that Forum...they posted many great pics though, like pics taken through the thermal imager of the M1

Voriax

Fallschimrjager, this might clarify.

The main armament is the 120 mm M256 smoothbore gun, developed by Rheinmetall GmbH of Germany. The 120 mm gun fires the following ammunition: the M865 TPCSDS-T and M831 TP-T training rounds, the M8300 HEAT-MP-T and the M829 APFSDS-T which includes a depleted uranium penetrator. Textron Systems provides the Cadillac Gage gun turret drive stabilisation system.

The commander has a 12.7 mm Browning M2 machine gun and the loader has a 7.62 mm M240 machine gun. A 7.62 mm M240 machine gun is also mounted coaxially on the right hand side of the main armament.

Why smoothbore for the 120mm Gun? Wouldn't rifling be better?

Originally posted by rbrunsman
Why smoothbore for the 120mm Gun? Wouldn't rifling be better?

May be FUD on my part, but I think almost every (western?) tank today sports smoothbores. Come to think of it, doesn't the M1 and Leopard2 carry the same gun? Why I can only guess, but modern tank ammunition isn't exactly what you'd call a "shell". They got their own stabilizers and are more like small rockets.

About the only 120mm rifled tank guns in use today are the one in British Challenger 2 and the other in the Indian Arjun MBT's. Both use is because they feel the need for the HESH (high explosive squash head) round. Apparently it won't work well if fired from a smoothbore.
Then the 105mm L7 gun that was the previous main gun in western MBT's is also rifled.
As for why smoothbores...well HEAT round doesn't work well if you give it spin and fire it from rifled gun...for example french had tank ammo that had an inner HEAT core that was separated from the outer shell with ball bearings..thus outer shell spinned but the HEAT part didn't. Obviously a complex and costly ammo and perhaps not that effective system anyways. And afaik you can get higher velocities from a smoothbore which is a bonus as present day antitank rounds tend to be fin-stabilized kinetic energy penetrators.

Voriax

If I recall correctly the move to smooth-bore main guns was started by the Soviets. I'm at the office so I can't pinpoint just which tank they started with. Hmm, or was it the Brits?

The reason for the smooth-bore relates, I think, to the more sophesticated new AT rounds. I believe most rounds used today, like sabot, have their own aerodynamic characteristics builtin which would be screwed up by spinning rapidly. Also I believe the Brits have long favored large smooth bores to deliver HEAT and HESH type warheads, neither one of which benefits by impacting the target while spinning.

BTB, how is hull-down modeled in SPWAW? I've tried to set tanks up in a hull-down position, but never succdeded. Is there some trick to it or is it not simulated?

I believe the 1st Soviet smooth bore was the 115mm in the T-62.