Artillery: News & Discussion

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Prem
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Prem »

https://www.livefistdefence.com/2018/04 ... -guns.html
Door Opened To India For Deeper Striking M777 Guns
While the first lot of guns are being supplied direct by BAE Systems, its Indian joint venture production partner Mahindra’s Assembly, Integration and Test (AIT) facility opens on Delhi’s outskirts by end June and will begun to supply Indian-assembled guns at a rate of five per month starting March 2019.Meanwhile, BAE Systems, which has been involved in a U.S. Army requirement to extend the range of current and future M777s with a longer barrel (from the current 39 cal to a new 55 cal barrel) has opened the door to the Indian Army to join up if its interested. BAE Systems showcased M777 and M777ER models side by side at DefExpo 2018.Speaking to Livefist, Paul West, India Campaign Director – Weapon Systems at BAE Systems said, “It could be a simply logistics decision for the Indian Army if it is interested in the extended range M777.”The M777ER is a set of six modules that can be retrofitted on existing M777 guns, doubling their effective range to between 54-70 km depending on the sort of ammunition used. The modules include a modified barrel, suspension and recoil system, and adds approximately 500 kg to the M777’s existing weight, though BAE Systems engineers are working to see if the modification can be effected with no change in the gun’s weight.The discussion and the M777 extended range option isn’t meant to be disruptive or to interrupt the Indian build program. However, it is a safer way for India to modernise looking into the future,” West says.With the BAE-Mahindra joint venture to begin churning out guns from later this year, the Indian Army has been briefed that it has the option of either retrofitting its M777s to the ER standard later, or modifying the Faridabad assembly line itself so that later tranches of the gun could be of the extended range version. The Indian Army has heard out the offer, though it remains very unclear how much manoeuvering room it may have with the existing deal considering intensifying budgetary pressures. The Army could conceivably understand the merit of advance planning on a modernised gun that it has fought hard and long for, especially with the attendant Make in India skin it will bear. But selling an additional cost on an existing deal at a time when other modernisation priorities tread water will be something else altogether.
BAE, though, is looking ahead. A more realistic option could lie beyond the current order of 145 guns. The current order is a bare 20 per cent of India’s known requirement of at least 700 ultra-light howitzer guns for its mountain divisions. West says an India-specific extended range barrel could be considered as part of work undertaken by BAE-Mahindra in India. The U.S. Army will get to fire six M777ER prototypes in 2020. The Indian production run of the M777 will be complete by June 2021.“It would be a good idea for a three-way discussion to take place at this time between the Indian Army, the U.S. Army and us. There’s huge commonality between the M777 and the M777ER,” West says.The Indian Air Force’s new Boeing CH-47F Chinook heavylift helicopters, which begin arriving in March 2019, will almost definitely count as one of their missions transporting underslung M777s to forward areas for training and exercises. The M777ER will also be Chinook-transportable, BAE Systems confirms.
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Singha »

the archer artillery of bofors also has the entire thing hanging off the back like the ofb design



the pzh gun on mlts vehicle....you can see the recoil forces ... no anchor spades

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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Singha »

good thing is our kit is now as tfta both in function and fit n finish as the best around. the BF ULH so soothing on the eyes

the germans and soviets had the 120mm vehicle mounted mortar (including a huge 240mm 2S4 with a huge base plate).... germans had wiesel.

it can be good force multiplier for the infantry esp as another vehicle can cart lots of reload rounds. increased lethality can be done with airburst fuses and in future some sensor fused pkgs. 120mm is a real pain for infantry units to carry manually .... they are better off with the regular 81mm.

they are learning all the tricks of the big bro howitzers - in a way they are - just shorter in range and low in cost

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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Prasad »

Interesting bit of info on the Bharat MGS on their board -
Image

Image
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Pratyush »

Has the Kalyani ULH been tested by the IA?
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by hnair »

Prem wrote:https://www.livefistdefence.com/2018/04 ... -guns.html
Door Opened To India For Deeper Striking M777 Guns
Meanwhile, BAE Systems, which has been involved in a U.S. Army requirement to extend the range of current and future M777s with a longer barrel (from the current 39 cal to a new 55 cal barrel) has opened the door :lol: :lol: :lol: to the Indian Army to join up if its interested
Image
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by hnair »

Time to give some firm pre-production orders to Kalyani-sir and see what other doors are condescendingly opened up for the native
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Kakarat »

Pratyush wrote:Has the Kalyani ULH been tested by the IA?
No only the gun has been proof tested at CPE Itarsi. the total system (both) is heading for trials in may 18 and subsequently will be offered to the Army
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Singha »

we should look to subsidize our domestic products by giving them as military aid (money goes GOI->desi OEM), product goes desi OEM->ally like gotus does with its aid pkgs. so while IA might not own 4 types, the unwanted can be funded and desi ecosystem built up with foreign sales.

these guns could be given to bangladesh, bhutan, sri lanka. if we dont offer or sell, the chinese surely will. offer them to nepal as well, and get its army deep into indian weapons and wean them away from whatever maoist tyrant assumes the throne in kathmandu. we can also sell them to africa, south america, afghanistan, CAR states, syria, iran :D, oman and east asia. far more useful kit than the billion dollah Thaad and F-solahs the khan finds excuses to sell all over.

arms and money are the two biggest diplomatic instruments not yak yak talk talk.

we should also build export variants of our growing family of EW and land based radar.
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Prasad »

Uh Afghanistan wants tanks, attack choppers etc. We could give them ULH and Dhanush :)
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Karan M »

hnair wrote:Time to give some firm pre-production orders to Kalyani-sir and see what other doors are condescendingly opened up for the native
Just love that post with Kalam sir!
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by raghuk »

From the little interaction I had at DefExpo, everybody wants the LCH either free of cost or at any price we may quote depending on the country. Almost the same with the tejas but we can only make so many of both.
Cheers!
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Will »

hnair wrote:Time to give some firm pre-production orders to Kalyani-sir and see what other doors are condescendingly opened up for the native
Expect the IA to say that’s it’s heavier than the M777 by 5 kg and hence not suitable :roll:
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Kartik »

raghuk wrote:From the little interaction I had at DefExpo, everybody wants the LCH either free of cost or at any price we may quote depending on the country. Almost the same with the tejas but we can only make so many of both.
Cheers!
Didn't get the "free of cost" part..but it seems the sentiment is positive for both the LCH and the Tejas..are you referring to foreign customers for both products? Any chance you could reveal the nationalities?
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by ramana »

hnair wrote:
Prem wrote:https://www.livefistdefence.com/2018/04 ... -guns.html
Door Opened To India For Deeper Striking M777 Guns
BAE has not lost any of their arrogance even after becoming a mostly US company.

Have they resolved what happened to their guns during trials?
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Prem »

BAE afraid of India making her own matching gun or even best them in this game.
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Cybaru »

raghuk wrote:From the little interaction I had at DefExpo, everybody wants the LCH either free of cost or at any price we may quote depending on the country. Almost the same with the tejas but we can only make so many of both.
Cheers!

What about the users, what are you hearing back from them? things you can talk about ofcourse, if you can't that's ok.
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by raghuk »

Kartik wrote:
raghuk wrote:From the little interaction I had at DefExpo, everybody wants the LCH either free of cost or at any price we may quote depending on the country. Almost the same with the tejas but we can only make so many of both.
Cheers!
Didn't get the "free of cost" part..but it seems the sentiment is positive for both the LCH and the Tejas..are you referring to foreign customers for both products? Any chance you could reveal the nationalities?
As in gift from the Indian govt to keep the fire breathing lizard out. Yes I was referring to foreign customers. Guessing thr nationalities shouldn't be a problem if you get what I mean.
Cheers!
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by JTull »

Apparently L&T and Ashok Leyland are replacing the 100 BM-21 original mount vehicles with Ashok Leyland vehicles in a 100crore deal. In this link the first 2 are the remounted ones during a recent exercise in Thar Desert.

https://twitter.com/twitter/statuses/988117380038561795

Now there's another order for Ashok Leyland for re-mounting Smerch too.
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Singha »

watch with sound high

IA BM21 unit in recent exercice https://twitter.com/livefist/status/988117380038561795
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by A Sharma »

Shots on target, finally

DefExpo stars: Dhanush by Ordnance Factory Board, and M777 by BAE Syst
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by sudeepj »

A Sharma wrote:Shots on target, finally

DefExpo stars: Dhanush by Ordnance Factory Board, and M777 by BAE Syst
Enthralled with its performance during trials, the defence ministry has decided to procure the first lot of 40 guns for the Indian Army. But, the Army wants the weight of the gun to be reduced to 13 tonnes from 19 tonnes, along with improvements in auto-loading.


Unobtainium.
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by JTull »

Ridiculous. Why not 3 tonnes?
ramana
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by ramana »

A Sharma wrote:Shots on target, finally

DefExpo stars: Dhanush by Ordnance Factory Board, and M777 by BAE Syst

I didn't find much new in this article. Looks like a summary article.
I am really interested in results of the instrumented shell trials for M777 and the new trials for Dhanush.

I also wonder about the requirement for weight reduction of 19-13 = 6 tonnes for ATAGs. That will end up with cracked trails.

And the auto loader improvements.
ATAGS already does a high rate of fire.
from wiki
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DRDO_Adva ... em_(ATAGS)
Burst:3 rounds in 15sec Intense: 15 rounds in 3 minutes Sustained: 30 rounds in 60 min
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by abhik »

Do we know how much Dhanush 52 weighes? In the DefExpo videos the ATAGS looks huge compared to the Dhanush. Apart from a few more kmhp speed what is the advantage of the ATAGS layout compared to the bofors derived one which is aparently several tons lighter.
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by sudeepj »

Possibly two or three tonnes can be reduced by replacing steel wheels with alloy, replace regular steel in trails with ultra-high-strength steel or titanium. More than that is simply asking for trouble. Meanwhile Pakis have inducted Panter in numbers.. 155mmx52Cal Turkish artillery that outranges any tube that we have today.
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Katare »

Only 32% weight reduction..... :rotfl:
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Pratyush »

The 7 ton weight quoted for fh77 is incorrect. The weight of the gun is more in the region of 12 to 13 tons. That is what the army is asking for in the atags.

But the IA needs to be told that atags will be heavier than fh77b because of the larger volume chamber and the assorted recoil handling mechanism. Along with longer barrel of 52 Cal.

PS I wonder if the atags barrel and chamber can be ported to the FH 77 carriage.
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Indranil »

Of course the army knows what such a gun should weigh. Let’s not believe the numbers on a media report. The knowledge of our reporters to interpret technicalities is subhanallah!
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Cybaru »

How does it matter, what the weight is? We have bridges that cant take 17 tons?
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Kashi »

Cybaru wrote:How does it matter, what the weight is? We have bridges that cant take 17 tons?
More like we lack trucks that can pull 17 tons- or at least that's one of the "explanations" that I have seen parroted around.
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by pandyan »

I think Kalyani saar mentioned in interview that weight is the top improvement item customer had requested and he also mentioned that the next iteration coming out in july(?) would be lighter.

I wonder if BF and Tata guns should have been two different versions(lighter vs heavier) instead of almost identical
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Vips »

The question is will Bharat Forge/TATA be able to reduce the weight drastically in one go or it will be a iterative process of few hundred kilos to be validated by tests year after year after year..... :(
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by JTull »

pandyan wrote:I think Kalyani saar mentioned in interview that weight is the top improvement item customer had requested and he also mentioned that the next iteration coming out in july(?) would be lighter.

I wonder if BF and Tata guns should have been two different versions(lighter vs heavier) instead of almost identical
Each would have added value for their own version but with a common core design. The barrel comes from BF for both though.
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by ramana »

Indranil wrote:Of course the army knows what such a gun should weigh. Let’s not believe the numbers on a media report. The knowledge of our reporters to interpret technicalities is subhanallah!

Are these requirements given in written paper or just via reporters?

This requirement to reduce weight by 1/3 does not reflect on the entire team: DRDO and IA.
The industry partners are the manufacturers of DRDO design and hence not part of the problem.
Was there no design co-ordination about principal requirements?

How can one wake up suddenly after trials and ask for 1/3 weight reduction?
That would need total redesign.

This is happening too often with DRDO and IA wrt artillery.

This one deserves a Parliament question to get to the bottom of this silo mentality.
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by ramana »

Anyway what's the resolution for the muzzle strikes for Dhanush and M777 guns?

Will some one speak up? At-least to favorite reporters?
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by sudeepj »

Indranil wrote:Of course the army knows what such a gun should weigh. Let’s not believe the numbers on a media report. The knowledge of our reporters to interpret technicalities is subhanallah!
This is the 4th or 5th time this information - ATAGs is overweight, army wants a 12tonne gun - has been reported, each time by different reporters. Appears to be genuine, though you may be right that it could be DDM echoing DDM.
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by Kakkaji »

Arjun story being repeated with ATAGS :(
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by jaysimha »

http://pib.nic.in/newsite/PrintRelease. ... lid=178654
PrintXClose
Press Information Bureau
Government of India
Ministry of Defence
13-April-2018 14:31 IST
BEML & OFB launches Force Multiplier 155mm 52 Cal Mounted Gun system

Ordnance Factory Board (OFB) and Bharat Earth Movers Ltd. (BEML) have unveiled its latest product viz 155mm 52 Cal Mounted Gun system at a function held at the ongoing DefExpo 2018 in Chennai. It was launched jointly by CMD, BEML Shri Deepak Kumar Hota and DGOF & Chairman OFB Shri S K Chourasia.

The uniqueness of this project is that it has been completely and independently designed and manufactured by OFB in association with BEML & BEL and is therefore a shining example of ‘Make in India’. The gun is equipped with the state-of-the-art laying and sighting system such as GPS aided INS, muzzle velocity feeder data management, day and night firing, ballasting computer system capability.

The base vehicle used for the gun system is the BEML-TATRA 8X8 truck with all differential lockable and a powerful 300 KW (402 HP) engine, which provides it a power to weight ratio of more than 10KW/ton. This is a high mobility vehicle with independent wheel suspension and swinging half axles to provide enhanced cross-country mobility. The vehicle has a cruising speed of 80 km/hr on road and more than 30 km/hr in cross-country and has a cruising range of 1000 km without refuelling.

The armament used in the 155 mm 52 Cal has a target destruction capability of approximately 42 kms. The Gun System combines with the advantage of high mobility performance of a truck with accurate long range fire power of a 155 mm 52 Cal gun and with its onboard ammunition storage capability of 18 rounds of HE shells as well as 18 BMCS and 2-6 chargers. It can be automatically deployed in any terrain and can perform a mission independently.

With its high strategic manoeuvrability in all types of terrain it will serve as an all weather reinforcement for the infantry and will be a present force multiplier for the Indian artillery.

SRR/NAo/Rajib

178654
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Re: Artillery Discussion Thread

Post by nam »

sudeepj wrote:Possibly two or three tonnes can be reduced by replacing steel wheels with alloy, replace regular steel in trails with ultra-high-strength steel or titanium. More than that is simply asking for trouble. Meanwhile Pakis have inducted Panter in numbers.. 155mmx52Cal Turkish artillery that outranges any tube that we have today.
Paks don't have Panther. They decided not to induct it due to.... weight!
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