AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

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Lord Jim
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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

Post by Lord Jim »

ArmChairCivvy wrote:
RetroSicotte wrote:The M109s new gun however is based on the M777, so perhaps another option there to seek commonality.
They have modified the parallel version to our LG, to do 50 km; linked to it on some thread (to humour LJ ;) ).
- that one is towed, though
Well if they deliver cargo and precision rounds as well I would be happy. If they can develop a guided round for the Bofors 57mm increasing the options for a 105mm should be possible, though most effort goes into 155mm. I just cannot help think that the 105mm is becoming a dead end with the option preferred by many nations being the 120mm Mortar and the 155mm. The 105mm is a good weapon but is out done on range, payload and precision by the combination of the other two.

On the AS-90 it is criminal though how the upgrade to 52 Cal was allowed to slide off into nowhere as a result of penny pinching at head office. Everything was basically in place but the management of the programme was incompetence personified.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

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L118 is still a great gun and the caliber is nothing to be scoffed at. There are loads of good targets for it and no armoured unit will just ride through an artillery barrage. 105mm can mission kill any tank and damage the drivetrain. It's great for supporting troops in contact, has great RoF and shoots 360°. As for AS90 it needs either 52cal version or replacement, preferably K9 or PZH2000. 155mm is great but expensive caliber, new shells costs thousands of pounds each. One barrage can easily cost 400K£. 105mm is much cheaper. As for mortars they don't compete with range, 2m barrel gives at max 8km range and 3m barrel (aka. Amos, Nemo and the polish one) have 10km with normal ammo. The ammo weighs about 60-80% that of 105mm but has double the RoF. Finnish mortar company of 12 heavy mortars can shoot 144 rounds per minute in one hectare area. On top of that plunging fire with almost vertical impact angle providing superior fragment pattern.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

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Don't get me started on Mortars, the Brandt 120mm Rifled Mortar can shoot out to 16km.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

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With RAP ammo, I listed ranges that normal ammo has.

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Old RN
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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

Post by Old RN »

As there may be a move to a wheeled bias in the UK armoured forces why not consider the updated G7 Rhino from Denel (South Africa). It was the earliest RAP family giving very long ranges?

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

Post by Voldemort »

They had such long range due to different breech than what NATO JBMOU has stated as standard. Long ranges are with 25L breech where as NATO standard is 23L which also means different charge system.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

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Old RN wrote:As there may be a move to a wheeled bias in the UK armoured forces why not consider the updated G7 Rhino from Denel (South Africa). It was the earliest RAP family giving very long ranges?
It is a great platform but weight as much as a AS-90 if not more. How about we revisit the old 175mm as fitted to the M107 and find a more modern chassis and ammo. It would certainly have the range and payload for a useful Divisional level asset.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

Post by mr.fred »

What would the 175mm do that a 227mm rocket won’t?

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

Post by Lord Jim »

Cheaper? at least the ammo should be. The M107 was/is one of the few western artillery pieces that could/can match Russian Artillery in range.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

Post by mr.fred »

For longer range tube artillery, wouldn’t a 203mm be a better “next step up”?
Shot for shot, a 175mm or 203mm could be cheaper, neglecting the development cost, but neither are going to match the throw weight of the MLRS. At longer ranges each shot will need to be guided to be worthwhile, and the rocket has less guidance cost for a given warhead weight.
And the MLRS has a much higher rate of fire.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

Post by Lord Jim »

The M107 175mm is the long range sniper of the tube artillery world, with the US providing Israel with a special extended range round unique to the IDF to enable them to use it for counter battery against Syrian tube and rocket batteries.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

Post by mr.fred »

Granted, I’m using wiki as the source, but the description of the M107 was 35km with fairly indifferent accuracy at the extremes of range. Meanwhile the M270 will reach more than 40km with unguided rockets, and more than 80km with guided.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

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G6-52 goes out to 73km!

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

Post by mr.fred »

What's the dispersion like at that distance?

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

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mr.fred wrote:Granted, I’m using wiki as the source, but the description of the M107 was 35km with fairly indifferent accuracy at the extremes of range. Meanwhile the M270 will reach more than 40km with unguided rockets, and more than 80km with guided.
Haven't got all the data but in the Vietnam War the M107 was to go to counter battery weapon against the NVA 130mm, which in turn out ranged the US 155mm. It must have has pretty good accuracy to be tasked with counter battery as the units were usually six guns or less so limiting the number of rounds in the air at any one time.

On a more serious note, the threat form Russian Artillery is really their multitude fi MLRS with even their old BM-21 having new far more effective rockets and they have hundreds of these available let alone the big boys.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

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And now the MLRS is the counter battery system of choice.
there’s an argument that says that you shouldn’t make any given system or unit responsible for too many things. It would be nice if your brigade support artillery had the range for counterbattery work, but I don’t know that it is vital for them. With a 39 calibration AS 90 you could add a few long-range shells to the ammunition supply at the gun to provide increased range for when you need it, at somewhat reduced cost than buying a whole new system. In the mean time, firing at shorter ranges gives you better responsiveness (as you aren’t tasked to do more) shorter time of flight and greater accuracy. Given difficulties with longer barrels, you also potentially have a higher and longer sustained rate of fire.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

Post by Lord Jim »

I doubt you will find anyone who will disagree that the MLRS if the west's main counter battery weapon system especially since the guided rounds were introduced. It will be interesting to see if the UK adopts the successor to the ATACMS being developed and planned to be introduced into service in the early 2020s.

Regarding the AS-90, like so many programmes, the failure o fhte MoD to follow through with plans to upgrade the gun to a 52 calibre is criminal especially as all the parts required are already available, as seen in the Polish Krab. Just another example of the lack of funding given to the Army and the choices it has been forced to make when prioritising resources.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

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Lord Jim wrote:
Regarding the AS-90, like so many programmes, the failure o fhte MoD to follow through with plans to upgrade the gun to a 52 calibre is criminal especially as all the parts required are already available, as seen in the Polish Krab. Just another example of the lack of funding given to the Army and the choices it has been forced to make when prioritising resources.
Criminal? Of all the decisions (or lack thereof) made regarding land forces, retaining the 39 calibre ordnance over the 52 calibre one is about the least problematic decision over the past three decades. I mean, how has the lack of 5km range hurt the British Army since the project was cancelled? Conceivably, how much hurt would that same lack have caused us in any likely situation?

Compared to the lack of appropriate AFVs or training for example?

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

Post by Voldemort »

We need to remember that counter battery radars are reasonably inaccurate and M30/31 rockets have metric accuracy meaning they'll miss most of the time if shot with radar target designation. They are not good for area fires which counter battery is.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

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mr.fred wrote:
Lord Jim wrote:
Regarding the AS-90, like so many programmes, the failure o fhte MoD to follow through with plans to upgrade the gun to a 52 calibre is criminal especially as all the parts required are already available, as seen in the Polish Krab. Just another example of the lack of funding given to the Army and the choices it has been forced to make when prioritising resources.
Criminal? Of all the decisions (or lack thereof) made regarding land forces, retaining the 39 calibre ordnance over the 52 calibre one is about the least problematic decision over the past three decades. I mean, how has the lack of 5km range hurt the British Army since the project was cancelled? Conceivably, how much hurt would that same lack have caused us in any likely situation?

Compared to the lack of appropriate AFVs or training for example?
May be I should have said one crime amongst many. Of all three services the Army has suffered by far the most with chaotic programmes to procure new AFVs, existing AFVs that are in some cases almost 60 years old, lack of training in any true scale for decades, when was the last true Brigade level exercise for example. Yet even here in this site, if one stats that the other two services should have some of their allocated funding diverted to the Army uproar follows, state arguments like we rely on maritime trade so we need to protect this fir enemy submarines and so on, yet the Army sweated blood and tears for nearly two decades fighting two major land campaigns and only got small hand outs in the form of UORs and still has not been reimbursed by the Treasury for the operating costs of Iraq and Afghanistan as was agreed.

The Navy got its shiny new carriers and so has to change its priorities to protecting them, all other roles except protecting the CASD are secondary as well as the relevant deployments. If it wanted to retain 30 odd escorts it should have asked for smaller and cheaper flat tops.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

Post by mr.fred »

Voldemort wrote:We need to remember that counter battery radars are reasonably inaccurate and M30/31 rockets have metric accuracy meaning they'll miss most of the time if shot with radar target designation. They are not good for area fires which counter battery is.
The M30 is a guided submunition rocket, although with submunitions being out of favour it has been replaced by an alternative warhead with preformed heavy metal fragments, trading off unexploded ordnance with heavy metal contamination. This means that you can still, albeit expensively, go for an area effect against an uncertain or mobile target with the guided rockets by using a pre-determined pattern.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

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Of all three services the Army has suffered by far the most with chaotic programmes to procure new AFVs
This and Watchkeeper are exactly the reason why nobody wants to give them even more money. They have managed to waste fantastic amounts for very little returns, often literally zero. And when they have received funding for their own 6 billion programme, Ajax, they have managed, in less than one year, to change their mind so radically that they are now trying to pretend it can be a medium tank and that the armoured brigades do not need recce cavalry at all, after all. They are lucky they have not been taken and thrown out of the window. I still wonder who the hell thought Carter as CDS was a good idea. He messed up the army in a spectacular way, and i hope his time as CDS won't be as damaging.

By the way, the Land budget in the 10 year equipment plan is bigger than the Ships budget and is also bigger than the Combat Air budget.
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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

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mr.fred wrote:
Voldemort wrote:We need to remember that counter battery radars are reasonably inaccurate and M30/31 rockets have metric accuracy meaning they'll miss most of the time if shot with radar target designation. They are not good for area fires which counter battery is.
The M30 is a guided submunition rocket, although with submunitions being out of favour it has been replaced by an alternative warhead with preformed heavy metal fragments, trading off unexploded ordnance with heavy metal contamination. This means that you can still, albeit expensively, go for an area effect against an uncertain or mobile target with the guided rockets by using a pre-determined pattern.
Yes, my bad. I meant the AW and unitary rockets which are nowadays the bulk ammo even though they cost you an arm and a leg. AW might be good against older and less armoured targets like 2S1&3 and unarmoured like BM-21 but have my doubts about effectiveness against 2S19. For counter battery I'd rather use Bonus/Smart or just regular artillery. If we could have SFW rockets for MLRS that would be great.

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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

Post by abc123 »

Gabriele wrote:
Of all three services the Army has suffered by far the most with chaotic programmes to procure new AFVs
This and Watchkeeper are exactly the reason why nobody wants to give them even more money. They have managed to waste fantastic amounts for very little returns, often literally zero. And when they have received funding for their own 6 billion programme, Ajax, they have managed, in less than one year, to change their mind so radically that they are now trying to pretend it can be a medium tank and that the armoured brigades do not need recce cavalry at all, after all. They are lucky they have not been taken and thrown out of the window. I still wonder who the hell thought Carter as CDS was a good idea. He messed up the army in a spectacular way, and i hope his time as CDS won't be as damaging.

By the way, the Land budget in the 10 year equipment plan is bigger than the Ships budget and is also bigger than the Combat Air budget.
Well said. If you want an example of disasterous defence procurement programme, you don't have to look any further than Ajax.
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Re: AS-90 Self-Propelled Gun (Army)

Post by Timmymagic »

abc123 wrote:Well said. If you want an example of disasterous defence procurement programme, you don't have to look any further than Ajax.
It wouldn't be anywhere near the top though. It's actually delivering a product, one that is needed and that will (probably) satisfy the users.

Compared to all of the other bugger ups its a success.

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