#14
Post
by Groundgripper » Wed Aug 12, 2020 2:28 pm
Actually you are talking about three different types of anti-armour round.
HESH, High Energy Squash Head, which detonates up against the wall of the target, the resulting shock wave passes through the armour and causes fragments of the inner wall (spall) to fly off shredding the crew. Not effective against modern multi-layer armour.
APDS, Armour Piercing Discarding Sabot, which is a sub-calibre round comprising a 'dart ' of DU or tungsten carried in a full-calibre case that disintegrates as soon as the round leaves the barrel allowing the dart to fly to the target. For better stability and longer range the dart can have fins on the back to stabilise it, hence APFSDS.It's purely a Kinetic Energy (KE) round.
The third type is the so-called Shaped Charge. This has a cone, usually of copper, at the front of the round, with the explosive packed behind it. The cone has the large open end at the front. In front of the cone is an aerodynamically shaped nose that contains the impact fuse. As the front of this casing hits the target the fuse causes the detonator behind the explosive to ignite and the resultant flame front travels forward causing the copper to turn into a jet of plasma at a temperature in the order of 40,000K and up to a metre or so in length which literally burns it way through the armour. A feature of a tank that's been hit by one of these is the copper coating around the impact point where the copper has condensed. Modern ceramic or explosive reactive armour is designed to counter this. It's used in man-portable anti-tank weapons rather than tank guns.
In a previous life I used to work next to, but not for, our Warheads Department.
I just listened and asked a few questions.
GG