Tank Live Firing

[Stephen White]

Thought seeing what goes on inside a tank turret during live firing might be of interest. Although this is Challenger 1, Chieftain would look very similar. The live firing starts about 7 mins in.



Ah, the whiff of cordite and compo baked beans....

Stephen

[dennypatterson]

inside my centurian was,nt like that!!!!!! mark 3 and 5.good film.
denny.

[Fabrice Le Roux]

Stephen,
Cordite, yes. Baked beans, yes. But take it the coffee went down-range in the apocryphal thermos.
I assume the bagged charges are detonated electrically, how?
Google Earth-ed the area in Bosnia. Hilly ground to SW of town. Could not discern impact area for SFOR ranges (unlike Lulworth!) anyone have a lat and long?
Cheers, Fabrice

[Paul Fowler-Smith]

Stephen

Lots of fond memories from the past and not so past.

Paul

[Stephen White]

Fabrice

You'd have thought it would be electrical. That isn't entirely the case. The base of the bagged charge has an igniter pad, which was subjected to a charge from a vent tube, which resembled a cut down .50 case. The vent tubes were loads into a vent tube magazine mounted in the vent tube loader which is the large silver cube protruding from the lower part of the breech. The tubes were ignited electrically. The tubes were loaded automatically during gun run out but could also be loaded and rammed mechanically. The t-bar is the rammer. All very complicated but effective with few misfires

All the best.

Stephen

[Paul Wills]

Oh Fabrice,

You can't ask a Soldier for a grid reference !

I've never been myself, but if its like the training areas in Germany it wont be anywhere near the barracks and will be miles away from the place its named after. I would also hazard a guess that it not to the west, as its too close to Croatia

Brought back some good memories, but no biscuits or boiled sweets though

Paul.

[Fabrice Le Roux]

Stephen,
Thanks for the concise outline of the firing mechanism.

Oh Paul,
What you don't know, you don't know.
Most likely candidate is the old Glamoc airfield (actually a straight length of highway) 7km NE of Glamoc town.
Specifically:
Barracks, workshops and some AFVs @ 440431.14N, 164924.43E
Training area (ditched and ?fenced)@ 440438.24N, 164844.36E
Position of airfield, pre-SFOR deployment, confirmed on 1989 DOD Operational Navigation Chart (ONC-F2).
You correctly observe that Croatia lies to the West. The border is 20km the other side of the Dinaric Alps, which rise to nearly 7000 feet(2130 metres).

Which would make a better backstop than Lulworth Ridge, methinks.

cheers, Fabrice