4 ms·

At these ranges, wind, heat, humidity and more play huge factors into the bullet's trajectory. I highly doubt even a bench rest would yield anything resembling

by Alupis 4y ago

At these ranges, wind, heat, humidity and more play huge factors into the bullet's trajectory. I highly doubt even a bench rest would yield anything resembling a group at this range.

toomuchtodo 4y ago
Could you build a smarter bullet that could actively compensate?
- Alupis 4y ago
  It's been tried, but I'm not sure how successful they are/were. Modern day military artillery has "smart shells"[1] as well, which can move small deflection surfaces to "steer" the shell towards it's target. I do not know the limits of these systems... and of course they would be exceedingly expensive for your average sport shooter. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M982_Excalibur https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M982_Excalibur
  - wahern 4y ago
    The U.S. has apparently sent M982 Excalibur shells to Ukraine, according to leaked budget documents: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-09-08/most-accurate-us-artillery-shell-is-quietly-added-to-ukraine-aid https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-09-08/most-accu... AFAIU, Russia doesn't have any munitions comparable to these guided artillery shells or even the guided HIMARS rockets. Arguably these deployments in Ukraine may inch Russia a little closer to resorting to tactical nukes. Their military doctrine relies on tactical nukes as an answer to conventional weapons beyond their own capability, and that's part of the reason Russia has so many tactical nukes deployed (at least at sea).
    - topspin 4y ago
      > The U.S. has apparently sent M982 Excalibur shells to Ukraine, according to leaked budget documents The DOD straight up announced that a recent military aid package included 1000 M982 Excalibur rounds. Another thing the US has been providing is M1156 PGK. It's a kit used to make unguided rounds more precise by adding GPS guidance and it dramatically reduces long range CEP. Anecdotally I have noticed a large increase the frequency single shot artillery strikes on Russian tanks appearing in Telegram videos. Previously it would take a few shots to adjust fire. Now it's often boom! tank gone with no previous impacts evident.
    - _kbh_ 4y ago
      > AFAIU, Russia doesn't have any munitions comparable to these guided artillery shells or even the guided HIMARS rockets. Arguably these deployments in Ukraine may inch Russia a little closer to resorting to tactical nukes. Their military doctrine relies on tactical nukes as an answer to conventional weapons beyond their own capability, and that's part of the reason Russia has so many tactical nukes deployed (at least at sea). What, Russias nuclear doctrine is to use nukes against the threatening of their own sovereignty and borders, not against conventional weapons that are better than theres. What kind of pathetic military has a nuclear doctrine to drop nukes because the other country has modern technology?. It doesn't matter anyway because Russias nukes are just for sabre rattling, Russia knows full well the any use of nuclear weapons, tactical or not in Ukraine will bring an overwhelming response that will likely just straight up end the war in Ukraines favour.
      - tempay 4y ago
        I think you might be confusing tactical and strategic nuclear weapons. As far as I know strategic weapons are only for protecting their sovereignty and the use of tactical weapons is potentially more flexible.
        _kbh_ 4y ago
        > I think you might be confusing tactical and strategic nuclear weapons. As far as I know strategic weapons are only for protecting their sovereignty and the use of tactical weapons is potentially more flexible. I don't believe their doctrine makes a distinction, because the rest of the world would not make a huge distinction. Im happy to be wrong thought if you could link a primary source.
        tempay 4y ago
        I’m only directly aware of speculation with regard to there being a possible distinction such as https://www.bbc.com/news/world-60664169 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-60664169
        4y ago
    - myrmidon 4y ago
      Russia has the https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krasnopol_(weapon_system) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krasnopol_(weapon_system), which is quite comparable and was used in the war already. Strongly disagree about tactical nuclear weapons; I consider it extremely unlikely that these will be ever used by anyone- way to much escalation for very little gain.
      - wahern 4y ago
        Russia has laser-guided weapons, which have been around for decades. GPS-guided artillery and rockets are relatively new. According to Wikipedia, they were developed because laser-guidance turned out to be too cumbersome in Afghanistan, where the Taliban might be too well concealed or too far away for convenient laser targeting. Perhaps drones and fancier features (e.g. top attack flight modes) make laser guidance more effective than before (presuming the Russian versions can benefit from such technologies), but M982 GPS-guided shells have a range of 25+ miles, and HIMARS GPS-guided rockets 50+ miles (up to 120), which provide huge advantages in distance in addition to not needing a laser designator on the target the entire time.
  - randomswede 4y ago
    There's also Strix[1], a self-guiding anti-armor mortar round. Not actually sure when it was taken into use, I recall hearing rumours about it being in development in the late 80s, and the Swedish model designation (m/94) indicates it was accepted in 1994. But, 120 mm is a lot bigger than anything I'd be comfortable firing from a rifle. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strix_mortar_round https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strix_mortar_round
- wahern 4y ago
  Smart bullets exist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_bullet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_bullet Here's a live-fire video of the EXACTO: https://youtu.be/YoOaJclkSZg https://youtu.be/YoOaJclkSZg All the available information is several years old, now. I figure either the EXACTO (or successor) has secretly been deployed, or it proved impractical.
  - Animats 4y ago
    It may have fallen into the category of weapons too big to lug around, and inferior to vehicle-mounted systems. That's happened before. About 10 years ago, the USMC was trying out an "automatic mortar". This accepted fire direction like artillery - forward observer designates target, data is passed to weapon, weapon duly clobbers target. Worked OK, too heavy for infantry, and there are vehicle-mounted systems already deployed which can do that job.
FlingPoo 4y ago
At those ranges you'd likely have to take into account the Coriolis Effect as well.
- kodachrome64 4y ago
  The Coriolis effect would be constant and wouldn't affect your grouping.

by Alupis 4y ago

At these ranges, wind, heat, humidity and more play huge factors into the bullet's trajectory. I highly doubt even a bench rest would yield anything resembling a group at this range.

toomuchtodo 4y ago

Could you build a smarter bullet that could actively compensate?

Alupis 4y ago
It's been tried, but I'm not sure how successful they are/were. Modern day military artillery has "smart shells"[1] as well, which can move small deflection surfaces to "steer" the shell towards it's target. I do not know the limits of these systems... and of course they would be exceedingly expensive for your average sport shooter. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M982_Excalibur https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M982_Excalibur
- wahern 4y ago
  The U.S. has apparently sent M982 Excalibur shells to Ukraine, according to leaked budget documents: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-09-08/most-accurate-us-artillery-shell-is-quietly-added-to-ukraine-aid https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-09-08/most-accu... AFAIU, Russia doesn't have any munitions comparable to these guided artillery shells or even the guided HIMARS rockets. Arguably these deployments in Ukraine may inch Russia a little closer to resorting to tactical nukes. Their military doctrine relies on tactical nukes as an answer to conventional weapons beyond their own capability, and that's part of the reason Russia has so many tactical nukes deployed (at least at sea).
  - topspin 4y ago
    > The U.S. has apparently sent M982 Excalibur shells to Ukraine, according to leaked budget documents The DOD straight up announced that a recent military aid package included 1000 M982 Excalibur rounds. Another thing the US has been providing is M1156 PGK. It's a kit used to make unguided rounds more precise by adding GPS guidance and it dramatically reduces long range CEP. Anecdotally I have noticed a large increase the frequency single shot artillery strikes on Russian tanks appearing in Telegram videos. Previously it would take a few shots to adjust fire. Now it's often boom! tank gone with no previous impacts evident.
  - _kbh_ 4y ago
    > AFAIU, Russia doesn't have any munitions comparable to these guided artillery shells or even the guided HIMARS rockets. Arguably these deployments in Ukraine may inch Russia a little closer to resorting to tactical nukes. Their military doctrine relies on tactical nukes as an answer to conventional weapons beyond their own capability, and that's part of the reason Russia has so many tactical nukes deployed (at least at sea). What, Russias nuclear doctrine is to use nukes against the threatening of their own sovereignty and borders, not against conventional weapons that are better than theres. What kind of pathetic military has a nuclear doctrine to drop nukes because the other country has modern technology?. It doesn't matter anyway because Russias nukes are just for sabre rattling, Russia knows full well the any use of nuclear weapons, tactical or not in Ukraine will bring an overwhelming response that will likely just straight up end the war in Ukraines favour.
    - tempay 4y ago
      I think you might be confusing tactical and strategic nuclear weapons. As far as I know strategic weapons are only for protecting their sovereignty and the use of tactical weapons is potentially more flexible.
      - _kbh_ 4y ago
        > I think you might be confusing tactical and strategic nuclear weapons. As far as I know strategic weapons are only for protecting their sovereignty and the use of tactical weapons is potentially more flexible. I don't believe their doctrine makes a distinction, because the rest of the world would not make a huge distinction. Im happy to be wrong thought if you could link a primary source.
        tempay 4y ago
        I’m only directly aware of speculation with regard to there being a possible distinction such as https://www.bbc.com/news/world-60664169 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-60664169
        4y ago
  - myrmidon 4y ago
    Russia has the https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krasnopol_(weapon_system) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krasnopol_(weapon_system), which is quite comparable and was used in the war already. Strongly disagree about tactical nuclear weapons; I consider it extremely unlikely that these will be ever used by anyone- way to much escalation for very little gain.
    - wahern 4y ago
      Russia has laser-guided weapons, which have been around for decades. GPS-guided artillery and rockets are relatively new. According to Wikipedia, they were developed because laser-guidance turned out to be too cumbersome in Afghanistan, where the Taliban might be too well concealed or too far away for convenient laser targeting. Perhaps drones and fancier features (e.g. top attack flight modes) make laser guidance more effective than before (presuming the Russian versions can benefit from such technologies), but M982 GPS-guided shells have a range of 25+ miles, and HIMARS GPS-guided rockets 50+ miles (up to 120), which provide huge advantages in distance in addition to not needing a laser designator on the target the entire time.
- randomswede 4y ago
  There's also Strix[1], a self-guiding anti-armor mortar round. Not actually sure when it was taken into use, I recall hearing rumours about it being in development in the late 80s, and the Swedish model designation (m/94) indicates it was accepted in 1994. But, 120 mm is a lot bigger than anything I'd be comfortable firing from a rifle. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strix_mortar_round https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strix_mortar_round
wahern 4y ago
Smart bullets exist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_bullet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_bullet Here's a live-fire video of the EXACTO: https://youtu.be/YoOaJclkSZg https://youtu.be/YoOaJclkSZg All the available information is several years old, now. I figure either the EXACTO (or successor) has secretly been deployed, or it proved impractical.
- Animats 4y ago
  It may have fallen into the category of weapons too big to lug around, and inferior to vehicle-mounted systems. That's happened before. About 10 years ago, the USMC was trying out an "automatic mortar". This accepted fire direction like artillery - forward observer designates target, data is passed to weapon, weapon duly clobbers target. Worked OK, too heavy for infantry, and there are vehicle-mounted systems already deployed which can do that job.

FlingPoo 4y ago

At those ranges you'd likely have to take into account the Coriolis Effect as well.

kodachrome64 4y ago
The Coriolis effect would be constant and wouldn't affect your grouping.