Deactivated Ammunition

[Baz JJ]

Ive just purchased some inert deactivated ammunition for demonstration use.

 

Its very interesting to compare the differences between the standard NATO 5.56mm round and the larger 7.62mm stuff.

 

I didnt realise that even the Russians have started using smaller bore stuff on their AKs.

 

I always considered that to be a 7.62mm weapon even though it was a different length to the NATO issue.

[adam bussey]

and the relevance being?

[Unrustle_Thine_Jimmies]

Cool.

 

Put it in your hat,bandana or some shizzle. Just don't show it off in public because the bullets might reactivate and hit babies eyes,

[Baz JJ]

As I say I need it for a work project, otherwise I wouldnt have ordered it.

 

However, its interesting to physically compare them as you rarely see all the calibres side by side in the flesh.

 

I really wouldnt want to be on the receiving end of the 0.5" stuff, its huge.

 

Intrigued by the Russians using smaller calibre, I googled and found that its the AK74 that uses the 5.45 cartridges.

 

There are some lively debates on the web about the comparitive merits of the NATO 5.56mm rounds over the 7.62mm..

[Lozart]

The russkies adopted the 5.45 round for the same reason as we (well.. the US) adopted the 5.56 round. Reasonable lethality but a LOT less weight for the average grunt to lug about. The problem with it though is that when faced with shall we say a "fanatical" enemy the 5.56 either doesn't put them down or overpenetrates. Plenty of stories coming back from Afghanistan and Iraq of our side using field found AKs as the 7.62 has a lot more stopping power. Also the advantage of the smaller rounds is that it tends to incapacitate rather than kill outright in many cases. This is a "good thing" as it ties up more resources to evacuate and treat wounded than it does to bag and tag the KIA.

[Lozart]

Mind you if you want tosee some REALLY big stuff, take a look at the rounds used in the A10's GAU-8 cannon (it's the one on the right....)

 

[Moose87]

i have never heard of people picking up AKs and using them in a firefight. Simple fact that out there anything can be an IED so they wouldnt pick it up. also im sure they would get in trouble for not using there issued personal weapon.

the reason for the Nato 5.56 is that it is not an over kill round. its more likely to wound than kill. the 7.62 has a high kill rate as it just does so much damage when it hits.

[Liam1992]

Not to mention that the AK, or any other weapon "picked up" wouldn't be zeroed at all, rendering it about as useless as a water pistol.

 

As anyone here who has done a Casevac will tell you, its a ridiculous amount of manpower to remove one injured bloke, not to mention Heli's and all the extra gubbins that is required to keep the guy alive. There are massive Pro's and Con's to either argument.

[jcheeseright]

The russkies adopted the 5.45 round for the same reason as we (well.. the US) adopted the 5.56 round. Reasonable lethality but a LOT less weight for the average grunt to lug about. The problem with it though is that when faced with shall we say a "fanatical" enemy the 5.56 either doesn't put them down or overpenetrates. Plenty of stories coming back from Afghanistan and Iraq of our side using field found AKs as the 7.62 has a lot more stopping power. Also the advantage of the smaller rounds is that it tends to incapacitate rather than kill outright in many cases. This is a "good thing" as it ties up more resources to evacuate and treat wounded than it does to bag and tag the KIA.

Yeah, this is complete guff, the only time a British soldier would pick up a 'field found' AK is if everyone else in his section was dead and he had run out of ammunition while in contact with the enemy. So really, absolute last resort life or death situation that really doesn't happen.

 

If someone needs to be hit with 7.62 to put them down then there's always the LMT or just another couple of 5.56.

[Lozart]

Fair do's. The story I read was from a US (and very possibly apocryphal) source.

[Lozart]

Here, in fact is an example of said tale.. http://www.leatherneck.com/forums/showthread.php?9257-U-S-troops-using-confiscated-Iraqi-AK-47s

[Moose87]

So one minor newspaper report? from 10 years ago. sniffs of BS. the americans cant afford enough rifles?? hmmmm

Armoured troops wouldnt go out on patrols without rifles. why would armoured troops ground patrol anyway? its not there job and they wouldnt be good at it.

[Lozart]

OK look, I'm not trying to start a shitstorm but that was one example of a great number of anecdotal stories about primarily tank crews using AKs in GW1 due to only being issued 2 rifles per vehicle and then being asked to perform foot patrols. It would appear having done a quick trawl that there are some (and I stress SOME) stories online from US troops both serving and ex that they have and do use AKs in the field IF the situation demands it. That said most of the stories appear to be from several years ago (2007 and older) and any more recent stuff is actually Iraqi troops wearing the same uniform alongside US troops and holding AKs leading to an amount of confusion.

 

As you were.

[bornleverpuller]

Haven't the british army just purchased a load of new weapons to use out in Afghan because the smaller calibre weren't doing the job, they are designed to wound aren't they?

[Moose87]

not that i have seen, they have the introduced a DMR but thats about it

[bornleverpuller]

not that i have seen, they have the introduced a DMR but thats about it

when I said just looking into it it's was 2010 when they bought over 400 weapons.

[Moose87]

what weapons are we talking about tho?? 400 weapons isnt alot tho so it might be the DMR

[bornleverpuller]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1241509/MoD-forced-change-soldiers-rifles-bullets-lightweight-fight-Taliban.html

[Moose87]

yer so the DMR. they added one per section in infantry regiments. so its not really like they replaced the SA80. articles like that make it seem like AKs outrange the SA80, which is true in a respect. but its just they blast of a load of rounds from distance and they dont have any scopes so they are shooting at distant shapes.

They added the DMR for Accurate fire up to about a mile.

the army always should have had DMRs but for some reason neglected it.

USA and Russians have had decent ones for friggin years

[TacMaster]

Only reason the US have had them for so long is because they had a lot of M14s left over from the switch to the M16 during the Vietnam war, so a couple of thousand were converted to DMR standard and renamed the M21.

 

The Russians had switched their infantry's standard weapons from large caliber bolt action rifles to a combination of SMGs and AKs, and after this (during the 1960s) they realised that the average infantryman wouldn't have as long an effective range as they had before. This prompted the development of the SVD marksman rifle. They were issued to at least 1 member of each unit in the Red Army rather than attaching designated sniper units to each platoon, so that troops could have a decent chance at eliminating snipers.

[Ian_Gere]

There's a whole different philosophy at work when comparing NATO 5.56 & 7.62 x 51 to Russian 5.45 & 7.62 x 39

 

The NATO rounds have a higher muzzle velocity and, even though the 7.62mm obviously delivers a higher impact force (mass x velocity) they are nevertheless both designed to cause massive cavitation injury to live targets - a wound created by air expanding explosively having entered the body at supersonic speed behind the bullet, as well as powerful hydrostatic shock, which is essentially the same thing as the blast wave of an explosive. This is why an SLR round could go right through somebody's house wall in Northern Ireland, hit them in the left arm and still cause death by ruptured heart muscle.

 

The Russian rounds are not only slower but also unstable in flight - the rear of the bullet travels along the trajectory, but the front rotates around the imaginary line the rear follows, as well as the rotation caused by the barrel rifling. When they impact, they create much less cavitation but bounce off any bone and ricochet around inside the body even more than the Kennedy Magic Bullet. A hit in the leg could easily end up putting fragments in the brain, having left several small wound tracts throughout the body as spinning pieces of copper jacket head off in all directions and one big tunnel through anything the body has in the way of the tumbling lead core.

[sp00n]

pretty sure i was told by a regular army person (along time ago), that you didnt have to actually hit some one with a SLR round, if the round came with in 12" or so, the shock wave would knock them down

 

then again they switched to 5.56, as it was not designed to kill, it was designed to wound, there by not only taking the target out of the fight, possibly his mate and a medic too (to look after the original target), and drain medical resources

[Airsoft-Ed]

They added the DMR for Accurate fire up to about a mile.

Not a mile, only about 800m, it could probably reach out to a mile, but only in the same way a GPMG could.

[jcheeseright]

pretty sure i was told by a regular army person (along time ago), that you didnt have to actually hit some one with a SLR round, if the round came with in 12" or so, the shock wave would knock them down

No, it's still only 7.62, you'd know it had gone past but it certainly wouldn't knock anyone over.

[Airsoft-Ed]

I remember Mythbusters doing something similar to that, they tried to break glass with the shockwave from a .50 cal and nothing happened at all, didn't even move the glass, let alone break it.