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Strategic Arms Quest 3/2: Armor Edition

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SAGrognard said:
For the terminal attack runs, we build the World's Biggest Crossbow (tm). Put a nice big wall in front of it so the gunners don't shoot up the launcher. The high altitude stuff is probably going to have to be a towed glider. Maybe launch it outside the target area so no tow plane shootups?
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My thinking is would we be able to have an unmanned glider change trajectories without an actual tow plane? We run into the same issues with target drones expenses potentially, and given how important angle of approach is to the effectiveness any any AA fire from my understanding I don't want to just test static trajectories if we can help it.
 
So I'm thinking we want to study gun elevation, turret/mount rotation, minimum time to acquire a target at ranges (here we can do both on the ground as a rudimentary test and then (I'm not a hundred percent sure how) on flying targets. We should probably also consider top speed (do we want them to keep up with our tanks ?) and size (transport on boats/trains). Heck, maybe we ask that they try their best with an already accepted chassis to minimise supply problems. Speaking off, let's also throw in the traditional survive fire tests (this time with aircraft guns. We should probably assume a bomb hit=death for these guys) and the reliability of he vehicle under extreme conditions.
 
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"After World War I gliders were first built for sporting purposes in Germany. Germany's strong links to gliding were to a large degree due to post-WWI regulations forbidding the construction and flight of motorised planes in Germany, so the country's aircraft enthusiasts often turned to gliders" from wikipedia. So there should be no problem with gliders.
 
Gliders are rather simple, no?
And parachutes too.

And we could get Luftwaffe to start testing that stuff for creating airborne forces, if they haven't already.
 
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Automatons have been around for hundreds of years - a preprogrammed set of maneuvers in a clockwork controller for our drones is also possible though whether it would be any cheaper than a radio control rig is another matter. Developing the technology would give a leg up on both autopilots and cruise missiles though.
 
Yes, but clockwork control mechanism is delicate and complicated, not to mention you would have to find someone with enough talent in clockmaking to make it work.
 
kpkdktswnw2015 said:
Yes, but clockwork control mechanism is delicate and complicated, not to mention you would have to find someone with enough talent in clockmaking to make it work.
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On the other hand, if we just want it flying straight and level while the tow plane gets out of the area, that's probably enough to test heavy flak and we might be ably to get a few dozen at reasonable cost.
 
Karugus said:
My thinking is would we be able to have an unmanned glider change trajectories without an actual tow plane? We run into the same issues with target drones expenses potentially, and given how important angle of approach is to the effectiveness any any AA fire from my understanding I don't want to just test static trajectories if we can help it.
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You can use radio control. It'd be relatively expensive, but with a metal plane and frangible sub caliber ammunition it shouldn't be too hard on testing aircraft.

Or you could just armor the fuck out of a plane and use Bakelite/lead frangible sub-caliber ammo for scale testing with a setup like Pinball including a live pilot. Especially if we get some green pilots out of flight school as part of the program so we can test psychological stress as well.
 
NothingNow said:
You can use radio control. It'd be relatively expensive, but with a metal plane and frangible sub caliber ammunition it shouldn't be too hard on testing aircraft.

Or you could just armor the fuck out of a plane and use Bakelite/lead frangible sub-caliber ammo for scale testing with a setup like Pinball including a live pilot. Especially if we get some green pilots out of flight school as part of the program so we can test psychological stress as well.
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My worry is we've just been told how expensive a radio controlled testing rig will be, and the more expensive those are the more we're going to be limited elsewhere.

And considering how many incidents of golden bb we've seen just testing armored vehicles I'm leery of assuming we can safely armor up a plane to make the pilot completely safe from up to 8.8 cm test rounds. Or that said armor won't introduce flight characteristics we'd never actually see on combat aircraft.
 
Karugus said:
My worry is we've just been told how expensive a radio controlled testing rig will be, and the more expensive those are the more we're going to be limited elsewhere.

And considering how many incidents of golden bb we've seen just testing armored vehicles I'm leery of assuming we can safely armor up a plane to make the pilot completely safe from up to 8.8 cm test rounds. Or that said armor won't introduce flight characteristics we'd never actually see on combat aircraft.
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Scale testing. It wouldn't be up against anything more than 13.2mm frangible ammo. Which is more than good enough to test gun laying, or the one thing we actually need to test because for everything else wartime data and stand testing will do just fine.

Also this is going to be an expensive process no matter what.
 
Karugus said:
My worry is we've just been told how expensive a radio controlled testing rig will be, and the more expensive those are the more we're going to be limited elsewhere.
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NothingNow said:
Also this is going to be an expensive process no matter what.
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noliar said:
On the other hand, if we just want it flying straight and level while the tow plane gets out of the area, that's probably enough to test heavy flak and we might be ably to get a few dozen at reasonable cost.
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You guys have a low six figure testing budget for this, because flak has been on the table a while and High Command just anglamated two more regiments due to manpower issues. You can do a lot of stuff with your budget, but if you whale now you're going to need to get creative later.
 
Variation of our last tank-new turret with 2 autocannons or 4 machineguns, lighter armor to make more room for ammo. Preferably by Armid's Coaches, as their tank was the most accurate.
 
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kpkdktswnw2015 said:
Variation of our last tank-new turret with 2 autocannons or 4 machineguns, lighter armor to make more room for ammo. Preferably by Armid's Coaches, as their tank was the most accurate.
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Armid is NOT the way to go.
On this one we need a turret, the only thing that their tank lacked.

Also, 2-dimensional target acquisition is not 3-dimensional target acquisition; Our best bet is going to Kriegsmarine as they've already experimented with it.

Now, going with the same chassis - from MANN/CCC - is workable, since these guys are capable of juggling strings of subcontractors to that end; But we would get only light AA that way, with autocannons and/or high-caliber MGs.

By the way, could we do exactly that and, should command ask for bigger guns, tell them to tow acht-acht into position?
Then return most of the money back into treasury, and go nag our comrade who is doing anti-tank guns.
 
firestorm440 said:
Open-topped is probably better, I think? We need the visibility, this isn't going to be a ZSU.
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The design of the turret is less important than it's presence.
And we need a turret, for it's capability to train it's guns in any direction laterally. Casemated guns - like the one on Armid - are a bit limited in that regard.

Just making it open-topped would either make any armour on the machine useless (Sure, driver and engine would be safer - but with the gun and crew open to fire from all directions, it's not particularly relevant), or limit it's depression angle.
 
Bigger guns would mean bigger chasis, not to mention how to keep such a gun on target, hand crank is not enough for that. Its better to start with smaller guns.
 
Dwergar said:
Now, going with the same chassis - from MANN/CCC - is workable, since these guys are capable of juggling strings of subcontractors to that end; But we would get only light AA that way, with autocannons and/or high-caliber MGs.
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MANN CO is actually balls to the walls full between their share of the end of the ETERNAL W-5 WORKS that is getting pushed off the lines, building new artillery carriages, and working on the rather large number of aquatic tanks the Seebatalions have ordered (the UkW-4, a rather large rebuild and redesign of your old UkW-1). After that they need to retool and get started on some nothingburger project so they're not as overinvested as Wanderer got himself into. CCC meanwhile is barely holding their own on the new tank, having produced about forty sets of plate and turrets for the LpkW-34 (your newest tank) and is frantically working at setting up more facilities so they can take advantage of the buisness boom.

kpkdktswnw2015 said:
Variation of our last tank-new turret with 2 autocannons or 4 machineguns, lighter armor to make more room for ammo. Preferably by Armid's Coaches, as their tank was the most accurate.
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Out of the question- you're not going to be able to get MANN CO to let go of some of the requesite patents.

kpkdktswnw2015 said:
Bigger guns would mean bigger chasis, not to mention how to keep such a gun on target, hand crank is not enough for that. Its better to start with smaller guns.
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Hydraulic and electric power laying equipment exists (how else do you think an SkW-1 moves it's six ton turret and gun assembly??) so it's not like everything is all hand crank.
 
Ah... So maybe modified KW-12 instead, it would add bonus of being able to keep up with supply trucks. Turret and aiming by Skoda, as powered turret rotation is something they know how to do.
 
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  • Informational
    • So, since we're talking about the chassis again, I figure I would shill my writing on how to avoid conflicting missions in AFVs. Which is incredibly generic, but still something you should pay attention to.

    Well, I call it my writing, but it's the stuff @7734 and I yell at people on my server, summarized into a nice, easy to read (thanks to him, not me) post without any "Nyet"s or "rifle is fine".

    ----​

    Personally, I think big-gun AA with MT shells is not our concern - they are pretty shit on the field, though they are good for protecting more static assets, so we might want to do something. Our main task I see in the 30mm+ autocannon range. They offer a good rate of fire so that they can actually hit a moving target (opposed to MT fuzed big guns, which are only really useful against level bombing without radar). Opposed to the 20-30 range, they offer a lot more range and a lot more damage per hit. The range is the important part here, there are limits to how many of these we can buy even if we put them on the truck and not a tracked chassis. A higher range means that they can cover more area, or can stay a bit further behind the front lines.

    Thus, I'm going to cast the first vote, namely:
    [X] Work on the Weapons Specifications
    -[X]A Shell firing gun of at least 30mm caliber with a muzzle velocity of 850m/s. Ammunition should be fed through a belt or an uninterrupted clip feed, not through magazines or other things that halt the firing. The gun should be able to fire at least 70 rounds in the first minute, using up to 2 loaders, spare ammunition lying next to them.​
     
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