I shot Milan!
Of our compatriots, just a couple of people can say such a phrase, including gunsmith Dmitry Shiryaev, who conducted test shooting with foreign anti-tank missiles TOW, Cobra, MILAN, HOT. The author adheres to the old abbreviation - ATGM.
The motivation for writing this article for me was V. Suvorov (Rezun) “Aquarium”, in which the author misinforms the reader, informing him that, solely thanks to the author’s efforts, fragments of an anti-tank guided missile had appeared in the USSR (ATGM) ) TOW, developed by the American helicopter company Hughes. For the uninitiated, I inform you that the abbreviation TOW, or, in our opinion, “TOW”, stands for “shot from a container, controlled via an optical channel, wired”. I was very surprised by the statement of Suvorov, because I know where my legs grow from, because for a number of years he was the leading performer of research on foreign anti-tank guided missiles in the USSR. He did not get them, and not from where he writes. Moreover, it is obvious to me from the description of the technical details of the ATGM - the author didn’t even see the TOU complex or its fragments, and has no idea about it. I stumbled upon him and on other "skins", for example, where did he get information about a certain saboteur's knife, throwing the blade out onto 25 with a spring? From an engineering point of view, this is nonsense. Or “silver face” - this is about the head part of the TOU projectile. In fact, his “muzzle” is black, and there is nothing left of the ammunition picked up after the ammunition.
I would like Suvorov to read what was written here, and I would know how it really was.
TRAINING AND PRACTICAL SHELLS FOR SOVIET COMPLEXES ATTENDANCE
Actually, I'm not a rocket scientist - I have a diploma from the Tula Arms Department, and I started by participating in the development of rapid-fire aviation guns under the leadership of Academician Arkady Shipunov and his closest colleague Vasily Gryazev. But by the will of my superiors, I was cut off from my native armory subjects and assigned to guided anti-tank weapons.
My first task in this field was the development of an educational training and practical version of the wire-guided Bumblebee missile developed at the Kolomna KBM (Mechanical Engineering Design Bureau).
"Bumblebee" - an index GRAU 3М6 - this is the projectile of the so-called first generation ATGM. His shells are aimed at the target manually, like a computer monitor cursor, pointing at a certain point on the screen with a mouse. It’s not easy to master the manual control, I checked it on myself - I spent a month sitting behind the simulator to learn how to operate the Phalanga 3М11 ATGM, and after that for another couple of weeks I got used to the completely different handle of the Bumblebee or the 9XXUMX ATGM Small.
"Bumblebee" - this is the first domestic sample of ATGM. Its official name is “Light Infantry ATTME 3М6“ Bumblebee ”. The box with this “light” projectile hardly carried two hefty soldiers.
Learning to fire such missiles is expensive, so the idea of developing a reusable projectile on the basis of a regular ATGM appeared. Such a projectile had a cumulative warhead (CU), usually referred to as a warhead, replaced with a parachute container, and an electronic device was built into the projectile control system, which at a given time issued a projectile command "up". At a certain height, the pyrotechnic device tore off the cap from the parachute compartment, and the parachute opened.
To restart, the projectile replaced the powder charge of the engine and the coil of a wire communication line (coil PLC)
This projectile in the Grau was assigned the index 3М6TP (TP - training and practical). Later, in my sector, the parachuted radio command mobile phalanx 3М11 PTALS and the wired portable baby 9М14 Malyutka were developed.
During the period of these shooting complexes, an experienced landfill operator Mikhail Khromov, a freelance, retired senior lieutenant of artillery, led. Parachute launching ATGM 3М6 "Bumblebee" and 3M11 "Phalanx" we produced from combat vehicles BRDM, and 9М14 "Baby" - from the trench. In the car, I took the place to his right. In the trench - to the left, since the launcher according to the instructions was located to the right of the gunner and a meter ahead.
Interaction with Mikhail Khromov became a good school for me - in the future I fearlessly started the first launch of the 3М6TP projectile on my “combat” account and conducted it well.
Not without curiosities. The specificity of the "Bumblebee" was that when a wire line was broken, in order to avoid projectile flight in an arbitrary direction, the control system set the steering bodies to the position corresponding to the "left-down" command. So the idea came to our heads to use this to create a simple device that would lift a projectile up for parachuting at any distance — you just need to remake this command to "right-up" and, at the desired time, imitate a broken wire. However, the very first shot with such a device very puzzled us - the projectile, barely getting off the guide, went steeply upwards, having climbed to an unimaginable height, he, with the engine still running, began to fall, as it seemed to me, directly to the car. Devices that registered the trajectory, then showed that the projectile performed a dead loop extended upwards, the top point of which was at a height of a good kilometer. Coming out of the loop at a height of about four hundred meters, the shell hit the ground. The reason we got to the bottom, destroying a couple more shells, turned out to be a simple confusion - when the projectile started, the car started and the limit switch worked, blocking the power supply of the onboard equipment when the hatch opened. The projectile "understood" this as a broken wire line.
The development of the training, parachuted version of the 9М14 projectile was more difficult due to the design features of its airframe. It consisted of a plastic wing section with a steel case of a starting engine protruding from its front end. Since during the opening of the parachute large overloads occur, the parachute could only be attached to the sturdy body of the starting engine. Already at the very first launch, it turned out that the parachute, which was tightly pressed into the nylon bag, immediately after the disruption of the cap of the head part, ran across the wing and smashed the wing section. It was necessary to invent a method of ejection of the laid parachute as far as possible to the side. Variants of such devices were tested in the hospital with the use of high-speed photography. Photo 1 shows the initial moment of the descent of the cap from the packed parachute after the operation of the pyrodevice. Photo 2 illustrates the garbage in the direction of the laid parachute nylon apron attached to the cap. The 3 photo is already a real launch, where you can see a glider with the main engine still in operation, a detached cap with an apron, an exhaust parachute, a drop-down dome of the main parachute and a parachute mount to the body of the starting engine. Photo 4 - Glider parachuted wing downward. When landing in this position, the plastic wing compartment will inevitably be damaged, but in the 5 photo the glider is already lowered downwards with a solid part - this has triggered the pyrotechnic re-attachment mechanism of the glider. Multiple launches of training and practical PTUPC 9М14TP with such a re-linking system have always been successful.
The development of the parachute system was carried out in conjunction with a specialized organization - NIIPDS (Research Institute of the Parachute Service), from which leading engineer Anna Dubova was seconded to us. After reviewing our equipment, she immediately gave us a task to develop various devices for laying a parachute. It was explained to us that the area of the parachute dome depends on the desired speed of landing - 5 m / s, and the volume of the dome - on the speed of the projectile when the parachute opens. If we wanted to have the smallest volume, this entailed careful trajectory calculations for choosing the best time to drop the parachute.
To our surprise, it turned out that the parachute should not just be laid, but pressed into a small nylon case using pood scrap with a diameter of 30 mm. The end of this scrap was treated as a sphere and polished to a mirror finish. So that at the same time the cover did not explode, it was placed in a steel glass. Miniature Anna Dubova, naturally, could not cope with such a tool, therefore representatives of the male part of our team mastered this procedure. Under her leadership, she taught the art of braiding the ends of steel cables through which the parachute was attached to a projectile and a special knot of tying a halyard halyard halyard to the main dome since conventional knots were not suitable for a slippery kapron halyard or other parachute tricks.
The work was rather nervous due to occasional problems in the elements of our brainchild. For example, once everything happened in the design mode - the projectile accurately “pierced” the target, immediately flew up at its maximum height, when its speed fell, the cap shot off and the cover fell out with the main dome pressed in it and a long tail attached to it , everyone relieved breathed but it turned out to be premature. Watching the process in the refueling complex (the tube of the anti-aircraft commander), I heard a disturbing cry from Dubovoy, who was watching me with binoculars: “Overlap!”. Indeed, the dome was not fully opened because of the slings overlapping it, and the projectile accelerated toward the ground. “Lord! Yes, you dissolve it! ”Dubova prayed hysterically, and, at everyone's surprise, the strop dome overlapped the dome, and the projectile landed normally.
In the end, the 3М6TP projectile was adopted for army supplies and was mass-produced at the Kovrov Arms Plant named after him. V.A. Degtyarev.
Although in the abbreviation ATGM the first two letters mean "anti-tank" in fact on the battlefield for him, except tanks, many other goals. Afghanistan and Chechnya have confirmed this. ATGM is an accurate and powerful weapon. For example, at a distance of two kilometers, it can be sent without difficulty to the embrasure of a fortified firing position. Therefore, it is not surprising that for many years in a row some design bureaus, institutes and factories of our defense industry were in full swing developing and mass-producing various types of these weapons: infantry, man-portable and portable, tank and helicopter.
With shells of the second generation it was much easier to control - you just need to keep the mark of sight on target. Sometimes this control is called semi-automatic. It happened somehow that they asked me to conduct several launches of the Phagot 9М111 "Fagot" from an experimental installation at the TsNIITochMash test site. I performed these launches without any prior training simulator and, as it seemed to me, mainly due to the specific projectile control system developed in Tula KBP. The mark of the sight of the Tula launcher is aimed at the target by two handwheels - the turner tool and the milling machine table also control the tool. I had to familiarize myself with the guidance systems for the TOW and MILAN targets, but the Tula method seemed to me much more convenient and accurate. Handwheel for the right hand mark of sight moves along the course, for the left hand it moves along the pitch (vertical). And whoever has worked at least a little on metal-cutting machines can easily put a projectile "Fagot" or 9М113 of the "Competition" complex on the target.
COMPLEX "TOU"
At first, we tried to understand the structure of the TOU projectile according to very meager descriptions in the American open literature. It was stated that the "TOC" is induced by the modulated radiation of the onboard source. This protected the projectile from natural and man-made interference. After receiving such a source and determining the frequency of its radiation, you can create devices that protect our tanks from such projectiles.
This emitter was in our hands after the fighting in Sinai. He was in the wreckage of the tail of the rocket "TOW", which missed the Egyptian tank and exploded in the sand of the Sinai desert. I personally received these mortal remains in Moscow. However, according to Suvorov, it was he who was honored to acquire them in German. I was informed at the same time that among the members of one of the tank crews was a “competent comrade”, who noticed that they were being fired at by previously unknown weapons and picked up a couple of such fragments. One of them gave me, the second got into the Tula KBP. My desktop neighbor, one of the leading developers of PTUPC guidance equipment Fagot and 9М113, Ph.D. and State Prize winner Viktor Kurnosov, asked me for this radiator and, on his own initiative, unpacked the foam plastic of his electronic unit, made a block diagram in half a day, I started the emitter and determined the modulation frequency of the radiation - 5 kHz. Now it was possible to develop a device to counter the American shells!
The design of "TOW" was rated by our developers negatively. But the American technological approach caused us envy. For example, an American worker was reeling in 3000 mines using a coil of a wireline with 5 and a steel control wire. In that time period, the winding coils of the wireline of the communication line of our ATGM “Fagot” did not wind even a dozen coils per working day.
As a further example, an onboard balloon with compressed gas needed to power the TOU steering gears can be given. Our "Phalanx" also had a balloon with compressed air for the same purpose. If my memory does not change, the air pressure in this cylinder did not exceed 200 atmospheres. Included in the Phalanx maintenance kit was a compressor for periodically pumping air from this cylinder. But the tank “TOW” was pumped not by air, but rather fluid helium, and under very high pressure — 400 atmospheres, and the pumping of this cylinder over the many years of storage of the projectile was not envisaged. How the Americans managed to seal the helium balloon is still unknown.
Soon, several TOU shells in the factory closure fell into our hands. I was handed them to me at a military airfield by Chkalovskiy, a certain colonel of the Air Force, who ordered one of them in a peeing manner to return him in a peeing manner in a peeing manner to him in a few days. This requirement was fulfilled by us the next day, and a day later the rocket was sent as accessories. Naturally, the necessary measurements and weighing were carried out. Some time later, I was ordered to go to the landfill, where full-scale tests of American missiles would be conducted. I was informed that the specialists of the Tula KBP are responsible for the reliable operation of the electronic part of the American starting equipment. Mikhail Khromov will be the gunner-gunner, but I will have to give him the necessary explanations on the installation and continue to perform the functions of the loader.
The first shot was made on a homogeneous armor. “TOW”, unlike our missiles, was launched with deafening thunder, the installation and the gunner were wrapped in a cloud of bluish smoke, which dissipated in a couple of seconds. Further, the projectile accelerated to the speed of 310 m / s in one and a half seconds of engine operation and continued to fly to the target, by inertia accompanied by the crash of the rudders, which were shifted with a frequency of 20 Hz and a very beautiful ruby light onboard radiator. The measurement of the hit results showed that the cumulative blast jet penetrated the armor plate to a depth of 500 mm.
The next target rumbled past us and stopped nearby in the form of a T-64 tank. The officer who jumped off his armor asked Khromov if he could get into the left “cheekbone” of the tower if he installed a tank at a distance of 1800 meters. Khromov answered in the affirmative, but asked to greet a fat cross with a chalk. The officer explained to me that the tank was loaded with full ammunition, and in the field of the crew three cells with rabbits were installed. I looked into the hatchway, wanting to look at the animals sentenced to death, but the cells turned out to be covered with sheets.
This projectile Khromov spent extremely accurately, land in the intended place.
In the first instant after the explosion, a luminous dot appeared in the place where I was hit, and I had a thought that it was visible that the flame inside the tank could be seen through the hole and that the ammunition would explode, but nothing like that had happened. When we approached the tank, a famous tank specialist, General Leonid Kartsev, ran up to him and instantly climbed into the hatch. A minute later, his wide-smiling face appeared from the hatch with the question: “Now to start the car or later?”. The shell did not pierce the tower - the material of the tower turned out to be too tough for him, the cumulative jet deepened into it only on 330 mm, the rabbits, as if nothing had happened, crunched a carrot offered by them.
The next, last shell, let us down, and compromised in our eyes of its manufacturer. Due to the trajectory failure of the projectile, we did not execute some of the program. The reason for the refusal was rather prosaic. If more, then I, after the team start, pointing the binoculars at the target, in the field of view of binoculars I saw the ruby light of the emitter of the projectile and immediately there was a powerful explosion. Later, after deciphering the cinema recordings, it turned out that the failure of the engines was the cause of the failure, and the projectile fell ten meters after the launch, but the fuse had time to start and the warhead worked.
A minute later, on the speakerphone, the command was released. Mikhail Khromov and I did not rush to smoke and began to seal the materiel, but the approached officer said that I needed to immediately go to headquarters. When asked why I was needed there, he only shrugged.
In the headquarters it turned out that I was summoned to report on the device "TOW" and the results of its research in the Scientific Research Institute-61.
I had to report at a very representative meeting of senior representatives of the industry and the military, where the chairman of the Main Directorate of the Main Directorate, Pavel Kuleshov, chaired
In the course of my report, those present crowded around the table with the “TOW” mockup, clearly interested in its design. I did not fail to emphasize that constructively “TOU”, created by the helicopter company “Hughes”, is inferior to similar developments of the Tula KBP, but these shortcomings are too obvious, and therefore can be eliminated without much difficulty, and it can not be that this was not done in the near future. its creators. I also noted our technological gap.
Noting the constructive flaws of the "TOW", I looked into the water: soon we came to information from open sources, from which it appeared that the Americans had modernized the complex.
ATVM "COBRA"
Soon, a battery from four first-generation Cobra with four instruments from four West German ATGM was delivered to my company. The shells and instrumentation equipment, painted yellow, and the cables for switching the battery rockets with the operator’s console, still interspersed with sand of the Sinai desert, were in bulk in the back of the ZIL. The head of my unit, having learned that the Cobra battery with shells was in combat condition, clearly did not want to get involved with the dangerous cargo, and decided to refuse to accept it. Afraid that I would be deprived of the opportunity to familiarize myself with an interesting technique, I jumped into the body, instantly screwed the warheads off the missiles and shouted to the retreating chief that his fears were in vain, since the warheads were separate. Tomorrow, I and my assistants had the opportunity to examine in detail the items brought.
The battery was clearly in a combat situation, as some of its elements had traces of debris. One such trace was on the head part of the fuse from one of the Cobras. The primer of this part of the fuse exploded, but the detonator did not work, because the fuse was not cocked.
In the 6 photo, the Cobra is shown on the side of the external starter engine, next to it are a control panel with binoculars folded in the lid, a transfer box for connecting the battery shells and a cable connecting the projectile to the console. Photo 7 - projectile position before launch. The bottom cover is removed and secured on the ground with a hairpin; from the cover to the projectile, a cable goes to the wire communication line and a nylon cord unwinding the rotor of the gyroscope at the start. Under the nozzle of the starting engine, a metal shield is laid on the ground, the front part of the starting engine rests on the wire frame. On top of the projectile glider are thermopile, tracer and transport handle. Binocular stand mounted on the control panel.
Everything in the Cobra was amazing with its amazing simplicity and low cost execution. For example, the body of the airframe, the material of which we usually used was a durable aluminum alloy, in the Cobra is made of a material similar to getinaks, the engine bodies of our ATGMs are made of the best hardened steel, the Cobra has an aluminum alloy. The plastic used was not thermosetting, like ours, but thermoplastic, very convenient to manufacture, and not of the very highest quality - the so-called ABS plastic.
However, I was primarily interested in the design of combat units, and, judging by the marking, we got them of two types.
These warheads were non-separable: the two main parts - the body with the equipment and the long conical head fairing, made by stamping from a sheet of aluminum alloy, were joined with glue.
The very next day after receiving the material part, Yuri Alexandrov and I, just recently, my graduate student, taking a simple instrument, retired to a secluded place where they simply tore the warhead at the place of gluing. The device plunged us into amazement - the combat unit of a relatively low cumulative action was simultaneously powerful fragmentation. The explosive charge was a pressed cylindrical piece made from a mixture of RDX and aluminum powder. The front end of this piece had a conical recess, where there was a cumulative funnel of red copper. On the side surface of the checkers were laid four segments with fragmentation elements. The pieces of two of them were small (with a diameter of 2 mm) balls. Two other segments carried in themselves armor-piercing incendiary elements in the form of steel cylinders filled with incendiary composition. All this can be seen in the 8 photo.
The warhead of the second type of fragmentation elements was not, their place was occupied by explosives and a cumulative funnel, so this warhead had more armor penetration.
The warheads of both types of projectiles had the so-called head-on piezoelectric piezoelectric fuses, consisting of two nodes: the head piezo-generator and the bottom safety-actuating mechanism (PIM).
The original feature of the Cobra was also the device of its tracer. If, shooting our “Bumblebees” or “Tiny”, especially at dusk, you should not look at the sight at the first moment - the bright flame of the tracer strongly dazzles, then the Cobra tracer burns with a calm green light for the first couple of seconds, then turning into bright red . Launched "Cobra" without any guide straight from the ground - when triggered by the starting engine - jumped up and down and rushed to the target under the action of the main engine together with the transport handle and the exhaust starting engine suspended from below. These "architectural excesses" reduced its range of action to the correct kilometer.
ATGM "Cobra" is packed in foam packing. Any kind of waterproof projectile in such a container is out of the question.
Compared with our "Baby" "Cobra" looked pretty poor. However, it should be noted that some of our leading experts were not at all enthusiastic about the design of the “Baby”. In particular, the low opinion of her was the creators of her rival ATGM “Gadfly” Tulaki I.Ya. Stechkin and N.F. Makarov.
I SHOOT MILAN
Most of all I wanted to get the shells of the Franco-West German development “MILAN” and in every way I set our “suppliers” on it. The lead developer and manufacturer of these shells was MBB (Messerschmitt-Belkov-Blom). The name of this projectile was not in honor of the famous Italian city, it is an abbreviation of the French name "Light infantry anti-tank missile." In fact, “MILAN” is an analogue of our projectile “Fagot”.
In the end, everything went perfectly. We received both warheads, and a launcher with a pointing device, and the shells themselves. We got into the hands of "MILAN", the victim in the fighting, - elements of it carried traces of fragmentation hits. This projectile has one interesting feature - in its bottom part there is a piston made of transparent thermoplastic plastic, which, under the action of gases of an expelling propulsion system (VDU), pushes the projectile out of the container. The piston itself stops at the front of the container, cutting off the flames and gases from coming forward from the container. Since the piston acquires significant energy at the outlet, it became necessary to use a special device for braking it.
Izhevsk Research Institute of Technology (INITI) was involved in studying and evaluating the technological features of the projectile.
Several shells were sent to one of the sectoral organizations that undertook to organize firing, but after a few months my question by phone about the results of their activities, I received an answer: "We have to refuse this event, and you are not advised." In addition, the recovered projectiles were removed from launch canisters, and their wire lines were broken.
I received unexpected support in organizing the shooting from a highly talented and energetic woman’s head of the development of optical-electronic anti-ATGM tools, a candidate of technical sciences, with an unusual name and patronymic — Yakha Yakhyaevna and the last name Hadzhieva. It was interesting for her to check on the "foreign" projectiles the effectiveness of the jamming devices developed in her laboratory. She promised, using her connections, to organize the firing range of "MILAN", if we manage to put the shells in order and replace their combat units with inert ones.
I doubted that the landfill management would allow us to fire, because we had no passports for equipment and safety documents, as well as instructions for handling the installation and the shells, and it could not be. But Yakha Yahyaevna, who had repeatedly visited there with her designs and enjoyed considerable prestige among the training authorities, assured me that she would be able to agree with the management of the testing ground.
The material part, consisting of projectiles and launchers, was prepared fairly quickly with the voluntary and active assistance of specialists - developers of the guidance systems of my institute.
At the proving ground of a military unit near Moscow, where Khadzhiev organized the shooting, and obviously not adapted for firing on an ATGM, I was offered to deploy the installation on a small knoll. Strelkom was appointed a lieutenant colonel of the unit, who had experience in launching domestic shells "Phalanx" and "Fagot." He was not previously familiar with this setup, but my brief briefing for him turned out to be quite sufficient. “MILAN” at the rate is induced like our “Phalanx” - by rotating the rack with two handles. The left handle is equipped with a start button, the right, horizontally located, rotates, like a motorcycle regulating gas, only here when it is rotated, the projectile is controlled by pitch. The briefing was reduced to the indication that before the shot you need to put the angle of sight on the target and after the shot smoothly, turn the “gas” knob, lower the crosshair on the target (photo 9).
Drivers drove up to us from the two T-72 tanks, to which the lieutenant colonel indicated how to position the tanks as targets at a distance of 1800 m and when to turn on the jammer. Then the lieutenant-colonel unceremoniously tore off their helmets from them, one of which he handed to me - neither he nor I had soundproof headphones. A small group of officers and Yakha Khadzhiev settled down on the right-to-rear NP about fifty meters from us. I settled down in three meters to the left of the shooter, wanting to review and remember the whole process in detail.
The sound of the start was deaf, but strong enough, and I knowingly defended my ears with a helmet. Muzzle flame was not noticeable, a small fiery tangle with a smoky cloud of bluish color escaped from the expelling engine of the container simultaneously with the gathering of the container back. The container fell about three meters behind the installation.
Visually, the start of the engine could be determined by the jet stream that escaped from the nozzle after several meters of projectile flight. The fire tracer was clearly visible throughout the path. Without reaching five hundred meters from the target, the projectile flopped onto the ground.
When discussing this launch, one of the officers, turning to me, expressed doubt about the reasons for the fall of the projectile - in his opinion, this could be the result of our poor-quality repairs. The fact that the equipment that caused the interference was to blame was proved during the next launch, which I was already performing. And then the shell fell at the same distance, and Yakha Yahyaevna accepted congratulations on the equipment developed by her, which is capable of neutralizing the "foreign" weapon.
“MILAN” and “Fagot” are similar shells. Their ranges and weights are almost the same, but structurally they are completely different. "Fagot" in the launch container is sealed and not afraid of any moisture. It comes from the factory in a wooden box. “MILANS” are supplied in plastic packaging (photo 10). Being extracted from it, and in the position on the launcher, they are unlikely to be operational after a good rainstorm. Externally, “MILAN” and “Fagot” are compared in the 11 photo, from which it appears that the dimensions of the warhead warhead of a foreign projectile are significantly larger than the warhead of the domestic one. The wings of the Fagot are made of stainless steel sheet, and its foreign counterpart is made of translucent plastic filled with fiberglass. Photo 12 shows a drawing made by me according to the results of measuring the projectile "MILAN-2". From the usual "MILAN" it differs only in the shape of the warhead head, equipped with an elongated spout. This spout only slightly increases the armor penetration. If it had a length of 800 mm, before the contact with the barrier, the cumulative jet would have time to fully form and delve into the homogeneous steel armor plate on the 800 mm. The next, third, generation of German projectiles (PARS-3 - Panzerabwehr Raketen System) is equipped with fuses, undermining the warhead approximately at such a distance from the target. The same photo shows the expelling propulsion system, which is distinguished by a polymeric case and a non-separable structure.
MILAN combat units (13 photo) are different from all known in that the 6 detonator, which initiates the cumulative 3 charge from phlegmatized hexogen, is located at the bottom of this 5 charge, and not in a detachable fuse. According to German special literature, the best and stable cumulative effect of warheads requires precise coaxial placement of all elements of the charge. It is indicated that the tolerance for misalignment of the detonator must be within 0,05 mm. To ensure this accuracy, the billet of the bottom part of the charge is made by casting from a mixture of TNT and RDX and is finally formed by turning. The end of the charge is made in the form of a small cone on which the pressed block of the 6 detonator is glued. On such technology, our developers do not go, here we are inferior to the Germans in the quality of warheads.
An indispensable element of a cumulative warhead is the 4 lens made from inert material. It contributes to a more or less uniform approach of the detonation wave to the surface of the cumulative funnel. We have this lens molded from the press powder and very heavy. The Germans lens is almost weightless, as the material for it is porous rubber.
Considerable interest was caused by the fuse, more precisely, its safety-actuating mechanism, located in the 11 engine cover. The design of this unit makes it impossible to detonate the warhead in case of fire in the combat compartment of the machine.
When the deformation of the head fairing and its contact with the inner cap closes the electrical circuit, undermining the capsule of the electric-spark 12 type. Further, through the intermediate primer 19, the detonator is initiated. The intermediate primer is located in a moving engine, and before the start is moved outside the limits of the detonation chain. The 17 engine spring tends to move the engine to a position where the 19 capsule is located between the detonator and the 12 capsule, but this is prevented by the 8 stopper.
After ignition of the 13 charge end of the engine by the pressure of powder gases passing through the 14 channel, this stopper releases the slider and its 17 spring shifts it to the position when all three detonation caps line up on the same line.
With a slight increase in temperature in the combat compartment, a low-melting stopper is melted, closing the channel in which the 8 stopper moves. With a further increase in temperature, the engine charge ignites, but due to the absence of a plug, the powder gases go outside without moving the slider. From an elevated temperature, the shaped charge burns out without detonation. The explosion of the intermediate primer occurs aside from the detonator and does not lead to the detonation of the shaped charge.
PIM is installed in the 10 engine case of an aluminum alloy, it serves as its cover and is held in it by a split ring 16. The obturation of powder gases is carried out with a rubber ring 9.
No less interesting was the gyroscope. In weight and dimensions it is two times smaller than any of our counterparts. The rotor of this gyroscope is accelerated by a gas jet of a miniature powder accumulator of pressure. As a result of the study of this gyroscope, one of the researchers at TsNIITochMash created a prototype of an equally compact gyroscope, but, unfortunately, it remained in the discharge of the experienced ones.
The same miniature was the mechanism of the steering actuator, deflecting the gas jet sustainer engine.
Another knot surprised us "MILAN" - this is a bogie propulsion system (see photo 12), throwing a projectile out of the container. Both with us and with Americans, the body of such an installation with a lid on a threaded joint is made of high-strength alloy steel with heat treatment for greater hardness. At the same time, the headache of the production workers consists in the fact that a special (resistant) thread on the body and the lid is made after their heat treatment, while the cutter, made by an experienced puller, lasts about five parts. The Germans, the great technologists, managed in a very unconventional way: they simply wound the assembly of a powder expelling charge, like a silkworm cocoon, with a strong polymer thread. I have no idea how our production workers would agree to this technology, probably considering it to be highly dangerous.
The 14 photo shows the real launch of the MILAN-2. This picture seems to me to be a montage, because, being near, about the same place where the shooter’s colleague was located in the photo, I did not notice such a violent flame. And where will it come from if the projectile is thrown by a piston that remains in the container, blocking its muzzle. In the same photo you can see the container being dropped back, due to which there is no return. At the initial moment of a descent back the container has such speed at which it would fly off meters on 12 - 15. But in the VDU, the brake charge is triggered, and the container calmly lays down about three meters behind the installation.
The designs of combat units received by our foreign ATGMs and their fuses were studied by us without the involvement of specialized organizations.
MY ACQUAINTANCE WITH ATTORNEY "HOT"
The last sample we studied was the heavy, transportable, wired link of the Franco-West German ATGM "HOT". This name is also an abbreviation - "Shot from a container, controlled by an optical channel." Feature of "HOT" - it does not have an expelling engine. Its start is carried out by a starting charge of a two-chamber accelerating-main engine. The body of the projectile engine is made of lightweight aluminum alloy.
The velocity of the projectile out of the container is small - only 20 m / s. Therefore, it is controlled at the initial stage at high angles of attack. The "HOT" control system required the use of two gyroscopes. Practically, these are two, tandemly located in one case, gyro ATGM “MILAN”.
No matter how enviable are foreign achievements in the field of ATGM, but constructively the latest domestic developments are at least as good. An example is the products of Tula KBP. In this design bureau, preference is given to the layout of ATGMs according to the “duck” scheme, that is, the steering bodies are located in the nose of the projectile, in front of the center of gravity. Unlike foreign projectiles, for example, the same "MILAN", here the control force coincides in direction with the lifting, which increases the maneuverability of the projectile. Particularly successful is the invention of Tula’s use of the free-stream force for transferring the rudders and not spending on it the energy of the onboard power source. And in general, nowhere was the creation of a gyroscopic, non-hygroscopic, very simple, control system implemented at Metis ATGM and its modifications Metis-2. The latter is distinguished by a particularly powerful CU On these projectiles, the control system determines the angular position of the projectile from the tracer mounted on the tip of one of the wings.
Unfortunately, our disadvantage is the technological backwardness of production and slowness in the introduction of advanced achievements. For example, even at a central branch institute, a high-class milling machine operator who makes difficult parts of prototypes of weapons, changes the tool, operating with a heavy key. This alone takes a lot of energy from his work shift. The foreign worker performs the same operation by pressing a button.
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