German discarding sabot rounds

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stg 44
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German discarding sabot rounds

#1

Post by stg 44 » 24 Sep 2015, 17:16

Not sure if this belongs here, but does anyone have info about German discarding sabot WW2 rounds, even the experimental stuff?

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Re: German discarding sabot rounds

#2

Post by ChristopherPerrien » 24 Sep 2015, 17:30

search "APCR" or "composite rigid" in the forum search box, It will bring up a lot. Most German AT rounds were not Sabot per se', but it gets "complicated".


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Re: German discarding sabot rounds

#3

Post by stg 44 » 24 Sep 2015, 17:58

I'm looking for discarding sabot specifically; I know about the 'hartkern' rounds. I know the Germans used sabot rounds to make their AAA have improved range, the so called "treibspiegel", I was curious what they were able to do for tank rounds.

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Re: German discarding sabot rounds

#4

Post by Zünder » 24 Sep 2015, 20:24

I've been studying this subject for years now, and finding info is very very difficult.
Do you mean shells designed for tankguns only ?

The testreports i have read only mentioned Sabotrounds for artillery and Flak. never Kw.K.
But considering the vast amount of types that were tested, Kw.K. specific rounds seem likely to me.

One type of Sabotshell that can be ruled out are the Röchlingshells, which were long dart shaped full- or subcaliber sabotrounds.
In 1942 the Heereswaffenamt wrote that development of that type of shell for 7,5 cm Kw.K. (Tankgun) was not going to take place, simply because that type of shell was too long and would cause problems during loading and storing inside the turret.
Tests with AP Röchlingshells were problematic, and apparently stopped early in the proces, although i haven't found an exact date until now.

Zünder,

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Re: German discarding sabot rounds

#5

Post by stg 44 » 24 Sep 2015, 21:44

Zünder wrote:I've been studying this subject for years now, and finding info is very very difficult.
Do you mean shells designed for tankguns only ?

The testreports i have read only mentioned Sabotrounds for artillery and Flak. never Kw.K.
But considering the vast amount of types that were tested, Kw.K. specific rounds seem likely to me.

One type of Sabotshell that can be ruled out are the Röchlingshells, which were long dart shaped full- or subcaliber sabotrounds.
In 1942 the Heereswaffenamt wrote that development of that type of shell for 7,5 cm Kw.K. (Tankgun) was not going to take place, simply because that type of shell was too long and would cause problems during loading and storing inside the turret.
Tests with AP Röchlingshells were problematic, and apparently stopped early in the proces, although i haven't found an exact date until now.

Zünder,

http://www.wk2ammo.com
I'm surprised that 75mm tank guns would have that long of a sabot shell. Even the long 75.

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Re: German discarding sabot rounds

#6

Post by Yoozername » 25 Sep 2015, 19:25

There is a drawing of a 10 cm sub-caliber round that uses a PzGr 39 7,5 cm. I have no idea if it was fielded. I would assume it would have higher velocity with full charge and would be a good round for the StuH weapon. I can probably cut and paste a pic here if anyone is interested.

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Re: German discarding sabot rounds

#7

Post by stg 44 » 26 Sep 2015, 23:28

I would like to see the drawing
Yoozername wrote:There is a drawing of a 10 cm sub-caliber round that uses a PzGr 39 7,5 cm. I have no idea if it was fielded. I would assume it would have higher velocity with full charge and would be a good round for the StuH weapon. I can probably cut and paste a pic here if anyone is interested.

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Re: German discarding sabot rounds

#8

Post by OldCavGuy » 28 Sep 2015, 06:19

U.S., German, and Soviet HVAP/Pzgr 40/Sabot tank gun ammunition was all designed the same. A sub-caliber projectile (tungsten in most cases) inside a light (aluminum) full caliber shell with the same cartridge as the normal solid shot ammunition. The lower shell weight increased velocity and the shell helped the tungsten core penetrate when it hit its target. The British 6 pdr and 17 pdr guns had APDS ammunition in which the shell separates from the sub-caliber projectile and only the sub-caliber munition goes down range to hit the target. The HVAP tended to lose penetration at longer ranges due to wind resistance but was still slightly better than solid shot. The APDS not only penetrated more armor but the smaller munition decreased wind resistance and its penetration remained high at long range. However, in WWII there were still problems with the separation of the sabot from the penetrator which caused minor deflection of the round at short and mid range but resulted in misses at mid to long range. The Soviet ammunition appears to be a copy of the German ammunition captured by the Soviets. Soviet production quality restricted it to short range use and none of the users of the HVAP type ammunition ever had enough due to the problems with working with tungsten or in the case of the Germans not having enough (It was used in machine tools as it is hard enough to cut steel). U.S. 76mm production provided 10 rounds per U.S. tank per month. German production was stopped except for the Pak 38's sub-caliber round in 1942. It also stopped the major introduction of the German squeeze bore gun. The Soviets also never had more than a few rounds available in their T34 tanks. The British also had limited amounts of APDS although production increased from 1944 through 1945, based on the British providing the U.S. Army some 6 pdr APDS ammunition for the U.S. 57mm anti-tank gun in 1945. The British continued use of their excellent APCBC 76.2mm (17 pdr) ammunition so British production never caught up with need but the shortages appear to have been less than either of the four combatants. Standard armor piercing ammunition was also needed as the sabot ammunition could be very inaccurate.

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Re: German discarding sabot rounds

#9

Post by Yoozername » 28 Sep 2015, 16:38

stg 44 wrote:I would like to see the drawing
Yoozername wrote:There is a drawing of a 10 cm sub-caliber round that uses a PzGr 39 7,5 cm. I have no idea if it was fielded. I would assume it would have higher velocity with full charge and would be a good round for the StuH weapon. I can probably cut and paste a pic here if anyone is interested.
http://www.lexpev.nl/downloads/geschossringbuch.pdf

Look down to the 10.5 cm PzGr 39 (TS)

It is dated April 43

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Re: German discarding sabot rounds

#10

Post by Yoozername » 25 Jul 2016, 17:49

German documentation for April 1 '44 (Merkblatt 28/1) shows that these discarding rounds were for a few 10 cm weapons. A funny thing is that there is even a discarding HE round (using the Panther HE) for the StuH!

I am not sure what quantities these may have been manufactured. It looks like the Pzgr 39 is modified on the cap to hold the forward discarding elements.

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Re: German discarding sabot rounds

#11

Post by critical mass » 15 Jun 2017, 15:23

https://ww2aircraft.net/forum/threads/l ... -ts.46597/

Information about 105mm , 128mm, and 150mm discarding sabot AP ammunition.

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Re: German discarding sabot rounds

#12

Post by Yoozername » 16 Jun 2017, 22:11

I believe the 105mm just used a reworked 7,5cm pzgr 39. Overall weight was 7.7 Kg but projectile was 6.4 Kg. It was 'on the books' by April 1944.
105DS.jpg
105DS.jpg (85.34 KiB) Viewed 12848 times

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Re: German discarding sabot rounds

#13

Post by critical mass » 17 Jun 2017, 11:12

This presumption is a correct one, they indeed used 7.5cm Pzgr39 for 105mm and 88mm Pzgr39 for both, 150mm and 128mm Sabot AP.

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Re: German discarding sabot rounds

#14

Post by Zünder » 17 Jun 2017, 15:07

Here are the remains of an original 10,5 cm Pzgr. 39 TS, you can still see the remains of a drivingband, so this one dates most likely from the experimental stage.

If somebody has spareparts for shells like these, or knows who has them, send me a pm.

Zünder,

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Attachments
7,5 cm Pzgr 39 Ts.jpg

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Re: German discarding sabot rounds

#15

Post by Yoozername » 17 Jun 2017, 19:35

I think the actual driving bands are on the discarded parts of the assembly. So, the 7,5 cm Pzgr projectile is lightened a bit from that and also the removal of material from the cap for the forward part of the discarding element, and also the area around the HE charge is thinned out...perhaps compromising the penetration against highly sloped armor.

I wonder what the accuracy of these were? It would be another antitank solution for weapons like the StuH and Wespe and the artillery howitzers. The HEAT round for these weapons would be powerful also but somewhat range/velocity limited.

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