Tank armament effectiveness vs infantry

[Soren]

So you've seen the damage a handgrenade causes to people standing within 10 to 15m of it ? If so how the heck did you ever come to doubt that a cannon shell packed with 5 kg of explosives will make a complete mess of anyone within a 10m radius of it exploding ??

[Juha]

Having being in trench and in a log and earth bunker which firing aperture was almost towards the detonation while SC 50 and A/T mine were detonated and some 10-15 away from a detonating pipe mine in a VERY shallow depression laying flat. Now SC 50 had some 25 kg explosive, it was a quite a bang but nobody was hurt. Only dangerous situation was the pipe mine incident, we were inside 50% casualty zone without proper cover.

I have never claimed that standing man would survive unwounded within 10m from exploding 75mm shell.

[Kruska]

Hello guys,

Anyone who has been in the Army using hand grenades, knows that the average throwing distance of recruits is initially around 20m. Therefore throwing grenades without ducking and being behind a concrete wall or in a raised trench is absolutely forbidden (at least in the Bundeswehr and many other NATO armys), since the shrapnel distance of a DM51 hand grenade (6000 steel fragments) is up to 10m deadly in the open and highly injury prone up to 16m, DM56 training grenade or DM12/22 ground detonators are therefore used especially by national draftsmen.

Besides Members of the DSO and certain PzGrenadier units normal recruits of the Bundeswehr don’t even get to exercise with “real” grenades. That the Finland army has different training procedures then the Bundeswehr is true, however no one would be alive at standing within 10 m of a DM51 grenade or equivalent defensive grenades. Therefore Juha, I am very convinced that you were using exercise or offensive grenades.

Even the depicted grenade in Soren’s clip was not a shrapnel or defensive grenade. If for a DM51 the advertising board and most certainly the police officer would have been gone.

Training using EUHG51/85 with removed fragment mantel - offensive version

YouTube - Handgranaten Werfen

Regards
Kruska

[parsifal]

Here is a link to a US ordinance site, which gives the details of US Handgrenade ordinance.

Hand Grenades

As a general rule, the standard M-67 frag grenade has an effective kill radius of 5 metres. It has an effective casualty radius of 15 metres but carries a warning that shrapnel pieces may travel up to 230 metres. In battle conditions, this safety warning is routinely ignored.

Artillery kill radii are dependant on the cover conditions of the target. However, it must be remembered that the "Kill" radius is a function of the amount of energy per square metre away from the blast, and that this is essentially a 1/d3 relationship. In other words, it takes a great deal more energy to create an effective kill zone that is even a little greater than a shell or bomb that is only a fraction of its size.

As for the effect of artillery against Infantry in buildings, well, history shows that this only tends to increase the protection for the Infantry. the Infantry simply take cover in the rubble, which provides a great deal better cover, and virtually an instant entrechment to hide in. This was proven a hundred times over in wwii, from Stalingrad to Caen

[Juha]

Double post removed

[Juha]

Kruska
as I wrote we throw the granates from a normal trench, dug in, And it was a live granate. We had thrown a training granate before that. The target was a normal foxhole, but its surraundings were cleaned from undergrowth and branches and there wasn't trees near it.

Juha

[Kruska]

Hello parsifal,

Not quite; initially if the building is hit, the probability of the persons inside the building being killed is almost sure. That survivors or reinforcements will use the rubble for cover (nothing else left) is understood.

Monte Casino provided excellent cover for the German paras after the bombing. If the paras would have been inside the monastery, not many would have survived the bombardment. As for Stalingrad it was in fact the missing artillery firepower that made it so costly for the Wehrmacht. The assault artillery such as Brumbaer and Sturmtiger were actually developed in reference to Stalingrad to take out infantry in buildings.

Regards
Kruska

[Soren]

Exactly Kruska, that Juha was throwing training grenades was my first thought as-well as that is usually all a draftee gets to try.

Juha, if you knew how dangerous a real handgrenade is then you wouldn't have doubted what I said for second. We're talking a cannon shell packing 5 kg of explosives, thats tens of thousands of deadly pieces of shrapnel and a blast large enough to knock you cold if you're within 15 - 20m of it detonating.

As for the pipe mine you were talking about, how large ? What kind of cover exactly ? The usual pipe mine contains anywhere from 150 - 200 g of explosives and has a lethal range of about 10 - 15m, but it is dangerous way past 50m.

[Soren]

Originally Posted by parsifal

Here is a link to a US ordinance site, which gives the details of US Handgrenade ordinance.

Hand Grenades

As a general rule, the standard M-67 frag grenade has an effective kill radius of 5 metres. It has an effective casualty radius of 15 metres but carries a warning that shrapnel pieces may travel up to 230 metres. In battle conditions, this safety warning is routinely ignored.

Artillery kill radii are dependant on the cover conditions of the target. However, it must be remembered that the "Kill" radius is a function of the amount of energy per square metre away from the blast, and that this is essentially a 1/d3 relationship. In other words, it takes a great deal more energy to create an effective kill zone that is even a little greater than a shell or bomb that is only a fraction of its size.

I take it you have never thrown a grenade in your life ?

As for the effect of artillery against Infantry in buildings, well, history shows that this only tends to increase the protection for the Infantry. the Infantry simply take cover in the rubble, which provides a great deal better cover, and virtually an instant entrechment to hide in. This was proven a hundred times over in wwii, from Stalingrad to Caen

That's complete bollocks Parsifal. Ordinary buildings are about the worst place to seek cover against artillery. If artillery strikes a building with people in it, those people are almost surely going to die.

Now AFTER the building has been turned to rubble, it will provide good cover for infantry, but not while it is still standing.

[Juha]

Soren
as I have wrote, if you are in a trench, behind a big boulder or otherwise well protected, a 75mm shell, at least WWII type, detonating 10-15 away from you didn't kill you. That's why armies bother to dig in.

Pipe Mine 68, 240 gr TNT, cannot remember exactly danger zones. Now when I have thought it ower, maybe we were not inside 50% but inside 25% casualty zone. But still well within the sharpnel range, one small, 68 produced almost entirely only tiny sharpnels, hit my helmet. The reason of the incident was that the regular broke all the safety rules.

[parsifal]

I take it you have never thrown a grenade in your life ?

Ah yes I have, both training and live fire exercises.

That's complete bollocks Parsifal. Ordinary buildings are about the worst place to seek cover against artillery. If artillery strikes a building with people in it, those people are almost surely going to die.

Not necessarily. In caen the usual place the Infantry to hide in is in the buildings cellars. in Berlin, the LDVs defending, as well as regulars used the buildings of berlin to hide in quite successfully. There is no gurantee in any situation, but a building provides far better cover than no building.

What do you see as a "typical building". If the building is double brick, or masonary, it is going to be quite resistant to artillery fire, lesser standards of construction will of course provide less cover

Now AFTER the building has been turned to rubble, it will provide good cover for infantry, but not while it is still standing.


Agreed, but the issue is whether Infantry within a building before it is demolished will survive. It depends on the size of the building, the type of construction, the explosive capability of the round and whereabouts in the building the Infantry is when the round hits. But generally speaking, buildings provide pretty good cover against artillery attack

Basically, it takes energy to demolish a building, the more energy to demolish the cover and get to the target, the less energy is left to hurt the targets. If the theory is that flying shrapnel is going to do the damge, the theory still holds true. There are more obstacles within a building, like internal walls an the like, to stop, or at leat slow down the flying debris inside the building

With regard to Blast effects of artillery, I found this site, which i think is interesting but simple at the same time. It suggests that an artillery piece of 75 mm calibre (with a 14lb explosive head) will crearte a typical crater of about 1 metre wide, and 0.5 metres deep. That is consistent with what might be expected. If that asessment is correct, I doubt very much that a single hit by a 75 mm shell is going to destroy a building of reasonable size or construction (eg, a factory or shopping complex, bank or the like. It would do consideable damage toi say a 200 square metre home of single brick construction. It would, in my opinion, be quite devastating to a lightly constructed timber building. I would not consider a log cabin made from heavy timber to be in this category

General information of artillery weapons and shells

[Soren]

Soren
as I have wrote, if you are in a trench, behind a big boulder or otherwise well protected, a 75mm shell, at least WWII type, detonating 10-15 away from you didn't kill you. That's why armies bother to dig in.

Then why the heck did you say "I doubt it" Juha ?? As I'm sure even you must know usually infantry on the offensive don't exactly have time to dig a trench.

Ofcourse proper cover such as a trench will protect you, that's a no brainer Juha, even if a 150mm HE shell goes off nearby. But that was not what you were responding to, you placed doubt that a 75mm HE shell will make a real mess of anyone within a 10m radius of where it detonates without cover.

[Soren]

Originally Posted by parsifal

I take it you have never thrown a grenade in your life ?

Ah yes I have, both training and live fire exercises.

That's complete bollocks Parsifal. Ordinary buildings are about the worst place to seek cover against artillery. If artillery strikes a building with people in it, those people are almost surely going to die.

Not necessarily. In caen the usual place the Infantry to hide in is in the buildings cellars. in Berlin, the LDVs defending, as well as regulars used the buildings of berlin to hide in quite successfully. There is no gurantee in any situation, but a building provides far better cover than no building.

What do you see as a "typical building". If the building is double brick, or masonary, it is going to be quite resistant to artillery fire, lesser standards of construction will of course provide less cover

Now AFTER the building has been turned to rubble, it will provide good cover for infantry, but not while it is still standing.


Agreed, but the issue is whether Infantry within a building before it is demolished will survive. It depends on the size of the building, the type of construction, the explosive capability of the round and whereabouts in the building the Infantry is when the round hits. But generally speaking, buildings provide pretty good cover against artillery attack

Basically, it takes energy to demolish a building, the more energy to demolish the cover and get to the target, the less energy is left to hurt the targets. If the theory is that flying shrapnel is going to do the damge, the theory still holds true. There are more obstacles within a building, like internal walls an the like, to stop, or at leat slow down the flying debris inside the building

That's just completely wrong parsifal. Inside a building is one of the worst places to be under an artillery attack. Why ? Because it takes very little to make the whole building come crashing down upon you. A normal two storey home can quite easily be turned into rubble by a single 105mm artillery shell, with nearly everyone inside perishing.

Now hiding in the basement is another thing, but that's not what you do in combat Parsifal, in combat you're utilizing the building's effective cover against smallarms fire while at the same firing back from its various openings (Windows, doors & all sorts of openings in the tructure). This however makes you very vulnerable to cannon fire.

[Juha]

Soren
the key is that in your original message there waSN'T the words "without cover", that's why I doubt it. Not evn that you were talking on attacking infantry, only a blant statement. And even without trenches there might be all kinds of cover, banks of earth, boulders etc. While attacking one uses them.

[Kruska]

Hello Juha,

IIRC Soren never mentioned shooting at a trench, but shooting at infantry or building with a 75mm HE cartridge.
Any soldier around 5-15m would have been a goner. Nobody would put a trench round a big boulder, if hit fragmentation would be enormous. A tank would not shoot into a trench, for this one uses mortars and artillery and hand grenades.

And a SC50 dropped in front of a trench 10-20m would have certainly ripped some peoples eardrums, if not to include dead soldiers since during a battle even the guys in a trench certainly can't duck all the way.

Regards
Kruska