Hand Held Rocket Anti Armor Weapons

[Sefchick]

Being a Long time player of Advanced Squad Leader I tend to look toward the Game/Rulebook on some matters. In reguards of shooting Rocket Weapons inside a building or bunker. It should only be done in the most serious of condition. And when it is done there is a chance that the "backblast" will effect the user or anyone else in the room. The effect could be KIA/WIA or Panic/Breaking of the unit. There should also be a chance of a fire starting.

The same should go for recoilless rifles(If and when they are used in this game late in the war).

Has anyone seem the Movie "The Bridge" where the German fires a Panzerfaust at the Sherman Tank. He hits and kills the sherman but kills the the German citizen with his backblast!

Joe Sefchick

[Guest Big Time Software]

Got a copy of The Bridge sitting in the next room. Great movie.

Well, when we have a question about how something should be modeled, the last place we look is the ASL rulebook They did a decent job overall, but we have found too many obvious mistakes to put much faith in it.

In this case, however, ASL is pretty much correct. Although PFs fired from buildings was quite common, the backblast would be lethal if anybody was directly behind it. To the sides would be OK though. Right now such a weapon fired indoors simply supresses any nearby unit. Don't know if we will have time to do more than that, but we shall see.

Steve

[Los]

BTW per US Army and other nations I suspect also SOP, there are minimum open area square footage requirements for the different anti-armor weapons. Meaning say if you are going to fire of a LAW inside a room, then you need (for example) say at least 64 square feet of open window/door/hole space or else you will do a number on yourself and others in the room even if they are clear of the backblast.

Los

[Guest Big Time Software]

Yup, there was probably something like that for these WWII weapons, though it might have been a little less scientific. 64 square feet actually isn't that much (standard size room), and I am surprised that it is so low for a modern LAW. Afterall, they are a bit beefier than their WWII grandparents!

Steve

[Delaware Dave]

I think that the 64 sq. ft applied only to the opening in the room (i.e., windows). If the room had no windows or doors it would would have to be huge before it would be safe to fire a back blast weapon. The propellant is basically a high explosive under going a low order detonation. No shrapnel, but you have to dissapate the resulting overpressure. I used to have that info when I worked for ICI explosives but don't have it any more. My wild ass guess to safe room size would be around 20'x20'.

[Kevin Peltz]

"Don't shoot Corporal, I can't find my tape measure..."

[Dan]

LAW's Do not have much backblast. AT-4's DO....I thought the damn thing riped my shoulder off....Loud as hell too...But did it ever light up the captured T-64 we had on the US wepons range... TEHHe Ohh and since I have not posted in over 3 months let me say that the game gets better daily.(I have been to this forum daily) And I cannot wait untill the demo ... Must have demo I've been playing CC2 agian just to try to fix my habit...

Dan

[Moon]

When I was in the Army, I fired the "Carl Gustav" (officially named the Panzerfaust-3 I believe). It's pretty old and being replaced currently, and it has its roots in the Panzerschreck of WWII. Well, this thing has a HUGE backblast - about 50 meters (150 feet) minimum! Even trees standing with this area could reflect enough blast to injure the firer. That's my two Pfenning

[Cormand]

---Disable lurker status---

To continue in the great nitpicking tradition: The AT-4 and Carl Gustav is the same weapon, it´s a swedish design from the 80's. And yes, it has a h*** of a backblast.

---Enable lurker status---

Cormand

[Moon]

(Those damn' lurkers... )

Didn't know that...

Martin

[Guest R Cunningham]

Herr Moon, Herr Cormand,

The AT-4, Panzerfaust 3 and Carl Gustav are all completely different weapons. The AT-4 and Carl Gustav are Swedish developments, but they are radically different systems.

The AT-4 is a one shot disposable launcher that is like an M72 LAW in that the tube and projectile are packaged as one unit.

Here's a photo of one with a night sight attached:

<center></center>

This is from the site:

AT-4

The Carl Gustav is a more traditional recoilless rifle design that is loaded from the rear and can fire a variety of projectiles. Though it is still a capable anti-armor system, the Germans use it only for illumination rounds these days.

A Carl Gustav in Canadian service:

<center></center>

For more info:

CarlGustav

The Panzerfaust is the only weapon in the group that is really designed to be fired from enclosed spaces. The projectile is launched with a counter weight that offsets the recoil of the mechanical ejection of the round. Once the round has travelled meters the rocket motor fires. Since there is no backblast as the weapon is fired it can be fired from any location.

here's a panzerfasut 3 in Swiss service:

<center></center>

[Moon]

Thanks for the clarification! After thinking about it, I believe the Bundeswehr is calling the Carl Gustav the Panzerfaust-1 officially. But my little pea brain is so unreliable these days...

BTW, an off-topic question - is that a day/night scope on the AT-4?

Martin

PS. I really like the instruction label on the AT-4... LOL!

[This message has been edited by Moon (edited 09-05-99).]

[Guest R Cunningham]

That sight looks like an AN/PVS-4. It is not the normal sight for this weapon. The normal sights are the little black flip up sights that you can see near the muzzle and right behind the mount for the night sight. I've personally never seen a PVS-4 mounted on the AT-4 this way. The PVS-4 is good (can see at night)to about 700 meters the AT-4 isn't really effective beyond half of that.

As for the nomenclature of the Carl Gustav, the German Bundeswehr handbook "Der Reibert" refers to it solely as the "Leuchtbüchse" (flare gun). It may have been called something else in the past. The book also refers to an earlier Panzerfaust that looks a lot like the RPG-2. It is simply called the "leichte Panzerfaust" (light Panzerfaust).

The Panzermuseum in Munster says it has a "schwere Panzerfaust 84mm" on display in the Bundeswehr exhibit. It would seem reasonable that the Carl Gustav was called that before it current designation.

[This message has been edited by R Cunningham (edited 09-05-99).]

[Harold Jones]

Dan said <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>But did it ever light up the captured T-64 we had on the US wepons range <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I believe you mean captured T-72, since to my knowledge the T-64 has never been used by anyone other than the Soviet Union. Which means we would have had to have captured it from them. If we did have one we would definately not be using it on a weapons range, there is still a lot about the T-64 that we don't know.

[Dan]

"I believe you mean captured T-72, since to my knowledge the T-64 has never been used by anyone other than the Soviet Union. Which means we would have had to have captured it from them. If we did have one

we would definately not be using it on a weapons range, there is still a lot about the T-64 that we don't know."

Actuly Russia just like us once something is outdated they sell them..T-64 are used extsivly in the 3rd world. It was an Iraqi T-64. Only the Rebulican Guard had any T-72's and not many of thouse I don't think Russia has had the captial to fully replace T-72 w/ T-80's. Yeah that's a nighscope mounted on that AT-4. Nice picture. Or was it a T-62 damn it was over 2 years ago ..

[This message has been edited by Dan (edited 09-05-99).]

[Greg Deych]

Dan,

Could that have been T-62? Those are out

and about in quantities.

[Fionn]

I bet it was a T-62 since the T-64 is (presumably) more advanced than the T-72 since Russia happily sells T-72s abroad but doesn't like selling T-64s (I don't know of anyone outside Russia who has a T-64)..

Even if America did have T-64s they sure wouldn't be blowing them up as examples to troops.

They'd be a bit too hard to come by for that to be a good use of them.

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___________

Fionn Kelly

Manager of Historical Research,

The Gamers Net - Gaming for Gamers

[Harold Jones]

T-62 makes a whole lot more sense. The reason I thought it might be a T-72 is that after the ground war a bunch of them were too shot up to take home but they did make dandy hard targets for some units that had "excess" ammo to shoot off. Also if you don't spend a lot of time doing vehicle ID a T-72 and a T-64 look pretty much the same.