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Todays Fort Hood Sentinal, (post paper) had an article that says the new M1028 Cannister round was fired for the first time this week at Ft Hood by 2nd Battalion, 5th Cavalry Regt. This round is a 120mm shell, and when fired, sends approximately 1,100, 3/8inch Tungsten steel balls down range. It creates a lethal barrage of pellets that travel at over 1,400 meters per second, OUCH! They compare it to a Claymore mine in its effect. I wonder what took so long to develop something like this? I envision a Mortar round that explodes downward with a smaller size pellet. Useing a proximity fuze it would leave virtually no square foot un-affected.

Those should give decent penetration against certain targets compared to our old canister round.

You'd have loved "can", Jeff...10,000 finned nails of love per round in a 152mm.

Remember the "flechettes" I had from a 105 recoiless that I dug from a tree trunk at Ft Stewart that I showed you? This round reminded me of those. A nasty round to deal with. I'd love to see a huge paper target after its been shot by this new canister round.

- SFC_Jeff_Button

I envision a Mortar round that explodes downward with a smaller size pellet.

They had them years ago - they were called shrapnel rounds. Abandoned in favour of HE.

Hi Jeff! Hi Folks!

- SFC_Jeff_Button

I wonder what took so long to develop something like this?

As I understand some of it:
1. the end user didn't see a need, the primary mission and the only mission for the Abrams was stopping a Warsaw Pact armored attack. This is why for a number of years, I saw the M1A1 as a Tank Destoryer and not as a Main Battle Tank.
2. with the upgrade to the 120mm cannon, the Abrams just doesn't have a lot of room for main gun rounds.
3. Back to point one, for the longest time, no body asked for a new canister round
4. Tank became a dirty word. Remember the term 'Legacy Forces'? The next war doesn't need a 70 ton monster which we can't get to a distance battle field.

It wasn't until the 8th Army gave up on the M728 CEV that they started asking for a new canister round for use in Korea. 8th Army kept the M728 CEV in it's units long after the state side Army stopped supporting the system. Current post 'Major Combat' actions in Iraq clearly showed there was a need or use for something beside the Sabot and MPAT rounds.

My take on why it took so long,
Sgt, Scouts Out!

Wonder why they didn't use flechettes?

Wazza M728 CEV?

Hi Skeet! Hi Folks!

- Skeet

Wonder why they didn't use flechettes?
Wazza M728 CEV?

Flechettes which are small nails work very well in heavy brush.
Steel balls work better in urban areas. Brick walls for one example.

M-728 CEV was a M-60 tank mounting a 165mm demolition howitzer, an A-frame for lifting things, a bull dozer blade with the fluid system mounted inside the armor rather than on the outside like a standard gun tank with a dozer blade.

CEV = Combat Engineer Vehicle

www.globalsecurity.org...d/m728.htm

My 2 cents and a spot report.
Sgt, Scouts Out!

Dang nab it Roy. I thought you knew. TY

"Anatomy of an Abrams" aired last night on The Military Channel. I was surprized ot see it current enough to include the new canister round in it's section on main gun ammunition. I was really surprized, though, to see that the pellets were contained in the case where the propellent goes in the animated "x-ray view".

Hi everyone,
I think we are getting our rounds and reasons mixed a little. The Cannister round was requested by 8th Army after we turned in our M1/105's for M1A1's in '95. We gave up the APERS (Bee Hive) with the change to 120mm. It had 5000 fletchettes and used a manual fuze that the loader set from MA (muzzel action) to 4400 meters. Fletchettes don't get that good of a dispersion pattern with a smoothbore since the round isn't spinning. So we got a shotgun shell on steroids. Cannister was developed to fill that need but was slow getting fielded until OIF experiences. My belief was because 2ID was the only folks that wanted it until then. The loss of the M728 (CEV) created a need for an obstacle reduction round. Again, 8th Army was asking for a round to fill that need. The answer was the HE-OR round (High Explosive-Obstacle Reduction) which is a modified MPAT. These actually were fielded in Korea prior to OIF. Hope this clears the picture a little.

Joe D

I was under the understanding that flechettes had been banned under international treaty a long time ago (early 80s?). The wounds produced were just too nasty. I recall that same international convention sought to ban combat shotguns for the same reason, but the U.S. - pretty much the only user of combat shotguns anymore - dug in its heels and got its way. Remember, just a couple years ago there was a push to ban anti-personnel mines internationally but the U.S. dug in its heels once again. It main concern was covering the DMZ between N and S Korea without the use of anti-personnel mines.