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Subject: Smallest Effective Bomb Sizes
Roman    7/21/2004 9:42:52 PM
What would be the smallest size of bomb that would have significant military utility? The small diameter bomb will only weight 500 pounds (correct me if I am wrong - it may have actually been 250 pounds). If you managed to get bombs even smaller it would obviously enable planes to carry even more of them - but just how much smaller can you go without the bomb loosing much of its utility? Would 100 pound bombs be effective and if so how about say 20 pound or 10 pound or even smaller bombs? On a related note - how much of a bomb's mass is actually the explosive charge? Does this vary with the size of the bomb?
 
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displacedjim    RE:Smallest Effective Bomb Sizes    7/21/2004 10:26:59 PM
IIRC, the explosive fill weight to overall bomb weight (in pounds) of the classic Mk 81/82/83/84 family is approximately as follows: bomb explosive 250 88 500 about 230 1000 ? (Navy bomb, so I don't know) 2000 about 780 bomb weights are alos only approximate, e.g., I think the Mk82 might be closer to 550lbs, while the Mk84 is just under 2000lbs. I think the newer BLU-109 2000lb-class bomb only has around 400 pound explosive fill because it's built with more steel for increased penetration. Displacedjim
 
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Roman    RE:Smallest Effective Bomb Sizes    7/21/2004 10:33:19 PM
Alright - thanks for the table. I assume the 250 pound bomb is the SDB, so I was wrong about it weighting 500 pounds... And I would expect penetrators to have less explosive - I believe they use a lot of heavy metal alloys to increase penetration (in fact I would not be surprised if the metal used was an alloy of depleted uranium).
 
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doggtag    RE:Smallest Effective Bomb Sizes    7/21/2004 11:12:23 PM
If you guys haven't seen it yet, here's the Small Diameter Bomb: http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/munitions/sdb.htm I'm still trying to find out just who gets the contract: Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, or Boeing. Anyone know?.
 
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displacedjim    RE:Smallest Effective Bomb Sizes    7/22/2004 1:39:50 AM
Roman, I think it's extremely unlikely that DU is used in any of the increased penetration bomb designs. I am not aware of DU being used in any munition containing explosive. I believe its use is confined to 105mm and 120mm APFSDS penetrators and the AP cores of 25mm and 30mm ammo for the AV-8B and M-2/M-3 Bradley, and the A-10. The USN did use it in 20mm for the Phalanx CIWS, but someone recently posted here that they stopped using it. Displacedjim
 
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Roman    RE:Smallest Effective Bomb Sizes    7/22/2004 1:54:59 AM
Thanks for the link doggtag. The SDB seems like a patently good idea and I am wondering just how much further the concept could be taken before bombs would get too small to have significant military utility.
 
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Roman    RE:Smallest Effective Bomb Sizes    7/22/2004 2:08:40 AM
"Roman, I think it's extremely unlikely that DU is used in any of the increased penetration bomb designs." Maybe you are correct - I was just speculating. As far as I am aware it would make sense to use it. It is very dense - a desirable property for penetrating deep before an explosion occurs - perhaps it could also be alloyed with something else to decrease deformation during penetration. DU is also very cheap - another great advantage. Therefore, there appears to be little objective reason not to use it for penetrator bombs. The only problem I can think of would be bad PR - and if USAF is not using it, this is the likely cause. Still, the whole point of penetrator bombs is to bury deep underground before eploding which would minimize any possible side-effects of DU (if they even really exist), though I suppose there could be some worries that the explosion could spread the DU above ground in a powdered form. In any case, what do you think of at least using DU in non-explosive bombs (the new weapons that are supposed to use kinetic energy of 'ball-bearing-like' payloads to destroy targets without using explosives)? Would it not increase effectiveness? "I am not aware of DU being used in any munition containing explosive. I believe its use is confined to 105mm and 120mm APFSDS penetrators and the AP cores of 25mm and 30mm ammo for the AV-8B and M-2/M-3 Bradley, and the A-10. The USN did use it in 20mm for the Phalanx CIWS, but someone recently posted here that they stopped using it." This is ridiculous - I bet they stopped using it solely for PR purposes. Even if DU does have some health effects if inhaled, how the hell would that be a problem with CIWS which functions at sea? Sorry displacedjim, I do not mean to grumble - I am just sometimes frustrated with these never-ending scare-stories like mibile phones will fry your brain, electric power lines will give you cancer...
 
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wagner95696    RE:Smallest Effective Bomb Sizes    7/22/2004 4:13:36 AM
There would not be much sense in using DU or tungsten in a bomb. The velocities are too low to need or to take advantage of such expensive materials. Depends on what it is used for. If a ten pound HEAT or explosive formed projectile warhead can take out a tank from all but the front a similar size impacting the top should not have any problem at all. For soft above ground targets more little boms may actually be more effective than a few big ones.
 
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wagner95696    RE:Smallest Effective Bomb Sizes    7/22/2004 4:16:48 AM
I don't know exactly how 'cheap' DU is but I assure you that in the fabricated form it is going to be MUCH more expensive than steel. In regards to bombs a hundred pounds is a hundred pounds as far as penetration goes.
 
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doggtag    RE:Smallest Effective Bomb Sizes    7/22/2004 10:02:47 AM
"For soft above ground targets more little bombs may actually be more effective than a few big ones" In a nutshell, that is the idea behind cluster bomb systems like BL755, Wind Corrected Munitions Dispenser, MLRS-type rockets, and several arty shells packing those grenade/bomblets. It's a cool sight watching a Tomahawk overfly an area and shower down its bomblets. These are fine for area threats like artillery batteries, parked vehicles and aircraft, and open troop and armor formations. The US, and a few others, have dual purpose anti-armor/anti-personnel cluster bombs at their disposal. But if you only need to take out one or two vehicles in a pass, PGMs like Maverick, SDB, Brimstone/Hellfire/JCM are adequate enough. As far as effective penetrator bombs, the big GBU-28 5000lb bunker buster is actually built out of a section of an old artillery tube (155mm?). The barrels have enough integrity to hold together long enough to penetrate 30 feet down or so. But if we really wanted a deep pentrator, we must somehow reinforce the forward section and boost the kinetic energy: either by a release from higher altitudes, or by rocket assistance (such as the Durandal anti-runway weapon and other "concrete dibbers" work). With a strong enough nose and high enough velocity, a penetrator can reach down deeper that standard ordnance. We were talking on another thread about the big Tallboy and Grand Slam bombs, and mentioned that the mass and velocity of the Grand Slam could sink it 100ft down before it detonated, causing a seismic tremor to do its damage. That massive "concept" 30,000 lb weapon that Roman mentioned on JDW would rely on the same effect, probably. http://members.aol.com/nukeinfo2/ Here's the link of just who has made the biggest conventional bombs. Check out the pic of the B-29 hoofing a pair of Tallboys under its wings. Surely the B-1, B-2, and B-52 could have some heavy penetrators made available to their inventory (the kicker being the B-2, it doesn't sling weapons externally like the other 2 bombers, so it may be limitied to the GBU-28 5000lb weapons. But certainly a B-52 could be configured with 3 Tallboy sized weapons: one on each pylon, and one inside. Dropping such a beast from 40,000ft or so would definitely give you a nice penetrative performance. So we may have an actual smallest effective bomb size (actually, with the advent of the fuzed 20mm and 25mm rounds developed for the USA's next infantry weapons, airburst bomblets may find favor). For the tech record, the little 5- and 10- lb practice bombs many aircraft use for training are still ideally sized for the kind of microelectronics guidance that can be incorporated into weapons today. I'll agree that carrying a stick of 10lb guided minibombs seems a tad stupid, especially when one big cluster bomb can hold between 300-700 bomblets. But the technology exists to make a PGM that small: in such a case, it may be favored to use TV-guidance instead of GPS. TV guidance offers the true pinpoint "fly it in through the window" (or a vehicle hatch) option. And a 2-4lb HEAT charge (giving the bomb an average of 20-40 percent filler weight) going through a roof hatch will destroy the crew inside an AFV (the bazooka rounds of WW2 were roughly that size altogether, and performed perfectly against the crews in those tanks)..
 
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B.Smitty    RE:Smallest Effective Bomb Sizes    7/22/2004 1:40:11 PM
>>What would be the smallest size of bomb that would have significant military utility? << Define 'significant'. The 250lb SDB is being designed as an 80% solution, meaning it should be able to take on 80% of common battlefield targets. Munitions like the 44lb Viper Strike will also have significant military utility for arming UAVs. Even smaller PGMs like the 5lb NAWC Spike missile could have 'significant' utility on UAVs. http://www.designation-systems.net/dusrm/app4/spike.html
 
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