81mm air dropped mortar
Posted on 04/16/2010 8:15:10 PM PDT by ErnstStavroBlofeld
The U.S. Army, in what could signal a direction in combat missions, has launched mortars from unmanned aerial vehicles. The U.S. Army and General Dynamics (GD) have conducted tests of a so-called Air-Dropped Guided Mortar from UAVs in what could transform reconnaissance aircraft into attack platforms. The tests were meant to determine whether mortars fired from tactical UAV platforms could strike moving ground targets.
In a test in early 2010, General Dynamics Ordnance and Tactical Systems was said to have struck a stationary ground target with an 81mm UAV-launched mortar. The mortar, launched at the army's test grounds at Ft. Sill, Okla., was equipped with a guidance kit and fuse meant to provide precision strike capability.
"The ADM was released from a TUAV using the company's newly developed 'Smart Rack' carriage and release system that enables weaponization of any TUAV platform," GD said.
GD did not identify the air platform, merely calling it a tactical class UAV. Tests with the 81 mm guided mortar were said to have begun in 2008.
"Designed to meet the needs of the U.S. Army, Marine Corps and Special Forces for a rapid target response capability, the ADM uses existing mortar inventory to provide a low-cost, lightweight weapon system with proven energetics," GD said.
Executives said the so-called Roll Controlled Fixed Canard guidance kit, with flight-control and GPS-based guidance and navigational system, added precision strike capability to existing mortars.
They said the nose-mounted guidance kit would replace existing mortar fuzes and was demonstrated on multiple mortar calibers in both air-drop and tube-launch applications.
Middle East countries have been closely following combat UAV demonstrations in the United States. Israel has developed a UAV strike capability, with Turkey seeking to buy such a platform from the United States.
(Excerpt) Read more at geostrategy-direct.com ...
That’s cool. Here I am, fixing medical equipment for a living. What a sucker. i need a job where I get to blow things up.
Wow. If this is really accurate it sounds like a much cheaper alternative to a Hellfire.
Is it a mortar? A guided munition? It is a bit odd to call it a mortar.
Couldn’t use the link as it required signing in. Anyone with some knowledge of this mind explaining it to a layman?
Sooner or later, someone has to take the ground.
Sounds like a winner for our guys on the ground!
How could you have an indirect fire munition on board an aircraft where it has line of sight to the target at all times?
Don’t they normally call them bombs when dropped from a plane?
It LOOKS like a standard mortar round with a big guidance package attached, turning it into a "smart" mortar round. It appears to be a gravity rather than a powered device, but is tail-fin steerable.
This is definitely the trend: cheaply (by defense standards)turning dumb bombs into smart ones by using GPS, Laser, and thermal guidance devices. This is now done with many artillery rounds, including ground-based mortars. Amazing accuracy.
As a relic from the era of dumb bombs, but hopefully intelligent pilots, I can't wait to find out more. Perhaps I can be recycled as an UAV pilot, although my grandchildren beat the hell out of me in video games.
...but it is much easier when the enemy is spread over it in a thin, red film...
It’s worth it. My college/frat buddy works for Raytheon tells me he’s in jock heaven and wouldn’t trade places for anything.
In the old days, weren’t these things called “bombs”?
Well, I’m guessing they’re firing them rather than dropping them. The motivation is probably that a mortar round is a lot cheaper than a missile. But like a missile, the mortar can be fired from a distance, and if it is guided, it is accurate like a missile.
Toto, we're not in Korea anymore.
A mechanical engineer colleague left our optical communications startup to work for somebody in NH building very high firing rate machine guns. He’s having a blast.
I’m in software — nothing even moves. Let me tell you, that’s really rough for a mechanical engineer!
We did it to dumb bombs with JDAM kits, and now we're doing it to mortar rounds in this iteration. It's still a mortar round, it's just not being deployed the standard way nor left to the mercy of simple ballistics.
proven energetics = big can of whoopass
If it works, great! If it's cheaper than other weapon systems for the role, even better. If it kills our enemies and saves our guys, it's a winner.
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