According to the brigade, this may indicate that Russian troops can no longer afford to equip some strike UAVs with whole anti-tank mines.
It might also be to increase range; the weight of the payload will cut into the UAV’s range. There have been weapons in the past that have had their payload cut as a way to get increased range on an existing weapons platform.
I can imagine that Russian guy with an angle grinder cutting the mines in half.
I’ve seen that video somewhere…
Oh yeah, but the title says it’s a Ukrainian soldier.
No angle grinder needed, only a hammer and balls of Ukrainium.
Just remember to remove the fuze first!
Or it could be a compromise of less payload, for more range? At the cost of less destructive power of course.
Isn’t the whole aspect of a AT mine that a shaped charge is formed that penetrates the target? Do they attach these to drones solely for their contained explosive?
The TM-62 is just 7.5 kg of explosives with a fuse in the middle, no fancy shaped charges. They’re designed to be driven over, since tanks are more vulnerable on the underside and damage to the tracks can immobilize them.
Thank you. I had something like the TM-72 in mind, which has a shaped charge and thus needs much less explosive (2.5 kg).
most of the time no, the point is to cut tracks and that can be done with regular box of explosives. there’s a couple of types that use efp, or are basically a trap with rpg, but it’s not it
basically a trap with rpg
You’re thinking of a directed mine like the German DM12 PARM 1, but e.g. the Soviet TM-72 has a shaped charge and lies flat on the ground. However, it seems the drone is equipped with a half of a TM-62 (Thanks @fist_of_fartitude@sh.itjust.works) which is explosive-only without a shaped charge.
Russia is at the point where it’s more economical and more effective to mobility kill a vehicle than destroy it. Getting rid of it takes more material on your side, and makes it easier and faster to replace because they can just buy another. Repairing a broken vehicle, you have to either tow it out or have it repaired on-site, with an operation that might take a couple of guys to do and MORE equipment that you can take out with the saved explosive from the other half of the mine.
It feels weird, but it’s classic attrition warfare.
But you don’t need entire antitank mine to get complete disassembly of a truck
Explosives are dirt cheap and easy to manufacture on an industrial scale. If they put less somewhere, cost or availability is not the reason.
Man, this is a war in which artillery ammunition has seen severe supply shortages, not delivery shortages.
Everything has a cost.
Yes, for those you need quality steel and machine it with precision, every single one. You can not simply make a larger reactor to scale production 10x.
Yes, for those you need quality steel and machine it with precision, every single one. You can not simply make a larger reactor to scale production 10x.
For artillery ammunition?
Fuck, man, artillery shells are made to fired in the thousands. Dumb rounds, at least, require no such level of precision - and, for that matter, making a ‘larger reactor’ is an oversimplification of the process necessary to scale the production of explosive material.
I am pretty sure I can grasp exactly how to scale up the production of some chemical as a chemical engineer doing exactly that as a job. Bulk production of chemicals is EASY to scale compared to such discrete manufacturing.
The level of precision requires tuning the casing. If you think that is not precision, okay, whatever precision means for you is not relevant. It is hard to scale. You can not simply cast them continuously and be done with it.
I am pretty sure I can grasp exactly how to scale up the production of some chemical as a chemical engineer doing exactly that as a job. Bulk production of chemicals is EASY to scale compared to such discrete manufacturing.
Most facilities are not built for rapid expansion of processing explosive material. The current expansion of US RDX production capacity is projected to take half-a-decade and a billion dollars.
