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From: djm@castle.ed.ac.uk (D Murphy)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: BB main gun upgrade question
Message-ID: <1990Jun4.194503.4664@cbnews.att.com>
Date: 4 Jun 90 19:45:03 GMT
Sender: military@cbnews.att.com (William B. Thacker)
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Organization: Edinburgh University Chemistry
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Approved: military@att.att.com



From: D Murphy <djm@castle.ed.ac.uk>

Subject came up in a pub discussion about Iraq and large artillery..

I'm not a ballistics expert, but I'd imagine barrel wear in heavy guns
means that the inner sleeve of a gun barrel, especially a rifled one,
must be replaceable.

If this is the case, would it be possible to equip the BBs in the US Navy with
smooth-bore main guns, and use an FSDS round instead ? More to the point, if
this is possible, are there plans to do this to cope with any shortage of
15" ammunition (which I believe is all of 1950s make) ?

[mod.note:  There *is* a DS round for the 16"; it's a 13" projectile.
I don't think it's fin-stabilized, I believe it's spin-stabilized.  Yes,
the barrel liners are replaceable.  And to correct your typo, 
they're 16" guns.  - Bill ]

Murff...