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From: ferguson@maitai.SRC.Honeywell.COM (Dennis Ferguson)
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: Grooves on APFSDS rounds
Message-ID: <1991Apr1.043048.17970@amd.com>
Date: 30 Mar 91 02:20:31 GMT
References: <1991Mar27.051315.22536@amd.com>
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From: ferguson@maitai.SRC.Honeywell.COM (Dennis Ferguson)

MEDELMA@CMS.CC.WAYNE.EDU (Michael Edelman) writes:
>I noticed in an illustration that the standard M1 sabot round has
>a series of circumferential grooves over about 1/3rd of its length.
>What is the purpose of these grooves?

The grooves enable the sabot to grip the tungsten rod.  I believe the
majority of APFSDS use tungsten as opposed to DU.  DU makes the 
battleground cleanup worse.  This brings up an interesting question.
According to the news reports on the Iraqi's use of oil fires and 
oil spills as "environmental weapons" and the reported lack of concern by
the Arab nations over environmental concerns... did the Coalition Forces
uses DU in Desert Storm.  I seem to recall a CNN report on an A10 armorer
who showed a GAU-8 round and declared that it was a DU round.  Can 
anyone verify this?

Dennis