Peter Kemp wrote:
On 1 Jul 2003 06:50:23 -0700, (tedster) wrote:


Apparently the debris problem on the Apaches was caused by a plug
covering the Hellfire motor not vaporising on firing. This could
damage the stabilizer. Don't know why this should have affected the UK
Apaches and not the US ones. Was there a problem with the CRV7 rockets
as well? It seems as though the MoD is taking the view that they will
put up with the debris from Hellfire as an additional maintenance
cost.


IIRC it was a slightly dodgy batch of missiles - good enough to pass
acceptance testing, not good enough to field. As the US has rather
more missiles, they were less affected.


Two-Thirds of US Army's Hellfire missiles are defective!

As of November 2002 about two-thirds of the Army's Hellfire missiles --
about 10,000 weapons -- had flawed rocket motors that needed to be
retrofitted, and most of the missiles had yet to be fixed. The problems
affect only Hellfire rocket motors made by a particular contractor,
Hercules Aerospace Co. A second contractor's motors are fine. About
4,800 Longbow Hellfires and 5,200 Laser Hellfires are affected -- all
the Longbows and half the Lasers. The Navy does not need to fix its
Hercules Hellfires, because its helicopters are configured differently
from the Army's and the risk is low.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/milita...ns/agm-114.htm