Are the Israelis using smaller Hellfire warheads?

"Jim Yanik" wrote in message
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"Kevin Brooks" wrote in
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"Jim Yanik" wrote in message
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"Kevin Brooks" wrote in
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"Jim Yanik" wrote in message
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Glenfiddich wrote in
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On Tue, 20 Apr 2004 15:52:44 -0400, Yeff
wrote:

I've seen it suggested on some web pages that the Israelis are
using smaller Hellfire warheads for their anti-terror strikes
than come standard. Is this true and, if so, does anyone have a
good cite?

Highly likely - if it *was* a Hellfire.

Check the early pictures of the last airstrike - the blast
didn't even remove the car's hubcaps.
Ignore later pictures - reports say the car was vandalised by
souvenir seekers.


Well,Hellfire uses a shaped charge warhead,so it makes a "jet' of
penetrating metal,tearing through the car's interior and the blast
may occur outside the car,and it would not affect the
hubcaps/wheelcovers.

Think about what you just said. The fact that the standard Hellfire
uses a HEAT warhead does not really greatly affect the blast
effect; it only means that a portion of the blast has been used (as
it expands outward) to invert the liner and turn it into a stream
of really hot metal and gas focused on a small area. The explosive
still exhibits a generally spherical blast pattern overall. Set a
fifteen pound demo shaped charge against the average passenger
vehicle and you'll see that it does not *need* the shaped charge
effect to do a pretty good number on the target; that much HE going
off in close contact to the car will tend to ruin everyone's day if
they were unfortunate enough to be inside it.

Brooks


--
Jim Yanik
jyanik-at-kua.net



I *did* think about what I wrote.
The blast is going to occur in a place where the roughly spherical
blast front is not likely to affect wheel covers or hubcaps.
The jet will not do much damage in itself,the majority of damage
inside - will- be caused by the blast.

My guess is you have never seen these kind of warheads go off in
proximity to a thin-skinned vehicle--they do tend to do a lot more
than you seem to think against that kind of target.

Brooks


--
Jim Yanik
jyanik-at-kua.net



Sure,the blast will blow in the car's glass,and frags shred the metalwork.

But the pressure wave would be directed such that wheel covers or hubcaps
would be pushed ON,not blown off.It may not even be directed towards the
hubcaps.

You seem mighty sure of yourself on this. I could care less what happens to
the freakin' hubcaps--the point is that eight or so pounds of very energetic
HE going off in intimate contact with a friggin'
sheet-metal/fiberglass/plastic carbody will tend to do a LOT of damage. That
HEAT effect is almost an inconsequential byproduct when targeting a
thin-skinned vehicle. If you doubt that, then take a gander at what the
bigger off-route IED's are doing to our troops in Iraq. Or take the example
of an M21 AT mine set to go off *not* in intimate contact with a vehicle
(M21's use the platter charge, or IIRC Miznay-Schardin effect, and I doubt
they have much more HE in them than a Hellfire does)--we did that with an
old M880 pick-up truck and physically relocated that puppy (and that
penetrator had little to do with accomplishing *that*) (and we sort of
****ed off the range control guys in the process...).

Brooks



--
Jim Yanik
jyanik-at-kua.net