What is the most important thing for armor-piercing shells? Speed, of course! With velocity, there is energy, and in the process of penetrating armor, it is a process of continuous reduction of kinetic energy, and the velocity of the shell is quite important.

At the same time, another aspect, which is also important, is the diameter of the warhead.

With the same energy, it is definitely easier to tear a small hole than a large one, so, with this idea in mind, the engineers of Krupp began to study how to make tank shells thinner.

This result is a sub-caliber armor-piercing projectile.

As the name suggests, the sub-caliber, that is, the caliber is smaller, and this kind of shell is equivalent to a sandwich structure.

The outer warhead is a traditional caliber warhead, which accounts for about 60 percent of the entire armor-piercing projectile, and has a sharper inner warhead inside, which is much smaller than the diameter of the artillery shell, and is called a sub-caliber warhead.

When fired, the shell was fired like a normal shell, and when it hit the tank's armor, the warhead was shocked, and the back of the second-diameter warhead was filled with inert gunpowder, and the warhead inside was fired.

In this way, the outer stainless steel warhead is armor-piercing, and the internal tungsten alloy sub-caliber warhead is also armor-piercing, even if the outside cannot penetrate, the inner warhead has a thinner bullet diameter and is easier to penetrate.

"We have now completed the development of a 75-mm sub-caliber shell, which is more than 30 percent more effective than the existing ordinary armor-piercing projectile." Alfred said.

The initial development was not an 88 mm gun, because the performance of this gun was sufficient, and the main armor of any opponent's tank would be penetrated.

And in the equipment of the German army, there are also a large number of 75-mm towed anti-tank guns, which will be the main infantry anti-tank weapons of Germany in recent years, so the first thing to be done now is to improve the performance of this anti-tank gun, after all, the barrel of this gun is not long, and the power is not as good as that of the 88-mm gun.

A 30 percent increase in performance is definitely an absolute figure, and Alfred is very confident.

In later generations, in the late stage of World War II, the technology of German sub-caliber armor-piercing shells has been developed and expanded to all aspects, which is much cheaper than all shells are tungsten alloy, and the armor-piercing ability is better.

But...

Ciric frowned and said lightly: "I think there is still a lot of room for improvement in this kind of shell, that is to say, our armor-piercing projectile mainly relies on the sub-caliber core inside to penetrate the opponent's armor, so such a heavy warhead on the outside is a burden." ”

Relying on the inner core to penetrate, the outer part occupies 60% of the weight, isn't this a burden?

Hearing Ciric's proposal, the Krupp experts present couldn't help but be stunned, how to explain to the Führer?

The reason is very simple, the muzzle is so thick, not on the outer part, how to keep it closed with the barrel? Is it possible for an anti-tank gun with a caliber of 75 mm to fire a core with a diameter of more than ten centimeters?

"I think it is possible to remove all the outer parts, so that the warhead is thinner, the air resistance is less, the velocity in the air is high, and at the same time, with the same energy of the barrel, the lighter warhead can obtain a higher muzzle velocity, and for anti-tank guns, the higher the velocity of the shell, the better." ”

"So, how do we solve the problem of air tightness?" Alfred brought it up, because he knew that since Ciric had mentioned it, there must be a way!

"This is simple, let's add a butt with the same muzzle diameter as the muzzle, won't it solve the problem?" "Wouldn't it be better to let the butt fall off when it flies away from the muzzle, and only the thin armor-piercing projectile in front of it flies?" ”

Suddenly, everyone's mouths opened wide, not bad! This is indeed a good idea, why didn't you think of it?

Führer Ciric, what a genius!

"At the same time, I think that the elongated body of the missile may roll over in flight, so we can install a tail wing on the tail of the body for stabilization." Ciric continued.

Of course, these were not thought up by Ciric, this was originally a common tail stabilized shelling armor-piercing bullet in later generations!

The armor-piercing projectile body is sandwiched in the middle with a lightweight bullet butt, the caliber of the butt is consistent with the caliber of the cannon, the armor-piercing projectile is made into a slender rod shape, and the butt automatically falls off due to the effect of resistance after the discharge, and the projectile body continues to fly along the barrel point, which is the origin of the word "shelling".

At the same time, in order to ensure the stability and accuracy of the slender missile body during flight, when manufacturing the armor-piercing projectile, four tail fins are installed in the tail part, which are arranged in a cross shape, so it is called "tail stability".

The only difference is that the common smoothbore cannon in later generations is used to maintain stability, because this kind of shell does not rotate when it flies out, and now it is common to use rifled guns, and the tail also needs to be used, which is the experience of the British.

Because, this kind of thing, in fact, was invented by the British, and at the end of World War II, the British came up with this new type of ammunition and successfully used it on the 17-pounder anti-tank gun.

Ordinary hollow charge cap-piercing shells, at 500 meters, can penetrate 130 mm of armor, and after the use of shell-piercing shells, the penetration depth in the same situation reaches an astonishing 204 mm! It's definitely a god-defying existence!

Now that Britain has been conquered, there is no need to worry about this anti-sky level armor-piercing projectile, Germany is researching this new ammunition, which is still used as a technical reserve, and there are many unknown risks in new technologies.

For example, although the British in history had this kind of shell-piercing shell, the accuracy was low, the dispersion was large, and the number was small, so there were not many practical applications, and Germany would definitely encounter many problems if it wanted to study it.

This kind of sub-caliber armor-piercing projectile has matured, and the next step is to develop more excellent armor-piercing shells!

"In addition to armor-piercing shells, we are also delving into the protection of armor." Alfred continued: "Right now, we're working on ceramic materials, sandwiched between two layers of armor, in the hope of improving armor protection. ”

Germany has the best armor steel, and has also developed a mouse tank weighing nearly 200 tons, but the last orthodoxy is still the royal road of composite armor, and this thing, relying on the accumulation of industry, also depends on some luck.

German researchers are actively researching new technologies, and at the same time, in the factory, the Tiger tank has finally begun to enter the production stage in large quantities according to the already finalized plan.

On the battlefields of North Africa, fierce fighting continues.

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