From: "Hugh Bellars", [EMAIL PROTECTED]
<The slope effectively increases the thickness and
the chance of a richochet is a bonus. IIRC one of
the factors in AP projectile design is to minimise
the chance of richochet. Hence the use of HE "squash head"
and the probe in front of shaped charges.>
I guess that this thread is straying a bit from the
usual Cybershooters fare, but I couldn't let this one
pass unchallenged.
HESH is not designed the way it is to minimise
ricochets, but to smear a 'pat' of plastic explosive
across the face of the armour before it is detonated
by a base fuze. The shock waves from the explosion are
reflected from the back face of the armour, and the
resultant stresses cause a 'scab' of armour and clouds
of fragments to fly off the back face into the inside
of the tank. HESH is now obsolete against modern
spaced/composite armour, but it is still very effective
against soft and lightly armoured targets.
Likewise, the probe on the front of shaped charges is
not designed to minimise ricochets - it is the contact
fuze designed to fire the warhead. The reason that it
is often on a probe is that the penetration of shaped
charges is greater if the warhead is triggered at a
suitable stand-off from the target (usually best at
about 10 charge diameters IIRC).
<The effective protection of sloping armour is considerably
more than just the effective geometric thickness, due to
the effect of cavitation. As a shot strikes a sloping
plate, the nose is given a "nudge" in the direction
of the slope, such that the shot begins to bias along
the slope, increasing the amount of armour that the shot
has to travel through on a curved path.>
Yes, this is true for ordinary armoured piercing hard
core or armoured piercing discarding sabot ammunition,
but modern 'long rod' penetrators for tank guns are
designed to turn into the slope of the armour, thus
negating the effect of sloping. When you have seen one
of these beasties fired against a target, it kind of
puts all the debates about the 'stopping power'
of smallarms ammunition into perspective!
Going back to the original question - 'would greasing
an steel plate help to induce ricochets?', I doubt that
you would notice any difference, even with low velocity
pistol ammunition, since the different coefficient of
friction would make little difference to the velocity
of the bullet.
