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105mm flechette carrier shell
- Thread starter Rrickoshae
- Start date
"Lazy Dogs" were an air dropped item, either in externally mounted cannisters that broke open to spread them out or, allegedly, thrown out of aircraft by hand. There are solid steel, finned and look like a little bomb about the size of the end of one of your fingers.
FNG
FNG
hi, E-Tech, there's nothing on the shell at all. Its all polished aluminium but there are thousands upon thousands of flechettes in there. Dave
V40
Well-Known Member
Whenever a firebase was put up especially near a border region, it definately had a number of flechette rounds to protect the base and its soldiers (usually a company or two; depending). Usually their were some sort of signal given to let the perimeter troops time to get their heads down and deep in their bunkers. These signals would include a certain colored flair fired by a flare gun or M79 and/or a series of whistle blasts and even some sounds from a megaphone. Basically, it was anything that they could use that would get a soldiers attention during a firefight. Sometimes, because of the nature of that war a whole side of a camp could of been overraned and a few were fired in those directions, possibly without any warning. Allot of NVA, VC, and Pathet Lao were mowed down by these rounds with weapons being nailed to there sternum or to any frontal bone including the head. Some of these rounds also went to Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand for CIA and MACVSOG purposes. Just FYI.
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wemme
Well-Known Member
FYI There is a section on lazydog bomb on wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lazy_Dog_(bomb)
How effective were fletchlets and lazy dogs?
I would have thought one would have to be fairly unluck to get hit but one?
Very nice cut away btw.
Regards
Bart
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lazy_Dog_(bomb)
How effective were fletchlets and lazy dogs?
I would have thought one would have to be fairly unluck to get hit but one?
Very nice cut away btw.
Regards
Bart
Attachments
V40
Well-Known Member
Bart, here is a excelent thread on the subject of flechettes and there are many others. Just use the "search" button and you'll find many others on the subject of flechettes. Here is just one.
http://www.bocn.co.uk/vbforum/threads/57425-Flechettes?highlight=Flechettes
Gointodash
Active Member
That round looks familiar. It reminds me of one i saw a couple years ago. It definately has something unusual going on.
If I remember correctly the one i saw functioned in 2 stages. When the fuze functioned it would peel the forward section of the round open like a banana and the flechettes in the forward part of the round would be dispersed by the rotational force of the spinning projectile (notice the flash tubes that dead end on the threads where the upper and middle section of the shell screw together) then after a short delay an expelling charge behind the flechette canister in the lower part of the round would funtion and fire the rest of the flechettes straight forward.
I'll try to look it up at work tomorrow.
If I remember correctly the one i saw functioned in 2 stages. When the fuze functioned it would peel the forward section of the round open like a banana and the flechettes in the forward part of the round would be dispersed by the rotational force of the spinning projectile (notice the flash tubes that dead end on the threads where the upper and middle section of the shell screw together) then after a short delay an expelling charge behind the flechette canister in the lower part of the round would funtion and fire the rest of the flechettes straight forward.
I'll try to look it up at work tomorrow.
The forward "splitting" charge is standard for most US flechette projectiles. This is why you have flechette specific fuzes (first setting is MA for "muzzle action") and the main identification feature, the aluminum ogive with the lower steel body.