Depleted Uranium Alternative

The point of this thread is to ask the community here what would be an alternative to the use of depleted uranium or DU. For those of you who have no idea what DU is:
www.fas.org...
Take note that there are people who say DU is 100% harmless in all shapes and forms, then there are people who say DU is EXTREMELY harmfull and is one reason for the gulf war syndrom, mutations in children in Iraq as well as the USA.

So what would be a good alternative? One that does NOT require the use of any kind of uranium or radioactivity? Yet at the SAME TIME provide MAXIMUM penetration and range just like the current DU rounds? Out of all the metals on the planet there should be SOMETHING out there that will offer the same penetration only without the radioactivity. Also there is the problem that the atomization of the material causes internal problems should someone breath it in.


Any suggestions?

The problem is not just with atomisation of DU, but also that there is some radiation from a small precentile. This could be given off inside a tank as radon gas. Clearly if the victims are suffereing radiation side effects then it is not depleted uranium, but rather waste fuel from a reactor.

There need to be some serious questions asked about where the DU is sourced. If it is radioactive then it is not pure U238. Why is it not pure U238 ?

Is it depleted uranium from centrifuges ?

[edit on 9-6-2007 by sy.gunson]

It does not come from rods as far as I know, there is a LOT of information out there on the subject, just google Depleted Uranium and you will get LOADS of movies on it. I posted them online at another forum and people promptly called me a communist, called ATS a "commy website" and said DU is 100% harmless and is less radioactive than a lightbulb... yeah right. Needless to say I gave them the finger and left.
DU from what I know is the side product of uranium enrichment, yet is used from the leftovers from power plants. I saw a video somewhere once that showed about 400 yards of this stuff in HUGE barrels in the OPEN AIR in a field, stacked on top of each other. From the size of the people I would say one of these barrels was about 4ft wide and over 9ft long, gigantic suckers.

Still though I have seen absolutetly ZERO attempts at trying to find an alternative, only the attempt to make a bigger bomb using this stuff to harden the shell, missiles using it so they are better penetrators and larger shells and bullets so bust armor such as the 12mm gatling round used on anti-tank aircraft.

I learned in science class about the term half life. It is impossible to have 'depleted' anything as nothing ever completely goes away, it will only lose half of itself over a period of time to infinity. The half life of a material is the amount of time this occurs in and is measurable.

I doubt that there's anything heavier/more dense than uranium that exists that would be any safer than DU (in fact I think everything we know of so far would be far more dangerous).

Tungsten

The Rheinmetall 120mm L55 firing tungsten penetrators has around 18-20 megajoules of kinetic energy - which is very sinilar to the M829 APFSDS DU round fired from the M1A1 using the Rheinmetall L44 gun.

People who say that DU is harmelss should go to iraq and go to the docters there because i saw a report on the belgian news that said that there was a massive increase in cancer related desicies and that the cause off the cancer increase was DU that was used in iraq.

Children got cancer after playing in a field where DU was used for bombing that area..... That says it all.

A safe replacement should be tungsten. Rock hard and iff blended with lead, top heavy.

Tungsten eh? I have heard that name before just never when dealing with military equipment.

I am one who believes DU is highly toxic and radioactive and should not be used AT ALL. Yes it penetrates a tank like a knife through butter but at an extremely high cost: 4.5 billion years of radioactivity which we CANNOT solve AT ALL. Remember the Sun is going to last about 6 billion years, so this stuff will have only decayed by 50% 1.5 billion years BEFORE the sun dies... Yes we are screwed.

Anyway, does anyone else have any ideas or suggestions for replacement of DU rounds?

I started a thread a while back here on the dangers of Depleted Uranium...
www.abovetopsecret.com...
I finally got so sick of arguing with people whose only eivdence to the contrary was 'No it isn't' that I gave up on it.
They studied weaponizing depleted uranium specifically as a soil contaminant as early as the 1940's, they knew damned well what it does, and they used it anyway.

Twitchy I actually got partially banned from another website for brining up DU, I argued with people for two days about it being a danger and got so sick of the disrespect and hostility I left. Then I got an e-mail about me being partially banned from the website for "starting a fight" and oh jeez was it idiotic. If you want to see the fight yourself I can link you over to the website I went too and to the exact discussion. Turns out I found a hotbed of bu#es.


I looked into Tungstein and HOLY! That is RARE! Not to mention expensive because of that. So how about a more VIABLE solution to use of DU rounds? Tungstein is just TOO DARN RARE to use for military applications such as armor piercing rounds.

Also what is the KE of DU? KE being Kinetic Energy.

It can`t be that rare its used in light bulbs......

Actually it IS a rare substance, however what is used in a lot of lightbulbs is gases, not metals. Also, the lightbulbs most of us are familiar with have an itsy bitsy piece of metal in it, nothing big.

I am talking MILITARY implications and uses not small time production for household items which pales in comparison.

I'll chime in here:

First, sitting on my desk right next to me now is a DU KE penetrator that was test fired into a lake by an Abrams in the 1990's. It is confirmed to be DU, I have been in very close proximity to it for about 3 years, and I have seen no sign of sickness. I was in fact worried about it for a while, so I went in to the doctor to make sure I wasnt poisoned. And I'm not. At all. After two seperate tests.

Second, the reason DU is poisionous is in fine particles, when they hit tanks they abrade heavily, that releases fine particles into the air, and when inhaled, these are toxic and sometimes fatal. However the general radiation is not enough to cause serious harm, especially not in the short time period of desert storm.

Third, tungsten. A very very very good idea, it is extremely heavy. Tungsten is what they use in X-ray targets. You couldnt walk in shoes made of tungsten. Highest melting temperature of all metals, over 6000F. Its the only metal that I have hit with a full on thermite blast without penetration, and I was only using 1/4" thick tungsten.

Fourth, there is a new technology coming out that consists of carbon nanotubes to create incredibly dense materials. I dont know much about it, but I know its the armor for the FCS MCS. But I dont know anything about it really. I'll look into it.

Originally posted by Vekar
Actually it IS a rare substance, however what is used in a lot of lightbulbs is gases, not metals. Also, the lightbulbs most of us are familiar with have an itsy bitsy piece of metal in it, nothing big.

I am talking MILITARY implications and uses not small time production for household items which pales in comparison.

Interesting statement, considering we used Tungsten tips in our F88 AuStyr rifles and F89 Minimi LSWs, have been using them for ages (well as of five years ago that is).

Germans used Tungsten penetrators (at least on small scale) during the WW2.
The APCR rounds like PzGr.40 had a tungsten carbide core inside an aluminium jacket. So i assume it would viable to use tungsten carbine penetrators instead of DU.

Vekar, tungsten is rare - if you happen to live in the USA, where only 10% of the world's tungsten can be found.

According to the website: www.mii.org... - the USA imports roughly 75-80% of tungsten. China is the biggest producer of tungsten, followed by Russia, Canada, Bolivia, with Austria and Portugal also producing limited quantities.

A solid shot anti-tank round is in effect an updated cannon ball in it's effect on armour, the only difference being it's penetrative power - the balls could probably still defeat very lightly armoured or soft skin vehicles. Their lethality is only hindered by their shape, muzzle velocity and the size of the powder charge necessary to increase range and penetration.

During the Second World War, the Germans pioneered the use of high velocity anti-aircraft guns in the anti-tank role. The superb 8.8cm Flak 36/37 and the 8.8cm Pak 43/44 were prime examples. The Germans used a 'hardened' [tungsten?] solid shot fired from a long barreled gun which in turn, gave the round a much higher muzzle velocity, increasing both range and penetrative power.

German tanks also used high velocity weapons in both 7.5 and 8.8 calibre, most notably the 75mm KwK 42 L/70 on the Panther 'G' and the 88mm KwK 36 L/56 on Tiger I's, whilst tank 'destroyers' such as the Ferdinand and Elephant fired the 88mm Pak 43/2 L/71, and the Jagd Panther used the 88mm Pak 43/3 L/71.

It was not until the introduction of the Comet in late 1944/early 1945 that British tank crews enjoyed comparity with their German counterparts, whilst the Americans used the superb M36 GMC 90mm Tank Destroyer - both being more than capable of defeating the heavier German tanks.

Most modern tank guns fire APFSDS (T) - Chally 2, LeClerc, Abrams, Leopard 2 A6 and the
T-90. However this is where any similarity ends. The Leopard 2 A6 fires the 120mm L55 hyper-velocity gun, using a DM 53 tungsten long rod penetrating round.

The Abrams on the other hand, fires a 120mm M256 smoothbore gun using either the
M865 TPCSDS-T or the M829 APFSDS-T (DU) round.

It should be noted that the Leopard 2 A6 has a much longer barrel that that employed on the Abram, but the American tank gun can only achieve the same accuracy as the Leopard if the DU round is fired.

Having said that, the longest ever tank v tank kill was achieved by a Chally 2, using a 120mm L30, rifled tank gun firing a Charm 3 projectile as supplied by Bae Systems. The actual distance was 5.1km.

See www.army-technology.com/contractors/ammunition/apfsds.htm

With regards to the dangers of a DU round, Westy is absolutely correct. The inert round is harmless. However, when the dart strikes armour and penetrates, uranium dust is produced and it is this material that is fatal if breathed in.

I also have some concerns about the use of DU in armour. I would suspect that the same problem would occur if a projectile penetrated said armour.

To those who made comment about the DU lethality issue: Yes I already know all of that. It atomizez and then you breath in radioactive particles which go into your system. When you body absorbs these atoms then it causes mutations. For some of us it does not mean much since we are far away from where they use this crud. On the other hand, in places like Iraq... Well that right there is where it starts to get noticed. Also, DU armor IS something to worry about, because each time the tank is hit, that is more active DU going into the air as the stuff starts to crack and become active. The Abrams as you already know has a THICK hide of the stuff yet it still gets cut down which means that is a darn high amount of this stuff going into the air.

How exactly does this Tungsten anti-armor projectile work anyway? Do they have a hard core or do they make a "dart" out of it? Then again is it just one giant round without a casing that is a solid round without a jacket?

Interesting about the Chally-2, I will look into that further.

Here is an odd questions I suddenly though of: armor vs armor, tungsten vs DU armor. Then fire one tungsten round and one DU round and which would penetrate what?

WW2 use of tungsten, that would explain why Nazi tanks wiped out everyone so bloody fast, saw a special on the Tiger tank and how it mowed down other tanks.

I don't normally comment on these specific type of issues but I do like the tungsten as DU replacement angle. Tungsten blocks have been used as ballast in race cars (NASCAR - blocks in the frame rails and in race bikes to meet minimum weight rules often secreted into frame rails and engine sumps for a low CG).

Tungsten's largest use by far is in the incandescent light bulb biz in the form of wire. The incandescent light bulb biz is in the process of being legislated out of existence by various governments worldwide so the price of Tungsten "could" possibly drop a bunch in the years to come.

Yes it is relatively rare in a refined or purified form but very abundant in diffuse and hard to smelt ore beds in many nations. Most deposits are igneous-associated but there are less-common sedimentary and volcanic associated deposits, an example would be the sedimentary deposit discovered in Austria at Felbertal.

Tungsten is frequently used in alloying tool "metals" along with silicon-carbide and other metals and some very cool ceramet-blends. I have a couple of really expensive milling machine cutters and drill bits and lathe cutters that claim Tungsten as an alloying component.

As demand for Tungsten in lighting applications drops it may make sense for more use as a DU replacement in a politically palatable manner.

Current worldwide production of "new" Tungsten is 80,0000 tonnes per year and the price of Tungsten fluctuates between $US 4.00/lb a couple of years ago to a higher and more current range of $12.00 - 18.00/lb. and the driver is Chinese demand and production "protections".

Cheers,

Vic

Diamond tiped projectiles anyone?

Adds a bit of bling to the bang so to speak.

Diamond tipped? That would shatter on impact I would believe. None the less what penetrates armor is high velocity and extreme weight. In short your just bludgeoning your target to death.