And what country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
It's likely water from swabbing out the breech with a big wet sponge after each round was fired, so the next powder charge didn't hit a flaming ember and detonate prematurely.
When you spin the gun to lay on a new azimuth, as they're doing here, the breech rotates too, and the puddle is now on one side or the other, rather than its former location dead center behind the gun.
Dat's a 155, 100# shell came on pallet of 8 thats one of them on the ground could lob the round 25miles supposed to have crew of 7 , I never had more than 4 we were air mobile under the belly of a chinock until they decided too many came back down and we had to wait for the jolly green. Ah 20yrs old, all the ammo you could shoot warm beer free marlboros and $89 a month with another $25 thrown in for combat.
Um, not so much. Max range on The Pig was 16K yards, or a shade over 9 miles.
The only way you could fire a shell from one and have it go 25 miles would be as the belly gun on the Space Shuttle.
The gun also weighs over 12,000 pounds, even stripped for combat, and the max payload on the Jolly Green was 6000 pounds, and the max takeoff weight was only 9000 pounds above the empty weight, and that's before we talk about air density 10° above the equator, worse at altitude, so no Jolly Green was picking up Pigs anywhere in 'Nam, ever.
The Sh*thook A and B models could only pull 10,000 pounds stripped, which is more than the Jolly Green, not less, and they could only lift 7,000-8,000 pounds in-country, so no one was lifting Pigs in 'Nam with those either.
They couldn't even try it until the D model was introduced, which didn't happen until '79. Which is 6 years after we pulled out of Vietnam, and 4 years before it went all-commie from the Delta to the Chinese border.
If you yanked a lanyard in 'Nam, you should know the difference between an 105mm M-101, and a 155mm M-144.
Starting with the fact that the little 105mm howitzers, unlike their big brothers, only weigh about 5,000 pounds, and are the only guns any helicopter could pick up from 1965-1973. Let alone carrying another 1000 pounds of cannon-cockers inside the bird.
Some of us have done this for real, and in places other than Call Of Duty.
I'm not saying you didn't, but if you did, it's time for a check-up. Your memory is shot. But then, you'd be in your 70s now, so that's par for the course, and something we all have to look forward to.
Aesop. My WW II father was in artillery, 155s was all his battalion had, besides the 50's to protect them. Decorated by Patton twice, DeGaulle, Eisenhower, and Bradley. He said they could lay'em in at 25 miles all day and all night. Just like he did at Mannheim and many other places. He said they just added an small booster powder charge that provided the extra distance. Call him a liar if you want,,, be glad you don't know him if you do,,, Mr authority on all that is.
Dress code was jungle boots w/o socks, baggy fatigues w/o bvds, and a t-shirt. Add a green towel around neck to soften the ruck straps and wipe your brow. Good for a week until another supply came in.
JB's without socks - at last another Troopy who got along fine without them. No skivvy drawers either. Out of the field, socks and skivvy drawers were like lounge wear.
Used to pile 4 or 5 pallets of these 155mm shells together at a time and detonate all in one shot. The Navy doesn't like ammo that's been unloaded from the ship and sitting around in a humid area for very long. They refuse to put it back on the ship so it's disposal time.
I think it is a M114 155 mm howitzer.
ReplyDeleteDefinitely appears to be.
DeleteQuite so.
Delete"The Pig".
Klunky, heavy, solid, reliable, ugly-as-sin p.o.s., but it got the job done.
Is that an oil slick under the left tire? Did it have an oil lube system?
ReplyDeleteIt's likely water from swabbing out the breech with a big wet sponge after each round was fired, so the next powder charge didn't hit a flaming ember and detonate prematurely.
DeleteWhen you spin the gun to lay on a new azimuth, as they're doing here, the breech rotates too, and the puddle is now on one side or the other, rather than its former location dead center behind the gun.
Dat's a 155, 100# shell came on pallet of 8 thats one of them on the ground could lob the round 25miles supposed to have crew of 7 , I never had more than 4 we were air mobile under the belly of a chinock until they decided too many came back down and we had to wait for the jolly green. Ah 20yrs old, all the ammo you could shoot warm beer free marlboros and $89 a month with another $25 thrown in for combat.
ReplyDeleteUm, not so much.
DeleteMax range on The Pig was 16K yards, or a shade over 9 miles.
The only way you could fire a shell from one and have it go 25 miles would be as the belly gun on the Space Shuttle.
The gun also weighs over 12,000 pounds, even stripped for combat, and the max payload on the Jolly Green was 6000 pounds, and the max takeoff weight was only 9000 pounds above the empty weight, and that's before we talk about air density 10° above the equator, worse at altitude, so no Jolly Green was picking up Pigs anywhere in 'Nam, ever.
The Sh*thook A and B models could only pull 10,000 pounds stripped, which is more than the Jolly Green, not less, and they could only lift 7,000-8,000 pounds in-country, so no one was lifting Pigs in 'Nam with those either.
They couldn't even try it until the D model was introduced, which didn't happen until '79. Which is 6 years after we pulled out of Vietnam, and 4 years before it went all-commie from the Delta to the Chinese border.
If you yanked a lanyard in 'Nam, you should know the difference between an 105mm M-101, and a 155mm M-144.
Starting with the fact that the little 105mm howitzers, unlike their big brothers, only weigh about 5,000 pounds, and are the only guns any helicopter could pick up from 1965-1973. Let alone carrying another 1000 pounds of cannon-cockers inside the bird.
Some of us have done this for real, and in places other than Call Of Duty.
I'm not saying you didn't, but if you did, it's time for a check-up.
Your memory is shot.
But then, you'd be in your 70s now, so that's par for the course, and something we all have to look forward to.
Aesop. My WW II father was in artillery, 155s was all his battalion had, besides the 50's to protect them. Decorated by Patton twice, DeGaulle, Eisenhower, and Bradley. He said they could lay'em in at 25 miles all day and all night. Just like he did at Mannheim and many other places. He said they just added an small booster powder charge that provided the extra distance. Call him a liar if you want,,, be glad you don't know him if you do,,, Mr authority on all that is.
DeleteGo to his blog, Anon. He pwned you.
DeleteAnd you never get to enjoy the high notes in rock and roll ever again.
ReplyDeleteWhat's going on with the dance team in the background?
ReplyDeleteLaying the gun.
DeleteI have pictures of both my dad and uncle from the Korean War with those things.
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteVietnam, f the dress code.
Dress code was jungle boots w/o socks, baggy fatigues w/o bvds, and a t-shirt. Add a green towel around neck to soften the ruck straps and wipe your brow. Good for a week until another supply came in.
DeleteJB's without socks - at last another Troopy who got along fine without them. No skivvy drawers either. Out of the field, socks and skivvy drawers were like lounge wear.
DeleteUsed to pile 4 or 5 pallets of these 155mm shells together at a time and detonate all in one shot. The Navy doesn't like ammo that's been unloaded from the ship and sitting around in a humid area for very long. They refuse to put it back on the ship so it's disposal time.
ReplyDelete