-=> Quoting John Sandow to Steve Gunhouse <=-
 SG>What about S&W's new, improved 9-shot M-17? And I hear Taurus will now be
 SG>making a 10-shot. If the 9-shot was an "evil-assault-revolver", does that
 SG>make a 10-shot a tactical nuclear weapon? :-O
 JS> Yeah, with depleted uranium penetrators that make little mini nuclear
 JS> explosions on impact...  :-)
 JS> On a related subject, one of the guys I worked with was in the navy
 JS> for 4 years.  I forget what his job was, but it was not a metalurgist.
 JS> He was describing the Phlanx ship defense system that uses a 20mm
 JS> vulcan cannon, and informed me that the gun used 'depleted titanium
                                                       ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
 JS> rounds'.  Must be heck on the barrel walls, eh?  :-)
    ^^^^^^^^^
 But John, Ti isn't ever "pleated". Your friend is probably talking about 
uranium. Also, Ti isn't dense, therefore it wouldn't be one's first choice 
for a penetrator. Uranium and tungsten are two elements that will be in heavy 
demand as we develop and deploy kinetic weapons systems. All that mass, when 
accelerated to 7-14 mach, results in a very impressive demolition of the 
target.
 In re the barrel walls, the larger bullets (20 mm, 30mm) use a system which 
includes a "rotating band" in the assembly. It is basically just a bronze 
ring sweated into a shallow groove. While it is too tight to turn manually, 
it does rotate, probably to give the round (made of very dense, but hard, not 
tough, material) a chance to (relatively) slowly gain RPM, avoiding any 
chance of fracturing the bullet. Also, it obviously is better bearing 
surface, and will easily take rifling.
... Tighten until it cracks, then back off one half turn. ___ Blue Wave/QWK 
v2.12 
--- InterEcho 1.11
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