This module can only be taken as part of the Expeditionary Warfare Systems Engineering and Technology MSc (USA).

To describe the fundamentals of direct and indirect fire weapon systems, their ammunition and sub-system design

At a glance

  • Dates
    • Please enquire for course dates
  • Duration5 days
  • LocationNSWC Crane, Indiana, USA

Course structure

Lectures, tutorials, video demonstrations, computer-based exercises

What you will learn

On successful completion of this module a student should be able to:


- Categorise and appraise the elements that make up a gun system
- Critically evaluate the current technology governing the design of a gun and its ammunition as a system 
- Critically evaluate the current technology covering the design of cannons, their operating mechanism and ammunition
- Critically appraise the fundamentals of gun dynamics and weapon control applied to guns and their effect on the accuracy of fire
- Analyse and contrast/compare the design principles of both direct and indirect fire gun ammunition (fragmenting shell, kinetic energy and shaped charge round
- Critically analyse and relate the importance of gun barrel heat transfer and wear to accuracy of fire

Core content

- Build-up of a gun, 
- Subsystems such as breech, 
- Recoil and platform stability,
- Target analysis,
- Ammunition handling and autoloaders,
- Gun barrel design, 
- Barrel heat transfer,
- Fire control systems and gun dynamics,
- Propellants,
- High explosive (HE),
- Fragmentation and directed energy ammunition,
- Cannons and their operating mechanism.

 

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