Silly question, but with HESH how do you make sure the round sticks to the tank? Or does it happen so fast you don't have to worry about it sliding off or not being fully in contact with the armour?
Pansarvärnspjäs 1110 (pvpj 1110) "Armour-defence [artillery]piece 1110" seems a very similar contemporary concept, although based around a HEAT-round rather than HESH. I suppose the larger HESH-projectile also made the BAT suitable for demolition work against concrete-reinforced positions, just like tank HESH rounds, was that at any time part of the doctrine or a consideration?
@@aferguson850 it happens in a fraction of a second. It's not a sticky bomb, the force of impact compresses the charge, then the impact detonator at the rear fires near instantly. The main reason it became ineffective is the use of layered and spaced armour, which was even more effective against HESH and HEP than it is against HEAT rounds.
The WOMBAT was retained in West Berlin after it was withdrawn elsewhere, due to the difficulties of using MILAN in a built up area, especially the minimum engagement range which was hard to achieve.
@@zoiders that’s partly it. Also MILAN has a ‘gathering range’ after it’s fired before it’s under control. Any targets going across the line of fire would have disappeared before the operator could hit them.
@@bob_the_bomb4508 In urban fighting there is a very real possibility that the command wire on a MILAN can be cut before it reaches the target. It's been seen on the ranges in Wales that missiles have been lost during battalion live firing because the support company had the AT platoon engage a target while the SF platoon and mortar platoon were also firing upon it. There's so much ball and HE in the air the wire gets shot through and the missile vanishes over the horizon into the next valley or simply gets shot down in flight.
@@zoiders that’s true. One of our combat engineer tasks in the 1 (BR) Corps area was the demolition of electricity pylons to remove them as an obstacle to MILAN. Not the biggest issue in Berlin though.
As a young lad back in the day, as the lowest rung in a Conbat AT gun crew, i was a loader. Always remember how heavy the 120mm shells were, and yes, the back blast. Downside was you also had the job of removing the bloody things if there was a misfire, as the rest of the crew would hastily exit left to a safe distance. Got to fire the thing a few times on the range though, so wasnt all bad. Setting up the .50 spotting rifle and main gun to the sight using a bore scope was also a frequent task.
Once our army reservist mortar platoon at CFB Wainwright did a 81mm mortar illumination night shoot for our sister regiment in the British army, the Royal Irish Rangers armoured defence platoon. Witnessing these 120s firing at night and using thier M8 spotter rifles was an event I will remember forever. Summer of 1981 in Alberta.
I saw them being fired at dusk as part of a battalion in defence firepower demonstration at Warcop in 1978. Very impressive but god would they have been vulnerable as soon as they fired.
I'm an ex-British tank commander (Chieftain\Challenger 1) and frequently heard people mention how loud the 120mm was when firing. Although loud, it was nothing compared to the Wombat. My dad had been Anti-Tank platoon for years with 1RHF. He took me and my brothers along to a range day with the TA at Otterburn and i even got to fire the .50 ranging gun. My overriding memory of the Wombat firing to this day though, was the noise, the way the ground shook even up to 100m away and the venturi blast. It was biblical!
That explanation of squash head rounds was terrifying. I already knew basically how they worked, but the full details about shock waves, and all that, made them sound even worse. As for the naming conventions, one would think that half the development time for these projects is spent making sure the acronyms work out to something cool sounding.
I worked on a (non military, but government) project where the name of the product (and project) changed 4 times in the space of 4 months because people objected to the name as it stood, usually on some petty technicality like "you call it a database, but all databases are the responsibility of department XXX and you're department YYY so you have to change the name" (and yes, that really was one of the reasons we had to change the name of the project).
In the 60's I was in 4th Btn., Queens Royal Surrrey Regt., TAVR. On the BAT crew. Many happy memories of the beast. Very, very heavy with the 4 piece armoured shield!! I clearly recall our exercises where we would tip it into a ditch and had to get it out using just our manual efforts. And don't leave anything behind it when you fired- you will never see it again. We did try the boasted lack of recoil by following the prescribed example of a glass filled to 1/4" of the top and placed on the top shield. Fired without a drop spilled. And the added bonus? We never walked anywhere with our own wheels and plenty of space for our Bengazi Burner and all mod-cons. First rule, look after yourself. The happiest days.
I did my (Swedish) military service with an AT platoon mainly armed with a pair of towed pvpj 1110, a 90mm recoilless rifle. Fun fact: In 1989 the effective ranges were given as 800m/700m for stationary/moving targets. In 2000 those ranges had been dropped to 400m/300m. The Ontos is one of my favorite AFV designs. It's just about perfect for an ambush hit-and-run, the type of combat my unit was supposed to conduct. I've read many complaints about "not able to reload under armor" but that's a total non issue when you have a six-shooter for use in battles that never lasts more than about five seconds. With a single gun you'll be happy if there's time to fire a second shot before having to disengage. Then reloading takes place while not in combat.
So they are fired individually then, in a single shoot-and-scoot? It's not like you drop several in rapid succession, to make CERTAIN that thing you're aiming at is dead?
@@timbirch4999 The platoon had two guns. Both were (supposed to be) fired simultaneously for the first shot, aiming at different targets if more than one was available. Then adjust the aim for subsequent shots, IF (by some miracle) there were time to fire more than one shot. (The platoon also had two Carl Gustaf m/48 recoilless rifles and two LMGs that were supposed to chome in.) The main objective wasn't to "kill" the targets, but to *delay* the enemy advance by forcing them to deal with the threat caused by you.
In 1977-80 I was in A Coy 5 Queens (TA) and our anti-tank teams had MOBATs and were told “when they break if workshops can not fix them, they go off to a museum”. They also had the 7.62 Bren as a spotting rifle and most crews “borrowed” the 30 round mags for their SLRs.
Good presentation. As a US army reserve member I trained recruits in killing Tanks and lighter targets. Dragon, TOW, M72A1 LAW and AT-4/M136. I had a bit of training on the then New Javelin just before my 27 years of service ended. 2 active the rest on the reserve side. The Bat series were serious beasts. The Malkara had a bigger warhead but was a serious training challenge with poor field results.
That was fascinating. I knew that there had been a British weapon system called WOMBAT but knew effectively nothing about it. Now I know quite a bit about a very interesting Cold War era weapon. Thank you.
I spent 12 years in A/Tk started on Wombats back in 69 had a brief spell with Conbat before going to BAOR and back to Wombat, we also had Swingfire at that time, had a couple of years with a TA unit as PSI with MOBATS and finally on to Berlin in 1980 with the Platoon swapping the MILAN and going back to WOMBAT. Loved firing the WOMBAT.
Most enjoyable. I remember the infantry buzzing around the Einbeck Bowl in Landrovers carrying the Wombat, in the early 80s. I was a troop commander AD at the time.
An interesting way of considering the potential of the Burney 3.45” weapon is to imagine one trooper effectively carrying the destructive capability of the legendary 25 pounder gun/howitzer and consideration was given for deploying it in the jungles of Burma where normal artillery could be difficult to field. They were tested at the Shoeburyness Ranges a few miles from where I live. A handful were sent out to Burma but because of the sudden collapse of the conflict there, they were not used operationally. It’s also worth mentioning that Burney built a recoilless weapon designed for the assault on the Atlantic Wall. This was a stonking 7.2” calibre weapon firing a wall-buster shell weighing 139lb. It was trialled in September 1943 against a 5’ thick reinforced concrete wall and the effect was suitably gratifying ~ the re-bars were totally severed and chunks of concrete were blown up to 60 yards from the rear of where the wall had been struck. I believe that ultimately a combination of the problem of the immense back-blast and vulnerability of the firing team saw the 7.2” Burney set aside in favour of the Churchill AVRE with the petard mortar and its 40lb warhead ‘Flying Dustbin’ spigot bomb.
It was an excellent video, but it was not completely comprehensive. I think a comprehensive history of recoiless guns would need to talk more about the Carl Gustav series mentioned at the end.
Thank you for another excellent video. During the time the Wombat was in service, a punishment for a squadie could carrying a dummy full weight practice round for a day.. Somthing to be seriously avoided! Thank you again.
Anyone did the Royal Marine course, all the all arms Lympstone. I did the all arms. If you were a tad under weight in a webbing run, you had to carry heavy kit for the say, one bit was wally the wombat shell. I miss them days. I was young, healthy, fit. I am now stuck in with a lung condition I picked up in Iraq , slightest chill sets me of. I still exercise, but more jogs at a very slow pace.
@@gusgone4527 I went for a run last time, did stretching, woke up this morning very eary because all my body aches. We need stretching classes for us oldies.
@@gusgone4527 Yes, after the bands, after the medals. You still have a life to live. And many of us , have to live it damaged. I have damaged lungs from the toxins that was in the air. But I can still exercise them. And hopefully they wont kill me off to quickly. Losing limbs, brings its own pressure, stress, misery. Others have minds damaged.
I recommend breathing exercises, if you can't do anything else. Just suck the air down, deep as you can, then spread your ribs to keep pulling air in until you are straining, then hold it. Try to count heartbeats, and hold it for one more than it took you to fill up, then control the exhale to the same count as the inhale. Then hold empty, before inhaling again. The inhales will bust anything loose just like a run, as well as really working those rib muscles. The strain of going so long without air is its own pressure. Fifteen minutes of that would leave my back soaked in sweat, before my legs healed up, and it worked for a friend's dad who was largely immobilized for a back injury but he had one of those tilting boards to stretch him. What you said about needing to stretch is sorely true, I have taken up yoga but become slack.
We had Wombat. They had no radio as that could have caused an accidental discharge. I was a signaler, so on exercise sometimes I was sent with them with my A41. Wombat and portee were cool.
Exellent video! In future, if possible, could you please show us the breech open? It is so rare to see it in museum pieces but maybe in these kind of videos it could be done.
Very happy to see this. Using Javelins and other ATGW to attack MBTs, fair exchange. Using them against Sangars, mud brick compounds, bunkers? Not so much. Far more economical to use a recoilless rifle and very portable.
Quite a few atgm type weapons are being developed for the main job of hitting things like bunkers or breaching heavy doors. The Matator is a recent one I believe and AT4s do the job very well.
problem with HESH rounds is that they're not very effective against anything except steel armour plate. And no HE round was AFAIK created for these weapons.
@@jwenting HESH rounds are extremely effective in urban combat. You do realise that the HE bit on HESH stands for High Explosive and the Monroe effect is one of the best ways of poking holes in walls and bringing down structures?
As a British Army Teaching establishment you might like to ask someone as a "Training Exercise" too put some compressed air in the tyres, I bet even Richard would jump at the chance.
HESH is one of those concepts that I have always wondered why it wasn't more widely adopted. I have heard things like it requires rifled barrels which are naturally more expensive than smoothbore barrels and that it's easier to hit a target with a fast moving sabot than the slower HESH but never heard anything along the lines of lack of effectiveness against armor. Not to mention a HESH shell likely can replace normal HE shell in most cases for softer targets.
The use of spaced and composite armour made HESH largely ineffective against heavily armoured target. Sloped armour also deteriorates it's effectiveness so by the 1960s it was becoming more and more "obsolete" as an antitank weapon and against infantry it's not effective as HE as the casing is thinner and doesn't produce much fragmentation.
@@jazzb97 99% of the time you aren't engaging other tanks though its AFVs and if you do have to call up a tank to root out infantry then they are going to be behind concrete in an urban setting. That's why HESH remained a favourite. That doesn't mean sabots were not used it just means they were used appropriately. Using HE against infantry in the open was never very effective. Composite armour won't keep HESH out as the HESH doesn't have to penetrate to injure the crew. It's been shown in Ukraine that there are very few Russian tanks with any of the modern features found on Western tanks that would defeat HESH.
@@jazzb97 You are confusing spaced armour with composite. Composite is ceramic tile on a rubber backing. A big enough HESH round is still going to give you a bad day. You also can't have spaced armour section beneath the composite everywhere as it's bulky. Most Russian tanks have no spaced armour at all. Which is why they are currently being destroyed in Ukraine by quite ordinary AT weapons from the cold war.
Got to fire a couple of rounds out of conbat in Belize as i moved the target out to sea for the Irish guards anti tank platoon. Target only lastest about two rounds after that we shot at the 50 gallon drums.
In the late 1970s, our Wombats were named after the swords of heroes in the the Lord of the Rings. Painted on spotting rifle empty case protective shield. Joke was Wombat "...easily portable by its crew of four..." I believe ours went down on the Atlantic Conveyor after being handed over to Task Force. Unofficial doctrine was three rounds and clear off...signature from ventura was spectacular. Other role for AT platoon was fire support from 0.5 spotting rifle. The famous Browning heavy m.g. Very popular with rifle platoons who were very unhappy about us drawing unwanted attention to themselves and then crashing out to decondary position. They did like our travelling and extensive brew kits, though. Glad we never had to use them for real, though.
I know a fellow Marine who manned an Ontos, and he let me know that if all 6 tubes were fired at once, the two center tubes projectiles would hit each other not very far downrange.
Interesting weapon, today mostly forgotten by major armies, but some insurgency groups still use them... A cousin of mine back in the day had fired one while he was in the army. It was Yugoslav made M60 in 82mm caliber. Almost identical to American recoilless gun. He claims it is very accurate, almost sniper like, but low shell velocity and, biggest drawback - huge "demasking effect" (which is the way our army says "once you pull the trigger, they can see your position from the Moon"). Huge bang, smoke and dust go all around the weapon, so return fire is expected pretty much in seconds...
I've read that Wombats fitted to Land Rovers were supposed to be removed from the vehicle for firing; if firing from the vehicle was necessary, it was to be done at a 90° angle. I have a 1/35 scale Wombat conversion set for the Italeri Land Rover i need to build one of these days....
Sorry if this has already been written: As a child, around 1970, I bought a Britains Models BAT. That has long gone. It was far less effective, as a toy, than the crude Britains 25 Pounder. There were online resources claiming that all of this family were known as the 'VC gun' in British service. You could only got the medal posthumously; because if you killed a tank every single enemy would have started shooting at you before your round landed (and you don't get a medal for missing!). I suggest doing a video on how/why the 17 Pounder ATG was kept in British Army service in Berlin after it has been retired from the BAOR
Not with the back-blast flash signature; especially at night. Once seen, never forgotten. I'm ex-Royal Fusilier - 1969-1972 - and was on training exercise, some way from where the Anti-Tank crews were firing. The low cloud base reflected the flash and we could read by the light. Impressive.
Stop the video at 7:29 and please be upstanding and a round of applause to anyone who’s ever been “beasted” in the guard room with a WOMBAT shell.I feel your pain.
I did the all arms commando course, if you were a tad under weight in say your webbing, you had to carry wally the wombat shell. I remember marching around with it.
To the best of my knowledge the Australian Army never adopted the Wombat. I have read that there were a handful of L2 BATs in use as training weapons but they were never used operationally. The RCL in use from the early 1960s on was the US 106mm M40A1. This was deployed to Vietnam although hardly used and generally left in storage. They stayed in service into the 1990s . There is footage of Australian troops firing MOBAT on the range in Malaysia around the time of Konfrontasi but these were weapons borrowed from a neighbouring British battalion.
I used one during Inf Corps Training. I still have the scab from the Matilda I hit. It's about 75mm & was still attached by about a mm of steel. The inside of the Tank was shredded & nothing left of the scabs or anything else that was protruding anywhere. Terrifying.
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Very interesting Video. Learned something today. Not least about wonderfull Acronyms :)
Ha! I have some Pics of our Bn AT concentration back in the '70s, with a lot of wombats firing their tracer and main over a long camera exposure - must upload it somewhere one day. Back to wombats - good when mounted on the back of a 432, but talk about a signature...... Meanwhile wombat drill rounds were still being used in many Guardrooms throughout the Army for many decades after the weapon itself was withdrawn - they could be polished, and they were heavy - ideal for use by the 'detainees' who would, for loooong periods, either polish or carry them!
When I was a kid there was one of these at Biggin Hill air show which you could play with, including a wood an brass dummy round you could load and eject. Unfortunately when I wasn't paying attention someone ejected the round and it landed on my foot! Ouch. I didn't say anything because I didn't want to spoil the day for the rest of the family, and me of course. It was only when we got home that i spilled the beans... the damage was largely bruising but my poor old big toenail never grew straight again and got worse and worse as I grew older and eventually led to my toenail being killed off so I don't have one anymore....kids eh
It's said to be Australian Forces nickname for short Diggers of a certain roundness and plumpness. Alternatively, for a Reservist on annual training: "Eats, roots, shoots, and leaves."
The bren on the side might not been very good for sighting but would have been good for spraying the enemy after a shell or two I look forward to the next video here in Scotland 🏴
Great vid fun fact about the M50 Ontos yes it did see combat in Vietnam but from wiki quote: The Ontos did see use as an anti-tank weapon during the American involvement in the Dominican Civil War: on 29 April 1965 an M50 Ontos and an M48 Patton of the 6th MEU engaged and destroyed two rebel L/60L light tanks, each destroying one. In another instance, an Ontos destroyed an AMX-13. Apparently the 120mm BAT where shipped to see action in the Falklands war but never got taken of the transport ships they where being transported on.
Served with these weapons for about 5 years. Great weapons, very destructive. We reckoned that WOMBAT meant What! One More BAT!, But the, Squaddies do have a bizarre sense of humour.
Very good if they stick on the slope long enough for the base fuze to function. Between 90 degrees to around 10 degrees have been reported as working. Front slope impacts can slide into the turret ring for very good damage potential.
During many visits and walking Long Distance in Belgium, I sadly first later became aware of the "lost" Tiger 2. in La Gleize and never got to visit it! It has few dents in the front from the Americans, later trying to shot at it with anti tank guns!!
The first effective Recoiless AT Weapon was the US Bazooka at 60mm,GB was content till OP Market Garden then and a Work Group called Broadway began trials with a 3.7" (94mm) BAT using an Barrel from the M1937 Medium AA Gun but had problems with a suitable Venturi then the War ended and the Prototype was Scrapped.The rest is history but the Bren was converted to 7.62 .30 cal which had a similar trajectory to the Mobat and later we used a .50cal as a spotter on the WOMBAT.
@@skepticalbadger Technically the Bazooka is a Firearm under the Sub division Rocket Launcher and still a Gun but why argue over that issue when its main fault was the small Calibre of 60mm,the Germans captured some examples in 1943 in either Tunisia or Sicily and by Oct had a 88mm version working later up calibred to 100mm and these two could knock out all Allied Tanks the 100mm could burn through the Tiger 2s Frontal Armour and Brew Up the interior incinerating the crew.
Not suprised its now obsolete, It had such a flash and dust signature on firing that the crew, no matter how well concealed would have been immediately spotted and dead before they could get off a second roiund.
Our BAT was the 106 Plt We used the M-40 and mounted them on the ground, in an M-151A1C or on an M-274 mule. A 120 mm RCRL would be an earschplittenloudenboomer.
Hi Tank Nuts - let us know what you think of the B.A.T. in the comments below!
Very interesting weapon.
Can be easily handled by it's crew of 3 over rough terrain... who the .... wrote that manual...lol. A.T. the Light Infanty.
Silly question, but with HESH how do you make sure the round sticks to the tank? Or does it happen so fast you don't have to worry about it sliding off or not being fully in contact with the armour?
Pansarvärnspjäs 1110 (pvpj 1110) "Armour-defence [artillery]piece 1110" seems a very similar contemporary concept, although based around a HEAT-round rather than HESH.
I suppose the larger HESH-projectile also made the BAT suitable for demolition work against concrete-reinforced positions, just like tank HESH rounds, was that at any time part of the doctrine or a consideration?
@@aferguson850 it happens in a fraction of a second. It's not a sticky bomb, the force of impact compresses the charge, then the impact detonator at the rear fires near instantly.
The main reason it became ineffective is the use of layered and spaced armour, which was even more effective against HESH and HEP than it is against HEAT rounds.
The WOMBAT was retained in West Berlin after it was withdrawn elsewhere, due to the difficulties of using MILAN in a built up area, especially the minimum engagement range which was hard to achieve.
No point in a missile you can steer when the targets rolling down a strabe hemmed in on both sides by building's.
@@zoiders that’s partly it. Also MILAN has a ‘gathering range’ after it’s fired before it’s under control. Any targets going across the line of fire would have disappeared before the operator could hit them.
@@bob_the_bomb4508 In urban fighting there is a very real possibility that the command wire on a MILAN can be cut before it reaches the target. It's been seen on the ranges in Wales that missiles have been lost during battalion live firing because the support company had the AT platoon engage a target while the SF platoon and mortar platoon were also firing upon it. There's so much ball and HE in the air the wire gets shot through and the missile vanishes over the horizon into the next valley or simply gets shot down in flight.
@@zoiders that’s true. One of our combat engineer tasks in the 1 (BR) Corps area was the demolition of electricity pylons to remove them as an obstacle to MILAN. Not the biggest issue in Berlin though.
@@zoidersutter rot . What do you think happens in a conflict 🙄
As a young lad back in the day, as the lowest rung in a Conbat AT gun crew, i was a loader. Always remember how heavy the 120mm shells were, and yes, the back blast. Downside was you also had the job of removing the bloody things if there was a misfire, as the rest of the crew would hastily exit left to a safe distance. Got to fire the thing a few times on the range though, so wasnt all bad. Setting up the .50 spotting rifle and main gun to the sight using a bore scope was also a frequent task.
Once our army reservist mortar platoon at CFB Wainwright did a 81mm mortar illumination night shoot for our sister regiment in the British army, the Royal Irish Rangers armoured defence platoon.
Witnessing these 120s firing at night and using thier M8 spotter rifles was an event I will remember forever. Summer of 1981 in Alberta.
I saw them being fired at dusk as part of a battalion in defence firepower demonstration at Warcop in 1978. Very impressive but god would they have been vulnerable as soon as they fired.
Almighty God KABIR is the CREATOR OF all SOULS -- SAINT RAMPALJI MAHARAJ
I'm an ex-British tank commander (Chieftain\Challenger 1) and frequently heard people mention how loud the 120mm was when firing. Although loud, it was nothing compared to the Wombat. My dad had been Anti-Tank platoon for years with 1RHF. He took me and my brothers along to a range day with the TA at Otterburn and i even got to fire the .50 ranging gun. My overriding memory of the Wombat firing to this day though, was the noise, the way the ground shook even up to 100m away and the venturi blast. It was biblical!
This channel has the most clear, concise and knowledgeable educators on TH-cam.
That explanation of squash head rounds was terrifying. I already knew basically how they worked, but the full details about shock waves, and all that, made them sound even worse. As for the naming conventions, one would think that half the development time for these projects is spent making sure the acronyms work out to something cool sounding.
Think of a cool acronym, shoehorn the full name in any way you can later on!
Gotta love BESH smothering it's self all over the enemy's face before exploding.
In computing a Wombat, is a Waste of Money, Brains and Time.
Be careful what you wish for
@@davidty2006man getting hit by a 183 HESH really is a significant emotional event
I worked on a (non military, but government) project where the name of the product (and project) changed 4 times in the space of 4 months because people objected to the name as it stood, usually on some petty technicality like "you call it a database, but all databases are the responsibility of department XXX and you're department YYY so you have to change the name" (and yes, that really was one of the reasons we had to change the name of the project).
In the 60's I was in 4th Btn., Queens Royal Surrrey Regt., TAVR. On the BAT crew. Many happy memories of the beast. Very, very heavy with the 4 piece armoured shield!! I clearly recall our exercises where we would tip it into a ditch and had to get it out using just our manual efforts. And don't leave anything behind it when you fired- you will never see it again. We did try the boasted lack of recoil by following the prescribed example of a glass filled to 1/4" of the top and placed on the top shield. Fired without a drop spilled. And the added bonus? We never walked anywhere with our own wheels and plenty of space for our Bengazi Burner and all mod-cons. First rule, look after yourself. The happiest days.
I did my (Swedish) military service with an AT platoon mainly armed with a pair of towed pvpj 1110, a 90mm recoilless rifle. Fun fact: In 1989 the effective ranges were given as 800m/700m for stationary/moving targets. In 2000 those ranges had been dropped to 400m/300m.
The Ontos is one of my favorite AFV designs. It's just about perfect for an ambush hit-and-run, the type of combat my unit was supposed to conduct. I've read many complaints about "not able to reload under armor" but that's a total non issue when you have a six-shooter for use in battles that never lasts more than about five seconds. With a single gun you'll be happy if there's time to fire a second shot before having to disengage. Then reloading takes place while not in combat.
So they are fired individually then, in a single shoot-and-scoot? It's not like you drop several in rapid succession, to make CERTAIN that thing you're aiming at is dead?
@@timbirch4999 The platoon had two guns. Both were (supposed to be) fired simultaneously for the first shot, aiming at different targets if more than one was available. Then adjust the aim for subsequent shots, IF (by some miracle) there were time to fire more than one shot.
(The platoon also had two Carl Gustaf m/48 recoilless rifles and two LMGs that were supposed to chome in.)
The main objective wasn't to "kill" the targets, but to *delay* the enemy advance by forcing them to deal with the threat caused by you.
In 1977-80 I was in A Coy 5 Queens (TA) and our anti-tank teams had MOBATs and were told “when they break if workshops can not fix them, they go off to a museum”. They also had the 7.62 Bren as a spotting rifle and most crews “borrowed” the 30 round mags for their SLRs.
A welcome to Chris Copson..a good new member of the video narrators team 👍
Good presentation. As a US army reserve member I trained recruits in killing Tanks and lighter targets. Dragon, TOW, M72A1 LAW and AT-4/M136. I had a bit of training on the then New Javelin just before my 27 years of service ended. 2 active the rest on the reserve side. The Bat series were serious beasts. The Malkara had a bigger warhead but was a serious training challenge with poor field results.
That was fascinating. I knew that there had been a British weapon system called WOMBAT but knew effectively nothing about it. Now I know quite a bit about a very interesting Cold War era weapon.
Thank you.
I spent 12 years in A/Tk started on Wombats back in 69 had a brief spell with Conbat before going to BAOR and back to Wombat, we also had Swingfire at that time, had a couple of years with a TA unit as PSI with MOBATS and finally on to Berlin in 1980 with the Platoon swapping the MILAN and going back to WOMBAT. Loved firing the WOMBAT.
David Hall were you with 11 York’s ?
Yes I was 2 Yorks 1977 to 79@@grahamprice3230
Most enjoyable. I remember the infantry buzzing around the Einbeck Bowl in Landrovers carrying the Wombat, in the early 80s. I was a troop commander AD at the time.
This is an awesome presentation. I think Chris shows his past military service,. Concise, thorough and crystal clear!!
So one could say that an operator of this weapon might be called Batman. Another excellent video. Fascinating explanation. Thank you!
Interestingly the personal assistant to an officer in the British army was referred to as his "batman".
An interesting way of considering the potential of the Burney 3.45” weapon is to imagine one trooper effectively carrying the destructive capability of the legendary 25 pounder gun/howitzer and consideration was given for deploying it in the jungles of Burma where normal artillery could be difficult to field. They were tested at the Shoeburyness Ranges a few miles from where I live.
A handful were sent out to Burma but because of the sudden collapse of the conflict there, they were not used operationally.
It’s also worth mentioning that Burney built a recoilless weapon designed for the assault on the Atlantic Wall. This was a stonking 7.2” calibre weapon firing a wall-buster shell weighing 139lb. It was trialled in September 1943 against a 5’ thick reinforced concrete wall and the effect was suitably gratifying ~ the re-bars were totally severed and chunks of concrete were blown up to 60 yards from the rear of where the wall had been struck. I believe that ultimately a combination of the problem of the immense back-blast and vulnerability of the firing team saw the 7.2” Burney set aside in favour of the Churchill AVRE with the petard mortar and its 40lb warhead ‘Flying Dustbin’ spigot bomb.
I am really enjoying the anti tank chats, thanks
4:44 😅 that guy totally took a cactus to the face
Excellent video, I've never seen such a comprehensive history of recoilless rifles, and I've always wanted to know more about them!
It was an excellent video, but it was not completely comprehensive. I think a comprehensive history of recoiless guns would need to talk more about the Carl Gustav series mentioned at the end.
See author Ian Hogg for more.
Thank you for the great work Sir
Thank you for another excellent video. During the time the Wombat was in service, a punishment for a squadie could carrying a dummy full weight practice round for a day.. Somthing to be seriously avoided! Thank you again.
When i was a child I had a toy version of this. It fired matchsticks and i spent many hours trying to get it to fire one that would ignite on contact.
Anyone did the Royal Marine course, all the all arms Lympstone. I did the all arms.
If you were a tad under weight in a webbing run, you had to carry heavy kit for the say, one bit was wally the wombat shell.
I miss them days. I was young, healthy, fit. I am now stuck in with a lung condition I picked up in Iraq , slightest chill sets me of.
I still exercise, but more jogs at a very slow pace.
I empathise. Life as a war pensioner sucks. Unemployability and mobility allowances are no compensation for being active and fighting fit.
@@gusgone4527 I went for a run last time, did stretching, woke up this morning very eary because all my body aches.
We need stretching classes for us oldies.
@@tonycavanagh1929 It's difficult to run in a wheelchair.
@@gusgone4527 Yes, after the bands, after the medals.
You still have a life to live.
And many of us , have to live it damaged.
I have damaged lungs from the toxins that was in the air. But I can still exercise them. And hopefully they wont kill me off to quickly.
Losing limbs, brings its own pressure, stress, misery.
Others have minds damaged.
I recommend breathing exercises, if you can't do anything else. Just suck the air down, deep as you can, then spread your ribs to keep pulling air in until you are straining, then hold it. Try to count heartbeats, and hold it for one more than it took you to fill up, then control the exhale to the same count as the inhale. Then hold empty, before inhaling again.
The inhales will bust anything loose just like a run, as well as really working those rib muscles. The strain of going so long without air is its own pressure.
Fifteen minutes of that would leave my back soaked in sweat, before my legs healed up, and it worked for a friend's dad who was largely immobilized for a back injury but he had one of those tilting boards to stretch him.
What you said about needing to stretch is sorely true, I have taken up yoga but become slack.
Thank you for doing this Video.
History of the various BATs, need to be documented.
Well done, sir! I knew about the "projectile out front, gas out the back" principle, but not about the the squash head effect.
We had Wombat. They had no radio as that could have caused an accidental discharge. I was a signaler, so on exercise sometimes I was sent with them with my A41. Wombat and portee were cool.
Thank you .
Another Great video.
Cheers
Very interesting weapon & history. These videos are well presented as always. Thanks TTM 👍
Exellent video! In future, if possible, could you please show us the breech open? It is so rare to see it in museum pieces but maybe in these kind of videos it could be done.
Thanks!
My first Britains toy cannon was a Wombat. :)
Me too :)
Very interesting video. Well presented. I especially like how Mr. Copson pronouces German names in a way that they are actually recognizable.
Very happy to see this. Using Javelins and other ATGW to attack MBTs, fair exchange. Using them against Sangars, mud brick compounds, bunkers? Not so much. Far more economical to use a recoilless rifle and very portable.
One of the reasons the Carl Gustave 84 mm stays popular.
@@silverjohn6037 Indeed, not every solution merits a GLSDB.
Quite a few atgm type weapons are being developed for the main job of hitting things like bunkers or breaching heavy doors. The Matator is a recent one I believe and AT4s do the job very well.
problem with HESH rounds is that they're not very effective against anything except steel armour plate.
And no HE round was AFAIK created for these weapons.
@@jwenting HESH rounds are extremely effective in urban combat. You do realise that the HE bit on HESH stands for High Explosive and the Monroe effect is one of the best ways of poking holes in walls and bringing down structures?
Thanks, excellent presentation. I also had the matchstick firing BAT in the 70s!
I'm disappointed that one wasn't called a Cricket BAT
Or one fitted with a night sight called a Vampire Bat?
Wasn't there a film - Mortal Wombat?
ANZAC respect for the MCC I guess . . . (coughs, somewhat unconvincingly : )
The Crew Served Weapon Sight (a bigger version of the Individual Weapon Sight, a copy of the US starlight scope) was used
But I do see plenty of Old Bats as I move around the neighbourhood.
i was in an anti tank plt in BAOR....loved that gun the wombat !!
I repaired and decommissioned the Wombat at the Airborne Museum in Aldershot about 20 years ago. I had never seen one before. REME Metalsmith 88-10.
As a British Army Teaching establishment you might like to ask someone as a "Training Exercise" too put some compressed air in the tyres, I bet even Richard
would jump at the chance.
If you leave them flat the idiot can't push them into anything
I remember a training session with a wombat as a cadet. It was fitted with a starlight scope. the drill round was enormous. probably heavier than me!
HESH is one of those concepts that I have always wondered why it wasn't more widely adopted. I have heard things like it requires rifled barrels which are naturally more expensive than smoothbore barrels and that it's easier to hit a target with a fast moving sabot than the slower HESH but never heard anything along the lines of lack of effectiveness against armor.
Not to mention a HESH shell likely can replace normal HE shell in most cases for softer targets.
The use of spaced and composite armour made HESH largely ineffective against heavily armoured target. Sloped armour also deteriorates it's effectiveness so by the 1960s it was becoming more and more "obsolete" as an antitank weapon and against infantry it's not effective as HE as the casing is thinner and doesn't produce much fragmentation.
@@jazzb97 99% of the time you aren't engaging other tanks though its AFVs and if you do have to call up a tank to root out infantry then they are going to be behind concrete in an urban setting. That's why HESH remained a favourite. That doesn't mean sabots were not used it just means they were used appropriately. Using HE against infantry in the open was never very effective. Composite armour won't keep HESH out as the HESH doesn't have to penetrate to injure the crew. It's been shown in Ukraine that there are very few Russian tanks with any of the modern features found on Western tanks that would defeat HESH.
@@zoiders Except composite armour will keep HESH out shockwaves travel nowhere near the same through composite or air as in steel
@@zoiders Even ERA defeats HESH and most Russian tanks have ERA
@@jazzb97 You are confusing spaced armour with composite. Composite is ceramic tile on a rubber backing. A big enough HESH round is still going to give you a bad day. You also can't have spaced armour section beneath the composite everywhere as it's bulky. Most Russian tanks have no spaced armour at all. Which is why they are currently being destroyed in Ukraine by quite ordinary AT weapons from the cold war.
Got to fire a couple of rounds out of conbat in Belize as i moved the target out to sea for the Irish guards anti tank platoon. Target only lastest about two rounds after that we shot at the 50 gallon drums.
In the late 1970s, our Wombats were named after the swords of heroes in the the Lord of the Rings. Painted on spotting rifle empty case protective shield. Joke was Wombat "...easily portable by its crew of four..."
I believe ours went down on the Atlantic Conveyor after being handed over to Task Force.
Unofficial doctrine was three rounds and clear off...signature from ventura was spectacular. Other role for AT platoon was fire support from 0.5 spotting rifle. The famous Browning heavy m.g.
Very popular with rifle platoons who were very unhappy about us drawing unwanted attention to themselves and then crashing out to decondary position. They did like our travelling and extensive brew kits, though.
Glad we never had to use them for real, though.
I love weird early versions of things. Like the basics are there, it’s just got an extra shotgun strapped on for no reason.
I know a fellow Marine who manned an Ontos, and he let me know that if all 6 tubes were fired at once, the two center tubes projectiles would hit each other not very far downrange.
As a kid during the mid 60s i had a plastic model thinking Revell put together kit of Ontos...always was a unique model.
Great video :)
Keep 'em coming :)
Meanwhile - I have no rockets in pockets, or wombats in my combats
:)
Nor 'shamoolis in me goolies'.....wow...takes me back
Excellent ! Very interesting. Thanks a lot for the video.
Interesting weapon, today mostly forgotten by major armies, but some insurgency groups still use them...
A cousin of mine back in the day had fired one while he was in the army. It was Yugoslav made M60 in 82mm caliber. Almost identical to American recoilless gun. He claims it is very accurate, almost sniper like, but low shell velocity and, biggest drawback - huge "demasking effect" (which is the way our army says "once you pull the trigger, they can see your position from the Moon"). Huge bang, smoke and dust go all around the weapon, so return fire is expected pretty much in seconds...
The Carl Gustav works the same way and is still around plenty. Man prortable though.
I've read that Wombats fitted to Land Rovers were supposed to be removed from the vehicle for firing; if firing from the vehicle was necessary, it was to be done at a 90° angle.
I have a 1/35 scale Wombat conversion set for the Italeri Land Rover i need to build one of these days....
Sorry if this has already been written: As a child, around 1970, I bought a Britains Models BAT.
That has long gone. It was far less effective, as a toy, than the crude Britains 25 Pounder.
There were online resources claiming that all of this family were known as the 'VC gun' in British service. You could only got the medal posthumously; because if you killed a tank every single enemy would have started shooting at you before your round landed (and you don't get a medal for missing!).
I suggest doing a video on how/why the 17 Pounder ATG was kept in British Army service in Berlin after it has been retired from the BAOR
...any topic that launches with a nod to the Ontos, is bound to intrigue 👍🍻
I've always had a thing for the BATs. I have a feeling WOMBATs on FV432s might be surprisingly useful for Ukraine right now.
The Swedish PV-1110 Recoilless Gun has seen use in Ukraine: th-cam.com/video/p1XxLbl-iQk/w-d-xo.html&ab_channel=TheArmourer%27sBench
Not with the back-blast flash signature; especially at night. Once seen, never forgotten. I'm ex-Royal Fusilier - 1969-1972 - and was on training exercise, some way from where the Anti-Tank crews were firing. The low cloud base reflected the flash and we could read by the light. Impressive.
@@russbetts1467 and not against T62s and later, as they are far less vulnerable to HESH rounds than are the older T55s they were designed to take out.
That was absolutely fascinating. Thank you.
Same principal as the Cark Gustav. Thanks for the vid.
Stop the video at 7:29 and please be upstanding and a round of applause to anyone who’s ever been “beasted” in the guard room with a WOMBAT shell.I feel your pain.
Was still a thing in the 90s
Beasting. Now theres a term I havent heard for a while. hah
I did the all arms commando course, if you were a tad under weight in say your webbing, you had to carry wally the wombat shell. I remember marching around with it.
, and for good measure, the shell case was filled with concrete.
That was so informative from Chris again.
Another fine video as always. Thank you very much.
Great video. Thanks and please keep them coming.
Luv the clear explanation.
To the best of my knowledge the Australian Army never adopted the Wombat. I have read that there were a handful of L2 BATs in use as training weapons but they were never used operationally. The RCL in use from the early 1960s on was the US 106mm M40A1. This was deployed to Vietnam although hardly used and generally left in storage. They stayed in service into the 1990s .
There is footage of Australian troops firing MOBAT on the range in Malaysia around the time of Konfrontasi but these were weapons borrowed from a neighbouring British battalion.
I used one during Inf Corps Training. I still have the scab from the Matilda I hit. It's about 75mm & was still attached by about a mm of steel. The inside of the Tank was shredded & nothing left of the scabs or anything else that was protruding anywhere. Terrifying.
Very interesting Video. Learned something today. Not least about wonderfull Acronyms :)
Ha! I have some Pics of our Bn AT concentration back in the '70s, with a lot of wombats firing their tracer and main over a long camera exposure - must upload it somewhere one day. Back to wombats - good when mounted on the back of a 432, but talk about a signature......
Meanwhile wombat drill rounds were still being used in many Guardrooms throughout the Army for many decades after the weapon itself was withdrawn - they could be polished, and they were heavy - ideal for use by the 'detainees' who would, for loooong periods, either polish or carry them!
2:55 I have a surviving Stereoscope of the Krupp exhibit at the 1893 World's Fair, an astounding display.
When I was a kid there was one of these at Biggin Hill air show which you could play with, including a wood an brass dummy round you could load and eject. Unfortunately when I wasn't paying attention someone ejected the round and it landed on my foot! Ouch. I didn't say anything because I didn't want to spoil the day for the rest of the family, and me of course. It was only when we got home that i spilled the beans... the damage was largely bruising but my poor old big toenail never grew straight again and got worse and worse as I grew older and eventually led to my toenail being killed off so I don't have one anymore....kids eh
The right tyre on that L7 could use some air.
I can remember night firing the conbat at imber ranges ( i was in Anti-tanks Plt 1LI )
Forgotten Weapons did a video on the M8 spotting rifle
The car Burney is pictured with at the beginning of this piece is (I think) called the Burney Streamline and is of his own design.
I love recoilless rifles as a concept so this was great.
It's a good thing development ended when it did, or they would have tried to name a version combat wombat.
Hodaka motorcycles named one of their off road bikes that, I believe. Company long gone too.
It's said to be Australian Forces nickname for short Diggers of a certain roundness and plumpness. Alternatively, for a Reservist on annual training: "Eats, roots, shoots, and leaves."
Brilliant presentation.
The forward velocity of the hollow charge projectile before impact plays NO role ..... It can be even 0 m/s and be very effective ... Nice video 👍
The bren on the side might not been very good for sighting but would have been good for spraying the enemy after a shell or two I look forward to the next video here in Scotland 🏴
Great vid fun fact about the M50 Ontos yes it did see combat in Vietnam but from wiki quote: The Ontos did see use as an anti-tank weapon during the American involvement in the Dominican Civil War: on 29 April 1965 an M50 Ontos and an M48 Patton of the 6th MEU engaged and destroyed two rebel L/60L light tanks, each destroying one. In another instance, an Ontos destroyed an AMX-13. Apparently the 120mm BAT where shipped to see action in the Falklands war but never got taken of the transport ships they where being transported on.
Served with these weapons for about 5 years. Great weapons, very destructive. We reckoned that WOMBAT meant What! One More BAT!, But the, Squaddies do have a bizarre sense of humour.
It should be noted that recoilless rifles were used for decades after military service for avalanche control
This is very help full info for a mod we're working on for hoi4
I come across a wombat at an army fair and it had a Bren gun for ranging
Good video. Thank you.
Used ontos in Vietnam with beehive rounds and flechet rounds for fire base defense.
I love recoilless rifles ❤
how well do squash head rounds works if they strike at an oblique angle ?
Very good if they stick on the slope long enough for the base fuze to function. Between 90 degrees to around 10 degrees have been reported as working. Front slope impacts can slide into the turret ring for very good damage potential.
During many visits and walking Long Distance in Belgium, I sadly first later became aware of the "lost" Tiger 2. in La Gleize and never got to visit it! It has few dents in the front from the Americans, later trying to shot at it with anti tank guns!!
Pump the tyres up, there's a good chap.
The first effective Recoiless AT Weapon was the US Bazooka at 60mm,GB was content till OP Market Garden then and a Work Group called Broadway began trials with a 3.7" (94mm) BAT using an Barrel from the M1937 Medium AA Gun but had problems with a suitable Venturi then the War ended and the Prototype was Scrapped.The rest is history but the Bren was converted to 7.62 .30 cal which had a similar trajectory to the Mobat and later we used a .50cal as a spotter on the WOMBAT.
The bazooka is Recoilless but is not a recoilless gun. It's a rocket launcher.
@@skepticalbadger Technically the Bazooka is a Firearm under the Sub division Rocket Launcher and still a Gun but why argue over that issue when its main fault was the small Calibre of 60mm,the Germans captured some examples in 1943 in either Tunisia or Sicily and by Oct had a 88mm version working later up calibred to 100mm and these two could knock out all Allied Tanks the 100mm could burn through the Tiger 2s Frontal Armour and Brew Up the interior incinerating the crew.
I used to have a Dinky or Corgi toy of one of these in the 1960s. it was just called a BAT gun so I have no idea what specific piece it was.
Nice description, thanks.
Grandfather was in charge of an anti-tank company in germany with these things. In the DERR.
Not suprised its now obsolete, It had such a flash and dust signature on firing that the crew, no matter how well concealed would have been immediately spotted and dead before they could get off a second roiund.
very good ,the complete package
I always wondered at the wisdom of fixing bayonets on artillery... 😎
This should still be useful for blowing holes in walls and dealing with bunkers.
Trained on a 90mm recoiless rifle . Never saw them used in vietnam...
I enjoyed your video and learned something I didn't know about recoilless weapons...dang it i thought I knew everything 😁👍
Bat, Bat, Bat... I was waiting for Chris to suddenly say "I am Bat-Man"!!!
So modern guided rockets are recoiless projectiles with articulated stabilizing fins in-place of a tube/barrel.
And on this VE day. 🇬🇧 thanks
Our BAT was the 106 Plt We used the M-40 and mounted them on the ground, in an M-151A1C or on an M-274 mule. A 120 mm RCRL would be an earschplittenloudenboomer.
Like, 155dB. Broke windows.
Handsome looking weapon. Great presentation, thank you