Project Reality Forums

I made this suggestion in another thread in the off topic section. While watching the video of Marines engaging Insurgents held up in a house, they used a SRAW AT rifle. I saw something that I thought would be a great edition to PR.

Many AT and recoilless rifles use them, shoot a smaller tracer round like a 9mm and use its trajectory to adjust your more important shot. I would guess that you could just add another fire mode to the already used LAT kits, (except the RPG), one tracer round small caliber so it doesn't do much damage to human targets and no damage to armor. We could even bring back the SMAW with no lock on and a equal for PLA and MEC.

Video you can see the Marine cocking and reloading the rounds at the 25 second mark and firing at the 2:20 mark.

LiveLeak.com - US Marines ambush insurgents in a building.

The SMAW fires a variety of rockets from an encased tube attached to the launcher. The launcher consists of a fiberglass launch tube, a 9mm spotting rifle, an electro-mechanical firing mechanism, open battle sights, and a sight mount for attaching the Mk42 Mod O optical scope and other day and night vision sights. The integrated spotting rifle fires 9mm tracer ammunition to determine range and crosswind correction. The system has an effective range of 250 meters. The SMAW is employed in offensive and defensive combat operations by infantry and combat engineer Marines, typically to destroy crew-served weapons emplacements and vehicles and to breach building walls.

And to for balance reason the SMAW can be fired unguided, flattened trajectory, line of site weapon.

i know that in training soldiers will use modified at-4s that fire tracer bullets instead of rockets, that way it costs much less to train than firing real rockets all day. but im not sure if they use them in combat to accurately gauge the shot, but if they do, well that would be an awesome addition to PR.

The video in my post is very much combat.

They do fire tracers to find trajectory in combat, nedlands added this the the LAW. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3l1Z6JTUqHU[/youtube]

Won't work for the AT4. They don't have a tracer system on the actual field weapons. Only tracer ones are trainers.

Thats why I was suggesting the USMC getting the SMAW, I heard it was already in and got removed but I'm not for sure.

That leaves the LAW for the Brits and the SMAW for the Marines.

I looked for PLA and MEC(Basing off Iran), and the light AT Rifles they are using do not have spotting rifles. I hope the spotting rifle feature gets considered even though not all factions use it.

charliegrs wrote:i know that in training soldiers will use modified at-4s that fire tracer bullets instead of rockets, that way it costs much less to train than firing real rockets all day. but im not sure if they use them in combat to accurately gauge the shot, but if they do, well that would be an awesome addition to PR.

The M136 Trainer version that fires the sub-cal round is never used in combat. The purpose of this device was intended to train soldiers to properly use the sights of the M136 without having to fire live rockets or having to design a complex and expensive electronic trainer. Because the M136 is a shorter-ranged AT weapon, the use of a "ranging shot" would be fairly pointless as you would be so close that your target would most likely hear the shot and react, thereby probably moving and making the ranging shot less effective. Since more than one soldier will usually fire at armor with those weapons in a volley, it's most likely that at least one of the rounds will impact the target. Also by using such a device during training, using the sights during a live-fire should leave little room for error in range estimates and ensure a higher chance of a positive hit.

It would also not prove very effective if the ranging device was seperate from the live rocket, having to fire the trainer version and then pickup and ready a live round using the exact same sight picture would waste much time. Guided munitions, such as the TOW, would not need a ranging device either because of their guidance system. Come to think of it, I am not aware of any US military man-portable AT weapons that are in use today that still use the sub-cal spotting devices other than the SMAW. One note to mention is that the PEQ-4 can be used instead of the spotting device, but this is usually only effective when using NVD's due to range of target and daylight visibility of that sight at such ranges.

A few non-US nations do still use spotting devices on their weapons, namely the British. The LAW 80 spotting device is the model that the USMC copied into the SMAW (well, Lockheed-Martin copied it really).

Ninja2dan wrote: A few non-US nations do still use spotting devices on their weapons, namely the British. The LAW 80 spotting device is the model that the USMC copied into the SMAW (well, Lockheed-Martin copied it really).

no, not trainers used in combat silly! most of the thread is related to the SMAW tracer.

Well why not add extra rounds? There are several different projectiles for the AT4. Note that since the AT4 is a one-shot weapon, these projectiles are preloaded into the launcher tubes.

HEAT (High Explosive Anti Tank)
The AT4 HEAT round can penetrate up to 420 mm of RHA.

HEDP (High Explosive Dual Purpose)
For use against bunkers and buildings. The projectile can be set to detonate on impact or with a delayed detonation.

HP (High Penetration)
Extra high penetration ability (up to 500 to 600 mm of RHA.)