M-795 projectiles

The Ukrainian military is firing an estimated 6,000 - 8,000 M795 projectiles daily at Russian targets. Two days of expenditures at this rate is roughly equivalent to one month's production of M795 rounds in the United States (at 2022 production levels).   -Wikipedia

Assuming the factory is running six-days-a-week then the US factory has a daily rate between 500 and 600 projectiles. That is in-line with the production rate of a single shift at an automotive assembly plant.

Using the calculations from above, Ukraine (one side of a small brushfire war between two powers both of whose battlefield doctrine relies heavily on artillery) is burning through 13 days worth of US (former-superpower) production every day.

One of the bottlenecks to increasing production is that the forging of the shell of the projectile is a slow process and the dies are subject to wear.

Any effort to increase production will inevitably run into this constraint.

If I ran the universe...

 

I would introduce the M795-NI alternative.

600, deep-draw, one-hundred-pound forgings a day is a lot of forgings.

6000, one-hundred-pound nodular iron castings a day is not since a single foundry will supply all of the crankshafts used by several engine plants (which typically run three-shifts-a-day and six-days-a-week)

Nodular iron is used for vehicle engine crankshafts and MacPherson strut knuckles and in the wheels of train-cars. There is a great deal of automated production available world-wide.

What do you give up by switching to Nodular Iron?

Typical mechanical properties for an as-forged, medium carbon steel might be:

• Ultimate tensile strength of 100,000psi
  
• Yield strength of 60,000psi
• Elongation before failure of 20%
• Mass density of 7.8g/cm^3

Typical mechanical properties of an as-cast, ferritic grade of nodular iron are more modest

• Ultimate tensile strength of 60,000psi (a drop of 40%)
  
• Yield strength of 40,000psi (a drop of about 30%)
  
• Elongation before failure of 18% (a drop of 10%)
  
• Mass density of 7.2g/cm^3 (a drop of about 10%)

There is also a penalty in the uniformity of the mechanical properties, particularly with respect to tail-to-nose as the casting will have different cooling rates due to thickness considerations and the location of the risers in the sand. There is also more variation in mass density than for steel which will cause more variation in point-of-imact.

The smart designer would increase the thickness of the sides of the projectile to produce a projectile of the same mass as the steel version and match the center-of-mass so the ballistics will be identical to the original. That would come at a slight cost in the the amount of high-explosive that can be packed into it.

The good news is that the elongation of the two materials are close. That means that the energy released by the high-explosive will transfer to the kinetic energy of the shrapnel (i.e. the efficiency) will be close.

Given the slow turn-over of the procurement apparatus, it would behoove the Pentagon to start investigating the Dollar General version of the M-795 shell today.

In defense of Mike Pence

Mike Pence is quoted as saying that he did not think the plight of cities was his concern.

Why SHOULD the President of the United States be concerned about US cities?

"Helping" them enables them and they continue to double-down on their maladaptive remedies rather than facing reality.

Rather than cutting payrolls and rationalizing services offered, rather than paring back compensation packages to be more in line with that of their residents, they hold out their hands and demand that Uncle Sugar make-them-whole.

Constitutionally, the cities belong to the states and are not a Federal responsibility.

Cap guns

 https://mcmillenauctions.bidspirit.com/?lang=en&it=97372_4xjf8w_button&noRedirect=1&logo#catalog~245~266

A sample of what is going under the hammer on Monday:

Many, many more at the auction site. Just the thing to buy as a present for a young boy in a woke family. Either that or a set of drums and bag-pipes.

Nope. Not this time

 

EATON RAPIDS TWP., Mich. (WLNS) — The Federal Bureau of Investigation has confirmed it is assisting the Eaton County sheriff’s office with an investigation at a home in Eaton Rapids Township.

Several unmarked FBI and police cars have entered the property at Bunker Highway, near Eaton Rapids. The entrance is blocked off with crime scene tape.

Tractors equipped with backhoes were entering and leaving the property Thursday. Neighbors said that they had no idea there was an active search going on at the home. 

They described the person living there as an older man who rarely came out of the house.

An FBI presence is visible again Friday at a property at Bunker Highway near Eaton Rapids.

Unmarked law enforcement cars were parked on the property for much of the day on Thursday, and tractors equipped with backhoes were also on the scene.

Crime scene tape can still be seen at the property, and at least one apparent FBI agent was on the property making sure people stayed off private property.  Source

I had several readers call and ask if I needed money for bail. I assured them that Mrs ERJ was FINE and honest-to-goodness was out of town. 

Really.

Geeze, you guys have suspicious minds.

This visit from the long arm of the law did  not occur on my property.

This time.

 

An interesting dynamic

Suppose you were involved in a church whose stated mission was to bring the Good News of Jesus Christ to as many souls as possible.

Furthermore, suppose you were stupendously successful on the wrong-side-of-the-tracks while most of your funding came from legacy members who were quickly dying off. Those affluent members lived in the mansions on the hill on the affluent-side-of-the-tracks.

Now suppose that the legacy members, the money-bags, had one set of priorities and those priorities were repulsive to the new members you were winning over in droves.

Which piper do you dance to?

That is the situation that most Christian denominations, including Catholics, find themselves in.

The growth is in Africa and Latin America. They don't have much tolerance for the LGBT crowd because they have lived through real privation and threat of death.

The money-bags are in North America and they are trying to buy their salvation by "enlightening" the benighted pagans of Africa and Latin America.

The rumbling among the back-pews of Catholic churches is that there is a large commission being formed to outline a long-term campaign with regard to Church priorities. The rumbling suggests that the committees are being salted with progressives who are close to the heart of mammon and not-so-many iron-spined champions of the Good Book.

Luke 16 tells a story of the shrewd steward who was caught cheating. In the story, the steward re-writes the contracts of the tenants who owed the landlord money in which he re-wrote them but removed the "management fees" or commission that the (new) steward would collect.

The parable is unique for the amount of post-story editorializing. The narrator says that the sons-of-light should learn from the more worldly. That is an unusual position.

My take-away is that many "worldy" organizations "went WOKE" and ceased to be relevant. That lesson is in bright, flashing lights. God gave us brains, even to the clergy. He expects us to use them. Even the clergy. Going WOKE is not the path to success. Not in business. Not in salvation.

The final line of the chapter is 

“No servant can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon."

Why is this even an issue?

The general Christian position is "Who you are attracted to is not a sin. How you act on it is." You can be married hetero and see a real hottie making eyes at you. Sex outside of marriage is a sin. If you pursue the hottie then you are a sinner just like a pervert raw-dogging a dude in a bath-house. One either seeks and submits to God's will or one doesn't.

We are all sinners. We all need a path to redemption. BUT THAT DOES NOT CHANGE THE DIVIDE BETWEEN WHAT IS RIGHTEOUS AND WHAT IS SINFUL.

The mice will play when the cat is away...

Mrs ERJ and I are a team.

There are some things she does exceptionally well and I am joyful to let her do them.

When a call comes out for succor and aid and it requires getting on an airplane and batting about to distant corners of our great country, I am very happy to let Mrs ERJ do it.

On the other hand, if it requires driving down country roads at 3:00 AM in the morning, I get the nod. "Yeah though I walk through the valley of death and narcolepsy, I fear no evil for God is my rod and my staff and I have a large mug of caffeinated beverage."

So we got a call. Mrs ERJ is enroute, pending flight delays for weather. I will be left to my own devices.

I was left with strict instructions to not step in front of speeding cars nor to attempt to stop bullets nor locomotives.

Nor am I to use a ladder without somebody nearby to call 9-1-1. Ditto for chainsaws.

I already pissed off one of my kids. I was tasked with transporting it to the mechanic and communicating issues. After it was fixed, my dear, loving child asked what was wrong with it.

I texted my child "Jesse replaced the turbo-encabulater and of course he had to also change out the Thorvald thrust plates. Then he had to recalibrate the micro-crenulated encoders."

"Jesse said the bracket for the turbo-encabulater is pretty rusty and thin, so you have to drive it gently or he won't be able to fix it next time."

I suspect my kid showed it to one of his mechanically inclined buddies after he was unable to make sense of the gobbly-gook.

My kid did not appreciate my humor.

With Mrs ERJ not able to keep an eye on me, I have been scheduling field-trips to keep me busy.

Cherry paneling and lettuce seeds

The appearance side

Manufacturing stamps on the back.

Second manufacturing stamp. Not lauan but actual cherry or birch plywood.

I got my lettuce seeds in the mail today and counted out about 200 to germinate for the first flight for the greenhouse.

Does anybody care to guess how many lettuce seeds are on this 8" plate?

One technique for getting an accurate estimate is to use a business card to carefully count out three calibration piles of ten and then to use the same card to break the rest of the count into piles the size of the three piles you carefully counted out.

It is still pretty busy.

I counted about 35 piles so I had about 350 seeds on the plate.

The same method is useful in calculating the size of a V of ducks or geese. Count out five or ten and then just eye-ball in chunks of that size.

Pop-quiz: Do you know why one side of the V that geese or ducks fly in is longer and one is shorter?

Answer below the break