Brit firm sells hi-tech fabric vehicle armour to DARPA In normal times, amazing new military technology is developed in the USA and Blighty trails far behind, either reinventing American wheels or simply importing them. But today the process is reversed in a small way, as the Pentagon's bleeding-edge research bureau has decided to try out British-made tech which is already going …
"The DARPA programme is called "RPGnets", and is aimed at "special high-capability nets to dud, break, or otherwise disable rocket propelled grenades (RPGs)".
There is a Blithe Blighty Program with NIRobotIQs and AIMMORPGs which Renders Wwweaponry Redundant and a Sure Sign of Belligerent Intent/Necessity. One would then Need to Ponder on the Feed that Creates such Perverse and Subversive Needs.
But you surely knew that already from El Reg.
"For the most part Challenger II and M1A1/2 use similar armour with the exception that many of the M1s have the added layer of DU armour. Challenger 2 has Dorchester armour, which is a refinement of Chobham. The Abrams has Chobham, but with a DU layer. Dorchester is said to have a layer of tungsten that fulfils a role similar to the DU."
Warrior vehicles are also being up-armoured with Chobam panels, but not everywhere on the vehicles. It'll be a whole lot heavier than drawing the curtains down the tank sides. However, not everyone is lobbing old-style RPGs around - and how long will it be before double-fuse warheads (PG-7/VR) are commonplace.
Mine's the kevlar one with the DU-Chobam plates underneath...
It's bloody difficult to look like a hard bastard when you're driving around in a wheeled mattress.
Does it come with a selection of ticking swatches to choose from? I'm imagining APC's wandering around clad in a chintzy peony pattern picked out on a background of pastel blue stripes here*.
*I'm also beginning to suspect that I might actually be Napoleon's teapot.
"Britain did not invent radar, but it did exploit it. Must try harder."
Hey, but they did invent the Magnetron, didn't they? The one that you need if you want your radar to detect targets smaller than the Moon.
And what the Americans did with it? Put it into a microwave oven!
On the other subject - a couple of month after the first BNP member was elected to the European Parliament British boffins are forced to sell their revolutionary hijab for armoured fighting vehicles abroad. Is that a coincidence?
"Untill Qinetiq or BAE buy it .... Which is the usual way a lot of these global megacorps (Lock-Mart springs to mind) "Innovate."" .... By John Smith 19 Posted Thursday 6th August 2009 18:15 GMT.
And some Novel Technologies and IT's Use of some Novel Technologies/Methodologies are normally bought by Countries for NEUKlearer Virtual Leverage/Fair and Equitable Advantage which Leads with ProgramMING .... Hearts and Minds Projects
* Sweet and Sticky Bait for Mr Yentob and the BBC, if they are in any way Enabled and Capable IT Media Players/Great AIGamers. It is the least that is expected of them for the Future and anything less is their Failure Advertised and their Proferred Remit and Tenure, a Questionable Liability of Ambiguous Worth.
Actually, a lot of stuff has been invented over here but because it is done *in collaboration with* American companies (we supply the brains, they supply the money) it tends to be the Yanks who get the kudos.
And what they don't get through funding 'our boys' (and gals), they get by buying up the company a short time later... the latest "American" whizzo AFV, the Stryker, is simply an updated version of a Swiss design - the Mowag Pirhana - that was used by other nations (including Australia and Canada) for years before the Americans "invented' them... Mowag is now part of General Dynamics' Land Systems division...
In the early- to mid-90's there was an entire floor of a building at a BAE Systems site that had British designers, American Management and Admin staff and was working on something that started as a Joint Venture for UK/US forcces but ended up as a solely-US 'toy' - not because the UK didn't want/need it, but because it was so much better than anything the purely American projects had come up with and the Americans decided to 'pull out' of, and shut down, the JV - but kept all "their" intellectual property and carried on with "their" project... which just happened to bear an uncanny resemblance to what the BAE bods had come up with, but which BAE were no longer supposed to be playing with (I cannot say more as this much is within the public arena - any more and I run foul of the Official Secrets Act. Unlike certain members of our current Government, I know how to treat stuff labelled "Confidential", "Restricted" and "Secret"...).
"*Rocket Propelled Grenade, or Raketniy Protivotankoviy Granatomet ("Rocket Anti-Tank Grenade Launcher")."
The correct name is actually *Ruchnoi* Protivotankoviy Granatomet, that is a "Hand-held Anti-Tank Grenade Launcher". However, the missile itself is called Reaktivnaya Protivotankovaya Granata (i.e. "Rocket-propelled Anti-Tank Grenade").
Some selective quoting there, what comes before the line you quoted is "The magnetron was first described by German physicist Erich Habann"
Anyway the invention referred to is the Cavity Magnetron (which we gave to the Yanks in exchange for them to mass produce it for us) initially patented by the Germans and abandoned, followed up by the British. It allowed lightweight high resolution radar to be mounted on aircraft. They even used them to hunt u-boats by detecting an exposed persiscope.
I think you'll find on the same wikipedia page the quote the Americans said about the Cavity Magnetron - "the most valuable cargo ever brought to our shores"
If you're going to quote wikipedia do so fully - otherwise you may as well go back to who first jotted down the physics and properties of EM radiation. The first cavity magnetron was a German development and the first practical high power cavity (not pole, cavity) magetrons were developed by GEC here in the UK. Britain gifted an example with full plans to the U.S. as part of the Tizard mission.
"Not HOTOL .... I wouldn't have any problem mentioning that. No, this was something that is - quite literally - a lot more down-to-Earth. And decidedly Military in nature.
Sorry, /would have been/ more down-to-earth, but of course it was cancelled..;-)" .... By not.known@this.address Posted Friday 7th August 2009 10:42 GMT
How about Remote Viewing Manchurian Candidates .... Maslowian Self Actualised Beings. That is Ethereal and decidely CosmICQ in Nature.
"Unlike certain members of our current Government, I know how to treat stuff labelled "Confidential", "Restricted" and "Secret"...)." .... and thus get to Read and Experience and Play with the Real Stuff, not.known@this.address, by CyberIntelAIgent Silent Default and Right Royal Assumption? .......... Virgin Fast Track to Knightly Deeds Done Dirt Cheap. :-) ......and therefore Paradoxically Worth an Absolute Fortune.
"I'm Posting to all my American mates ...... Huzzah ... Brits demonstrate the application of Occams Razor" ... By archie lukas Posted Friday 7th August 2009 15:04 GMT
Indeed they can, archie lukas. And they can also use ITs Facilities with Dexterous Ease against Sinister Opponents/Faulty Components/Rogue Elements.
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