Cost of ammunition

[Sabot_Up]

How much does tank ammunition cost? Is HEAT or KE more expensive? What about a TOW?

[dejawolf]

i know the javelin costs $85000, and thats just the missile itself.

the portable launcher costs $135000.

i also read that a full load of gun-launched missiles of the T-80 would cost more than the tank itself.

[Sabot_Up]

Wow! :eek2:

[ShotMagnet]

Something I read a long time ago suggested that 25mm rounds for the M2 were USD10-15 apiece.

Shot

[foeh@mmer]

I know I've wasted several 100s of millions of virtual dollars playing steelbeasts.

[tankenator]

I remember our master gunner mentioning one time before TT VIII (or was it XII......) something about each round (training round mind you) costing somewhere around 900 to 1100 dollars. Don't know if that was true or not.

Being a machinist, as well as related to a machinist that actually made DU 105mm rounds, I know that service rounds would be drastically more expensive. My relative mentioned that they held tolerances on those to .0001"--on a very very long rod like that quite difficult. Not sure exactly how they do it, especially considering the different properties of the DU core and the tungsten outer shell.....

[dejawolf]

from Ssnakes reply on tanknet, the recent DM53 would in todays $ cost about 4400$ per piece.

for a full wartime load of sabots in an abrams, that'd be about 176000$

[Ssnake]

I'm sure it's less for the Abrams since

1. the Euro/Dollar exchange rate doesn't matter since they're domestically produced
2. the US are producing main gun ammmo in much larger quantities (larger fleet, actual combat deployment == many more rounds to be consumed per tank and year than in the Bundeswehr). Therefore the per piece price should be no more than maybe twice that of training rounds which are about $1000.- (as mentioned above).
   With HEAT rounds the price difference may be higher since only the projectile mass and form must be ballistically matched (so the casing gets filled with concrete), which is probably much cheaper than the real projectile. So I'd expect a higher cost spread.
   MPATs should be another matter due to their programmable fuzes and, probably, lower production number. I'd expect them to be the most costly round per piece.
   TERM and STAFF...?
   $$$...

[Sabot_Up]

Thanks, guys. Excellent responses.

[McDLT]

i remember about 6 years ago a Practice round for the leo C-2 of 105mm APFSDS-T so TPAPFSDS-T was 1600 $CAN a piece. and a HESH practice was about 800$CAN

McDLT