More like, not very awesome and pretty damn lame and NOW the damn disc for playing Mario Cart won't spin-up!

Tags for this video have been changed from 'tank, shell' to 'tank, cannon, shell' - edited by calvados

2 more comments have been lost in the ether at this killed duplicate.

More like a tank shell with your face on it!

totally cool how that shell traveled from the tank to its target. A couple of things I'd like to ask...

are those fins on the shell or is that just some effect due to the speed of which it travels?

And is it me or did the shell curved just a tad bit to the right? I was wondering if that was an actual effect of some phenomenon whose name really escapes me right now. (Something to do with compensating for long distance bullet travel and earth's rotation.)

No, it actually has fins on it. A sabot round is a dart essentially. Here you go: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabot

Just an educated guess but I suspect it's a tiny correction for wind drift which has been exaggerated by the camera angle.

The effects I think your referring to are called the "Coriolis" effect and "Gyro drift" and while they would have a similar effect this is seems like far too short of a range for them to come into play even at the relatively low velocity of that shell. That said its possible that with such a big round like that sabot "gyro drift" and maybe some sort of torque effect from leaving the barrel might be at work...

Gyro drift is due to the fact that the spinning bullet/shell starts to be pulled out of line by gravity causing the originally stable oscillation to slowly get knocked out of whack dragging the nose of the round out of line causing the round to pull slightly towards the direction it's spinning (though with a stable modern round this is very very subtle and only really comes into play at at least 1-2mile plus ranges).

The Coriolis effect is due to the fact that the earth itself is spinning. Over very long ranges the earth itself moves relative to the path of the round and so for 1-2mile plus shots one may need to compensate depending on the velocity and ballistic properties of the round. (this is why snipers tend to operate as a team because the maths and reference material necessary to account for all this plus standard bullet drop, variable wind conditions, atmospherics etc. etc. as well as maintaining situational awareness is a big ask for one person.)

Like I said though it seems unlikely they would have such a pronounced effect at such a relatively short range, the camera angle is definitely exaggerating what ever is going on there.


EDIT: I just watched it again, pretty sure it's just the camera angle (camera is slightly off to the left) I think the shell looks like it's actually travelling dead straight.

I call shenanigans on the actual shell. No way that would drop to the ground over the couple hundred metres/yards distance provided.

I have no doubt the tank is real, and shot at the camera, but I believe the shell is AfterEffects. Poorly done AfterEffects. It's the same clipart of the shell, moved down and scaled. The image of the shell stays pointed straight on at the camera.

APFSDS - Armour Piercing, Fin Stabilized, Discarding Sabot. The American Abrams tankers used to call them 'Silver Bullets' back in the early nineties; maybe they still do. They were made largely out of natural or depleted uranium and they combusted slightly when shot through the air, leaving a faint glowing silvery trail behind. You could see it best at night obviously.

Not saying you are wrong (though to my eye it does look legit) but bullet/shell drop is uniform no matter the range as it's an effect of gravity.

If you took a gun in one hand and a bullet in the other and dropped/fired simultaneously both bullets would hit the ground at the same time. The same goes for shells, the fins only keep it steady the shell itself does not "fly" it simply travels fast enough to cover a shitload of ground before gravity has its inevitable effect. i.e. the moment the shell leaves the barrel it is falling at the same speed it would if you just dropped it.

The camera is zoomed in which is making the distance seem shorter than it actually is and exaggerating the visual effect but the shell looks to be behaving pretty consistently with normal gravity to my eye.