The stick design provides leverage for throwing longer distances, but at the cost of additional weight and length, and has been considered obsolete by western countries since the Second World War and Cold War periods.
Ah, then why not throw them with a sling? All the extra leverage with none of the extra weight, and it’s more or less silent. Imagine a barrage of grenades coming in from 200 yards at 60mph.
That sounds complex. Just put some gunpowder at the rear end of the grenade, and stuff it in a small tube.
You could make this small enough to stuff the tube under the barrel of your gun, or big enough that it can function as a small artillery piece.
I’ve seen slings used to throw things. Either ropes attached to the projectile, or pouches on ropes designed to release the projectile.
I’ve also seen those slings not throw the “grenade” 200 yards away, but straight up in the air, or wrapping around branches or arms or flying backwards…
Slings require just enough skill that they would probably be more lethal to friend than foe.
They’ve got the M203 grenade launcher that attaches to their rifle, effective to 382 yards. They’ve got the M224 mortar that can be operated in a handheld configuration, and is effective from 70 to ~3812 yards.
I do historical reenactment, so I figured I’d learn the sling because it’s awesome.
Turns out it’s really really hard. After maybe 50 or 60 hours of practice, I could reliably hit the side of a house. Before that, it was indeed pretty much a crapshoot whether it even went forward.
If I throw something I can pretty reliably hit a person sized target. With a sling, forget about it.
Most boringly because most western armies are probably going to use an airplane or tank in that situation. Significantly less risky to have the squishy people hide behind something strong while a machine does the dangerous work from a distance, if you can manage that.
Grenade is more for close distances, like “just over that ridge” or “in the next room”.
My guess? the stick part blocks the effectiveness of the explosiveness at where ever the stick is point at time of impact. You could argue that to change that would be to make the stick part the actual explosive part and have effectively an explosive baton. But then the ends of the “danger” baton wouldn’t have the same explosive effect to the target facing the end of the baton grenade compared to a target facing the sides of the baton. So, to mitigate that, a sphere shaped grenade would probably be ideal with separable metalic “scales” as a shell. Now you have ideal coverage of the area no matter how the grenade lands at the target.
At that point, I would assume ergonomics and determining which way was up so that you know where the pin is leads to why grenades look the way they do today.
It’s just a bit of wood attached to a fairly big chunk of explosive and I would guess that wood shrapnel is just as deadly as metal within its effective range. The stick isn’t going to block much of anything.
Stick grenades could have a fragmentation sleeve, but they relied more on the explosive concussion for damage, not the shrapnel.
Interesting question.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grenade
Ah, then why not throw them with a sling? All the extra leverage with none of the extra weight, and it’s more or less silent. Imagine a barrage of grenades coming in from 200 yards at 60mph.
You could even give it some sort of rocket propulsion.
That sounds complex. Just put some gunpowder at the rear end of the grenade, and stuff it in a small tube. You could make this small enough to stuff the tube under the barrel of your gun, or big enough that it can function as a small artillery piece.
I’ve seen slings used to throw things. Either ropes attached to the projectile, or pouches on ropes designed to release the projectile.
I’ve also seen those slings not throw the “grenade” 200 yards away, but straight up in the air, or wrapping around branches or arms or flying backwards…
Slings require just enough skill that they would probably be more lethal to friend than foe.
They’ve got the M203 grenade launcher that attaches to their rifle, effective to 382 yards. They’ve got the M224 mortar that can be operated in a handheld configuration, and is effective from 70 to ~3812 yards.
I do historical reenactment, so I figured I’d learn the sling because it’s awesome.
Turns out it’s really really hard. After maybe 50 or 60 hours of practice, I could reliably hit the side of a house. Before that, it was indeed pretty much a crapshoot whether it even went forward.
If I throw something I can pretty reliably hit a person sized target. With a sling, forget about it.
Because you have to learn to use a sling and if you’re not good you’re much more likely to blow yourself up.
You could probably come up with a more idiot friendly version though some kind of fabric sock where you just launch the whole thing
That’s why you practice with rocks. Like what slings originally did.
So which existing training should we cut to make time for sling practice?
Do we really need them to be able to read?
this is the guy i want on my team for the post apocalypse
Most boringly because most western armies are probably going to use an airplane or tank in that situation. Significantly less risky to have the squishy people hide behind something strong while a machine does the dangerous work from a distance, if you can manage that.
Grenade is more for close distances, like “just over that ridge” or “in the next room”.
My guess? the stick part blocks the effectiveness of the explosiveness at where ever the stick is point at time of impact. You could argue that to change that would be to make the stick part the actual explosive part and have effectively an explosive baton. But then the ends of the “danger” baton wouldn’t have the same explosive effect to the target facing the end of the baton grenade compared to a target facing the sides of the baton. So, to mitigate that, a sphere shaped grenade would probably be ideal with separable metalic “scales” as a shell. Now you have ideal coverage of the area no matter how the grenade lands at the target.
At that point, I would assume ergonomics and determining which way was up so that you know where the pin is leads to why grenades look the way they do today.
It’s just a bit of wood attached to a fairly big chunk of explosive and I would guess that wood shrapnel is just as deadly as metal within its effective range. The stick isn’t going to block much of anything.
Stick grenades could have a fragmentation sleeve, but they relied more on the explosive concussion for damage, not the shrapnel.