Former AG here as well - 1992-1998 2/147 FA - SDARNG. Worked on both M110 and M109

I was a gun chief during the same time in Bamberg. I loved that gun.

Same but the barrel is welded

Wow that must be a cool display to see up close!

Have a few refreshing ales,then a joy ride, or a drag around the field.

No G6?

If they are anything like the tank museum in Texas, its a blast.

And I guess other cannoneers not listed were on KP duty.

I was a medic attached to an Army State National Guatd Batallion 1/144 Field Artillery CA These were our boom sticks. Great memories.

Howdy Redleg! 13 man sections, you must have been in its hey day. In the 80’s and early 90’s, we never had 13 man sections. Maybe 7ish on the active duty side. 4 rode on the gun, 2 maybe 3 in the faasv and the new guy or whoever the chief was pissed at was in the advanced party truck. Usually the chief ran the #1 man spot “lift/rammer” himself (if it worked or was used). That way the chief was in the perfect spot to check fuse and powder settings, run the loader if used (you know how dangerous privates can be) and turn around to verify settings for quadrant, deflection and zero in the collimator. The #2 man, did shut the breech with that gawds awful finger breaking handle they put on it and primed the gun. Sometimes he also did the lanyard but quite often it was a 25 ft lanyard pulled on the ground. If the loader/rammer worked, this was the smallest weakest guy on the gun. If the loader/rammer was broke, the faasv would back up almost to the spade and put the conveyor on the back deck the 2 of the 3 biggest or strongest lads would stand on the back as #2 pick the round up get it in the breech and hand ram it with a ramming staff. The other strong guy would be in the faasv prepping, fusing rounds and powder solo or maybe the powder man would help do the charges before he had to boogie off to the powder pit. I recall a few real lean times when the #2 man also did the AG hyds to set the quadrant to the general area and was fined tuned by the gunner. The last few guys, maybe one was sitting in the AG seat, or in the faasv helping to hump rounds, one was definitely the RTO which usually doubled as the ammo team chief that talked with FDC, received and recorded fire missions and who aside from the powder man was the only guy on the ground. Often he was the one that pulled the 25 foot lanyards on the ground. The only saving grace of being a crew on these was the hyds. It was a dream to elevate that heavy assed tube with hyds. Being an AG who’s sole job was AG was a coveted position. That being said most senior specialists wanted to faasv since it was kinda independent duties at times. It was a beauty in nice weather, a nightmare in the rain, snow and the horrible mud those tracks made. Have those memories, a bad back from picking up and carrying those heavy ass rounds and crooked fingers from that breech handle…..would love a few minutes with the guy that designed that beauty haha

Fort Silly?

I fired the cannons as a chief and artillery instructor from 84-99 and all 155's and 203's could be limited nuke capable.

I was in Artillery Survey/Recon. HHQ Battery 3BN 17TH ARTY, Nurnberg Germany. Had 12, 8 in M110s with support vehicles Ammo Haulers I called em. Fired them at Grafenwohr. 1970 to 1973.

Weird.

132BTY ?

HHC 7/9 in Florida 85-88. I was told that it was the vehicle that was the problem that caused them to be retired after Gulf War 1.

5 Hvy Baby. Back at ya! :) M107s

@@yorkcity55 did the 107 go away because it was an accurate or because it just eight barrels? Or a little of both? The 110 had a well-deserved reputation for being quite accurate.

​​@@joem5903 Was in c battery 7/9 The challenger 80s

Yep me too

How did it feel when this big mama jamma fired?

My grandpa served on one of the originals back in the 60s in west Germany. He was the driver since it was similar to the tractors he drove back on his farm

Lmao I'm guessing that keeps the mechanicals warm while the crew freeze?

we Did direct fire once a year at Graf on the M110a2 ... they had us wear eyepro .... some of the fragments would come back several hundred meters, and were sharp as hell.

I was in C Battery, 3/35FA 1987-89 .... we shot a lot and took pride in in smackin shit directly, which took a lot of attention to small details .... bore sighting and exhaustive maintenance, and great attention when laying the guns ...

True that. Facts, stats, equipment names all roll off the tongue like he’s Aust. Armour Google.

From one Veteran to another, Thank You for your service!

I was a 13E (FDC) in an 8" Battery. Humping ammo was no easy feat.

@@nightbladexxx Chris, I was an E-5 31F Signaleer in the MI Army National Guard. I have no doubt that humping ammo was not easy. In the Navy at least they partially mechanized loading the 8" Naval rifles! As I say my job in the Guard was to shoot off my mouth and not my rifle! I was expert though with the rifle! Thank you for your service!

Don't forget KP!

Have you heard of the Chieftain? Watch some of the videos he has made by himself or with WoT and come back here again... I think these are good but the Chieftain's are even better, sorry AusArmor

@@laurisikio of course I have seen the Chieftain, while his videos are very good I believe these are better. But hey, watch whoever you like, as will I...

I'm happy to watch both these and the Chieftain. I was just insulted that "tank Jesus" wasn't even mentioned when naming the best tank tour videos. Either way, we can at least agree on the matter that (when talking about restoration videos) Workshop Wednedsdays don't even have an opponent that comes anywhere near the quality. These tour videos are good advertisement for AusArmor but I want to hear how track tension is adjusted.

"No Idler Wheel" ... Sorta .... review the -10 regarding "track tension" ... --1:38-- ... the three things that made the M110a2 the most inherently mechanically accurate piece of US Army Artillery were the very stable firing platform (due to the recoil spade and suspension lockout system), the close proximity of the gunner's sight to the bore axis and center of traverse (basic geometry is ...well basic, and immutable) ... and the relative stiffness of the M201a1 Cannon, as compared to those on other US systems (particularly the M107's gun) ... I had heard barracks stories of gun sections bragging of Delta Hotelling 55 gallon drums at "10 miles" .... but became a believer when my unit deployed to Saudi Arabia and regularly DH'ed 8x8x8 foot concrete pylons in the Saudi Desert between 25 and 30K .... as long as you did all your boresight procedures and maintenance .... ~--7:15-- ... Manning .... while in Germany (1987-1989) , it was rare for a gun section to have more than 5 or 6 people, including the Chief of Section (an assigned M113? Who would have driven that?!?!!?) in the field: in 1985, the Army doubled the number of FA guns in the Army at the stroke of a pen. The number of units stayed the same, just the number of guns in them went up by 50 or 100% Batteries that had 4 or 6 guns now had 8. ... they just stretched the existing people. Gun Chiefs became Platoon Sergeants, Gunners became Chiefs, etc .... and anybody with a pulse could suddenly get into the Field Artillery (there were 2 people in my Basic Training Cycle that were Illiterate (not just "functionally illiterate", but signed their name at the chow hall with an "X" that was countersigned by the guy behind them in chow line as a witness) .... add onto that the "Old School/Good Ol' Boy " Legacy Army way of doing things in USAUER, where someone who was athletically gifted could be detached to go play football or compete on the weightlifting team for the Division or Corps teams, or to be a Driver/Orderly for some well connected Officer... or to post support (often the same guys) ... on paper, they were in your section, but you never saw them, EVER.,,,, and contrast this with when Desert SHield kicked off: these pealpl all showed up, all at once .... and we didn't know waht to do with them, and more importantly, how to pack all their gear onto a space and weight capacity that we had trained up to be occupied with less than 1/2 of that what was required (12 full time guys and the bags for the AP man, who was with us whenever we stopped, which was most of the time during Desert Shield and a few brif minutes a couple times during Desert Storm) .... and nobody had ever trained on loading just two vehicles with the neary 1/2 TON of small arms and AT munitions, rations, water on top of the 6+ tons of artillery Ordnance .... we narrowed it down to 6 guys on the Gun (Chief sat on the loader/rammer on a cushion (he was an old guy- the reverse of what happened in 1985 happened when suddenly all these senior guys that had been holding down sinecures at the field Artillery School or Post HQ were suddenly given senior jobs in firing batteries... "Smokes" often became Chiefs .... Chiefs got bumped down to Gunners, Gunners to Ammo Team Chiefs... ) Gunner sat in the Gunner's seat, AG in his, Driver (duh) and two guys on the sear to the right of the the gun breech .... and most of their shit: rucks, A bags, personal bags ... camo net, 2 cases of MRE's and several cases of water, several cases of 5.56 and linked 7.62 ammo for the M60 (also kept ready for action in front of the AG),,, there were 2 LAW's, an AT4 a ykon stove and a GP Small tent somewhere in all that.... all that was piled on the gun deck, mostly ... the 548 had the remainder of 10 days food and water, spare M16/ M60 Ammo, 50 cal ammo .... 2 more LAW's and an AT4 .... 13 B bags, 6 A Bags, 6 Rucks, 12 cots, 1 GP Small Tent, Yukon Stove .... camo net, poles, shit chair .... and 6 troops packed in the front of that 548.... on top of most of the small arms ammo ... I often thought a lot of time was wasted by myself and other guys "shammin" in the barracks during the summer of 1990, playing the video game "Tetris" .... turned out to be a virtual training system for what would become a VERY useful skill... but again, I digress,,,,,

I think two lessons/things learned will come out of the war in Ukraine. The first is the multiple uses of drone aircraft on the battle field and the second is that Arty is STILL the King of battle.

@@stuglenn1112 sure if it what's up to me every Squad would have at least two drone pilot and should be more for artillery unit with long-range distance drones with better quality night capability for all I think night capabilities is where it's at now white hot you can definitely take an entire platoon out with a artillery unit and good drone pilot coordination it's been done many times during this war even bigger than platoons Ukraine has that lockdown skill now with drone piloting and artillery coordination

The 2S7 Pion is a ponderously slow SPG .... the M110 was like Flying Artillery in comparison .... but it still could not keep up with the Abrams and Brads.

It was probably much easier than driving a tractor of the 1960's: I don't know of any tractors of that era that didn't have a clutch pedal .... the M110 had a steering bar, an accelerator pedal, a brake pedal, a gear selector lever, a master switch and basic gauges and warning lights. It was designed in the age of "Soldier Proofing" everything in the Army ...

With a Big Ass Wrench and a cheater bar. It sucked. Big Rocks, right ip off the ground. From the Stratosphere. Theres some big locking nuts and and eccentric arm to move.... Almost as bad as changing an inside road wheel or an idler arm or torsion bar, both of which involve loosen and then retightening track tension... our gun threw track after the driver pivoted too hard in wet sand during Desert Storm ... never so happy to be the 548 Driver ...

Would need a freaking big range!

@@frostedbutts4340 Ask the range folks up at Ft. McCoy, WI.....what happened when one of thses used too many charge bags....round sailed beyond the range's impact areas...and hit a maintenance barn at the edge of the Cantonment area....Powder bags were colour coded, by the way...shells were around 245 pounds.....One shell I directed, landed UNDER a White Tail Deer at a tree line (I was shooting at a snake, missed) Range to the "target was 3500m.....range from the gun? 5500m.

Early 80s if remember right

Yeah. It's a natural asphalt ripper.

@@ghostinthemachine8243 If track maintenance was kept up, and driver training was good, it wasn't bad at all .... bare grousers and hard pivots on asphalt would cause "community relations issues" .... a good unit will have fewer of those than a bad one ...

@@danieparriott265 Driver training? I drove the M113 for our outfit, so the LT figured I could drive the M110 to. He simply said get in and "move that sumbitch off the parade ground" This had the expected result. At least I didn't kill anyone.

That’s the right sequence.

You almost had it ,,, Sequence is: (and remember, all of these things are being done AS FAST AS POSSIBLE WITH ZERO ERRORS, because mistakes mean the wrong people get killed) Warning Order ("FireMission!!!!!!1111!!!!!) given, and Shell, Fuze, Time (if applicable) Charge, Deflection, Quadrant and then any Special Instructions (if any- examples could be "At My Command" "Right By Piece", etc...) are given, and announced/repeated back by the RTO or ATC, or Chief (depending upon unit SOP), and each responsible Cannoneer repeats back his pertinent information (ie the Cannoneer(s) handling the projectile shout out the projectile called for, the guy selecting fuzes calls out his fuze, the guy setting the fuze calls out the setting or time set, Gun tube brought to loading elevation, projo placed and rammed ("Ramming! " Announced) , correct propellant charge correctly placed ("Charge (whatever) , I SEE RED! (indicating that the red igniter patch is to the rear (have heard that they have patches on both ends these days, to dumb it own further for the Millenials)) , CLOSING!!!!!111!" and the gun goes up ... the Gunner in the meantime has been laying the gun for Deflection and when he gets there, he Announces "Defection **** Ready!" and the AG ( or the Gunner if doing 1 man/1 sight) elevates the gun and Announces "Quadrant *** (or ****, and God help him if he's getting there manually and hasn't kept the equilibrators well adjusted) SET!111!!!) ...mean while the No. 2 Cannoneer (on the M110- 1 man the M109 series) inserts a primer in the firing lock, snaps the lock closed and waits for the chief to tell him to hook up the lanyard... and the Chief is double Checking at his "Safety T" information, checks his Gunner's Sight picture, and gives the "Hook uP", "Stand BY!", and unless it's a "At My Command" , "FIRE". You notice that every single critical step has the command repeated back, and the person doing the step verbalizes exactly what they are doing as they are doing it, both to double check themselves, and so the Chief, who is the guy responsible if anything goes wrong, gets clued in that everything is going as it supposed to. .... If the crew doesn't know what they are doing, it's invariably a Grade A Clusterfuck. If they do, and have drilled (practiced receptively) together sufficiently, it's a Thing of Beauty, a Well Oiled Machine operating in harmony, without thought, or effort .... "Slow is Smooth, Smooth Becomes Fast, Fast Becomes Reflexive." Clear as Mud?

Most of the time, the "Ammo Limber" (an M548 Cargo Carrier in my time on the M1101a2) was within 100 meters of the gun .... but there was a good day, day and a half where our gun broke down during Desert Storm that we did not see them ..... but I doubt very much that the 2 rounds would have helped at all if they were broken down alone in the desert ..... if they couldn't solve the issue with small arms or their 1 AT4 and 2 LAW's .... to their credit, they did prepare for direct fire action until they got the gun short tracked and moving again ...

Thats what She said.

The actual telescopes are pretty unimpressive..... very 1960's tech ... finicky and very maintenance intensive.

Fort Sill CAPEXes were impressive .... but then I fired a lot of Charge 9 in Desert Storm ....

Pretty sure that stopped in the late 70's when the chief got run over in our motor pool coming in from the field ... driver braked hard, guy rilled off the front of the gun deck and the gun rolled up on him .... there used to be pics at the Fort Sill Safety Office lobby....

@danieparriott265 we still did that. Myself (the driver) and our mechanic mounted a detachable seat and added comm boxes for the chief in the driver's compartment and in back to speed up the laying of the gun.