Earlier this week, Orbital ATK, also announced it has received domestic and international contracts for medium- and large-caliber ammunition valued at $105 million.
These new orders span a range of 20, 25 and 30mm tactical and target practice ammunition for multiple U.S. and allied services for use with air, sea and land weapons platforms, as well as 120mm tactical and training ammunition for the Abrams Main Battle Tank. The contracts were awarded to Orbital ATK through the U.S. Army Project Manager Maneuver Ammunition Systems in its role as the Single Manager for Conventional Ammunition.
Orders for large caliber ammunition include a contract for the full-rate production of its next generation 120mm Kinetic Energy anti-tank cartridge, M829A4 which recently received type classification and has passed its initial lot acceptance testing. Full rate production is expected to begin in early 2016. This new Kinetic Energy tank ammunition highlights the competencies of Orbital ATK and provides the U.S. Army’s Abrams Main Battle Tank with combat overmatch against threat systems with Explosive Reactive Armor and other types of advanced complex base armor.
In addition, Orbital ATK received an order for the 120mm M1002 Multi-Purpose Anti-Tank target practice cartridge, which provides tank crews with realistic training ammunition to maintain Abrams tank combat crew efficiency.
Contracts awarded for the production of 20mm ammunition are for the PGU-27 target and PGU-28 tactical Semi-Armor Piercing High Explosive Incendiary commonly used with fighter aircraft. Additional 20mm orders included the MK244 Armor Piercing Discarding Sabot Enhanced Lethality cartridge which is used with the U.S. Navy’s Phalanx system and the M940 Multi-Purpose Tracer Self-Destruct cartridge for use with the U.S. Army’s Counter Rocket, Artillery and Mortar (C-RAM) system. These rounds will be produced at the Lake City Army Ammunition Plant in the new Orbital ATK-managed production facility, which recently surpassed one-million rounds of production for 20mm ammunition.
Orders for 25mm ammunition included the M792 High Explosive Incendiary with Tracer and Self Destruct cartridge which features a self-destruct fuze exclusively produced by Orbital ATK. M792 is fired by the M242 Bushmaster, KBA, M811 or GAU-12 cannons.
The company also received a contract for the production of the 30mm MK266 High Explosive Incendiary rounds, which use a low-drag fuze created and produced exclusively by Orbital ATK. They can be used with the company’s MK44 Bushmaster® cannon or any cannon firing 30mm x 173mm ammunition.
