25 mm caliber is a specific size of popular autocannon ammunition. It has also been recently used for the

Barrett XM109 The Barrett XM109 is a prototype anti materiel sniper rifle, chambered for 25 × 59 mm grenade rounds and developed by Barrett Firearms Manufacturing. It was designed in accordance with a requirement set out in 1994, and is capable of defeating ...

anti-materiel rifle An anti-materiel rifle (AMR) is a rifle designed for use against military equipment, structures, and other hardware (materiel). Anti-materiel rifles are chambered in significantly larger calibers than conventional rifles and are employed to elimi ...

. Such ammunition includes the

NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO, ; french: Organisation du traité de l'Atlantique nord, ), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental military alliance between 30 member states – 28 European and two No ...

-standard 25×137mm and 25×184mm, the Soviet 25x218mmSR, and the Chinese 25×183mmB.

Usage

The 25 mm round can be used in both an anti-materiel and anti-personnel fashion. When operating in the anti-personnel role, a 25 mm weapon armed with HE rounds can effectively kill large numbers of opposing troops either in the open or in light fortifications. When operating in the anti-materiel role, a 25 mm weapon armed with

armor-piercing Armour-piercing ammunition (AP) is a type of projectile designed to penetrate either body armour or vehicle armour. From the 1860s to 1950s, a major application of armour-piercing projectiles was to defeat the thick armour carried on many wars ...

rounds can disable many

aircraft An aircraft is a vehicle that is able to fly by gaining support from the air. It counters the force of gravity by using either static lift or by using the dynamic lift of an airfoil, or in a few cases the downward thrust from jet engine ...

and vehicles, including some

main battle tank A main battle tank (MBT), also known as a battle tank or universal tank, is a tank that fills the role of armor-protected direct fire and maneuver in many modern armies. Cold War-era development of more powerful engines, better suspension sys ...

s. The

US military The United States Armed Forces are the Military, military forces of the United States. The armed forces consists of six Military branch, service branches: the United States Army, Army, United States Marine Corps, Marine Corps, United States N ...

uses 25 mm weapons in their

AV-8B Harrier The McDonnell Douglas (now Boeing) AV-8B Harrier II is a single-engine ground-attack aircraft that constitutes the second generation of the Harrier family, capable of vertical or short takeoff and landing (V/STOL). The aircraft is primaril ...

AC-130 gunship The Lockheed AC-130 gunship is a heavily armed, long-endurance, ground-attack variant of the C-130 Hercules transport, fixed-wing aircraft. It carries a wide array of ground-attack weapons that are integrated with sophisticated sensors, n ...

M2 Bradley The M2 Bradley, or Bradley IFV, is an American infantry fighting vehicle that is a member of the Bradley Fighting Vehicle family. It is manufactured by BAE Systems Land & Armaments, which was formerly United Defense. The Bradley is designed ...

, LAV-25,

F-35 Lightning II The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is an American family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather stealth multirole combat aircraft that is intended to perform both air superiority and strike missions. It is also able to provide elect ...

and as a standard ship-based munition in the Mk 38 autocannon.

Types of 25 mm ammunition

Several sub-types of the NATO 25 mm ammunition are available—the most common being

, high-explosive,

sabot Sabot may refer to: * Sabot (firearms), disposable supportive device used in gunpowder ammunitions to fit/patch around a sub-caliber projectile * Sabot (shoe), a type of wooden shoe People * Dick Sabot (1944–2005), American economist and busi ...

, tracer, and practice rounds.

Cartridge Cartridge may refer to: Objects * Cartridge (firearms), a type of modern ammunition * ROM cartridge, a removable component in an electronic device * Cartridge (respirator), a type of filter used in respirators Other uses * Cartridge (surname), a ...

s are usually composed of a combination of the aforementioned categories. For example, the M791 is an armor-piercing discarding sabot with tracer (APDS-T) round. It is used against lightly

armored vehicles Armour (British English) or armor (American English; see spelling differences) is a covering used to protect an object, individual, or vehicle from physical injury or damage, especially direct contact weapons or projectiles during combat, or f ...

self-propelled artillery Self-propelled artillery (also called locomotive artillery) is artillery equipped with its own propulsion system to move toward its firing position. Within the terminology are the self-propelled gun, self-propelled howitzer, self-propelled ...

, and aerial targets such as

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes ...

s and slow-moving fixed-wing aircraft.

25 mm weapons

Each weapon is listed with its cartridge type appended.

Current weapons

* M242 Bushmaster: 25×137mm * GAU-12/22 Equalizer: 25×137mm *

GIAT M811 {{Infobox weapon , name = Giat M811 , image = , caption = , origin = France , type = Autocannon , is_ranged = yes , is_artillery = yes , service ...

: 25×137mm *

Oerlikon KBA The Oerlikon KBA is a 25 mm (25×137mm) autocannon, developed as a close range multipurpose weapon for the mechanised battlefield, originally made by Oerlikon (now Rheinmetall AG) and currently produced in Rheinmetall Italia S.p.A. facilities. It ...

: 25×137mm * Oerlikon KBB: 25×184mm * Oerlikon KBD: 25×184mm * Type 61: 25×218mmSR *

Type 95 SPAAA The Type 95 (PLA military designation: PGZ95 – ; pinyin: ''95 shi zixing gaoshepao'', "Type 95 self-propelled anti-aircraft artillery") is a Chinese self-propelled anti-aircraft vehicle. It is armed with four 25 mm caliber cannons and optionall ...

: 25×183mmB * ZPT-90: 25×183mmB

Historical weapons

25 mm Hotchkiss anti-aircraft gun The Hotchkiss 25 mm anti-aircraft gun was an anti-aircraft autocannon designed by the French firm of Hotchkiss. It served in World War II with French, Japanese and other nations' forces. Other than the designer company and the calibre, th ...

/ Type 96 25 mm AT/AA gun: 25×163mm *

25 mm Hotchkiss anti-tank gun 5 (five) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number, and cardinal number, following 4 and preceding 6, and is a prime number. It has attained significance throughout history in part because typical humans have five digits on eac ...

: 25×193.5mmR * 25 mm M1940 anti-aircraft gun: 25×218mmSR * 25 mm Bofors M/32 anti-aircraft gun: 25x205mmR (initial) or 25x187mmR (later)

External links

Federation of American Scientists: 25mm Ammunition
{Dead link, date=April 2019 , bot=InternetArchiveBot , fix-attempted=yes Large-caliber cartridges