USAF practice bomb

Hi all, I bought this blue U.S.A.F. practice bomb for 10.00 U.S. in a military surplus shop locally about 5 years ago. Near as I can figure it is probably form the 1960's. What caught my eye was the abundance of stenciling. it says
BOMB PRACTICE
BDU 33 B/B
USAF DWG. NO. 69F303-01
CONTR. NO. F42600-70-C-1391
LOT NO. SCC - 2 -3
FSN 13254015967E969
It is 22 1/2 inches long and 4 inches across
Dano

bdu-33

loaded thousands of them on F-16's. Need any info?

that is a BDU-33 or MK 76 if it's from a navy bird it simulates the fall of a 500 lb bombs they are still in use today I have cleared thousands of them.

you nedd a couple of impact plates. but when collecting practice ordnance beware of spotting charges, Blue means practice not inert!

BDU-33 B/B Blue is Practice, NOT INERT

Bombsaway,

Thanks for that note! Too often the actual meaning of "blue" is misinterpreted. More 462s have been hurt seriously by the BDU 33 than by Mk82s by my records.

I do have a question--did the "B/B" use the impact plate? I know the A/Bs, the first model, did not. Then the "C blocks" came in, and it was redesignated "B/B." I looked, around 2004, I think the "D/B" was still in the field, but whatever mod it was definitely had the impact plate.

Even more interesting is the number of times the spotting charge was moved during this evolution. All of the changes were intended to either improve reliability or increase safety.

Taber
AF Munitions 1974-2004

My 25 pounder - BDU-33 D/B

LOL...

I paid $5 for mine at a gun show.... guy just wanted to get rid of it....:tinysmile_shy_t:





Kind of neat... mine seems to have a different tail fin assembly....

Great thread with good info Chaps
I didnt know that about 'blue' not being totally inert?

cheers

waff

Practice rounds can contain a sizable spotting charge, Like a blasting cap in a practice grenade to a 20LB spotting charge in a practice MK82. the only totally inert items are Gold the only danger with them is if you drop it on your toes

Blue

Just a note on the different kinds of "Blue"...
the light blue seen in the posts above is "Deep Saxe Blue" and denotes a practice round.
A dark blue, called "Oxford Blue", denotes drill weapons. hope this clears things up, don't be messing with Deep Saxe Blue!

i always liked the name "eau de nile", the colour used to denote "Smoke".

BOMBSaway1980 said:

Practice rounds can contain a sizable spotting charge, Like a blasting cap in a practice grenade to a 20LB spotting charge in a practice MK82. the only totally inert items are Gold the only danger with them is if you drop it on your toes

Click to expand...

I'd have to check on the MK 106, but I believe that orange should be good to go as well, unless incorrectly loaded or someone has changed the color code.

As I recall, blue means practice, and of course practice may include spotting charges, in some cases of up to several pounds of TNT. This should be indicated by a brown (pyrotechnic/low explosive spotter) or a yellow (high explosive) band. Of course the brown bands don't always show up well on the blue background paint and are often misidentified.

If I recall correctly, gold/bronze indicated that a piece was "not to be used with a delivery system". Typically found with factory displays, nuke trainers, etc. Orange meant "recoverable", which normally indicated that no energetics were supposed to be associated. This is the one for which I wonder - many orange pieces I recall were solid metal, but for the 106's and such I don't remember.

Bombs, if you can dig up the latest copy of the appropriate TM 60A it would be interesting to know if these definitions were still correct. I'm shooting from memory here, but I get lucky sometimes....