Arjun Main Battle Tank (MBT)

[Dejawolf]

What you cannot understand with your level of drawing skill is ,
if you put your 18cm blue lines one by one on the crew hatch black hole you can fit at least 3.5 18 cms blue lines into it.
.

you're wrong.

 

[Dejawolf]

See you only accurate side view with dimensions is available in BHARATH RAKSHAK website, the top view is without any dimensions , so it is wrong on your part to say that you got the hull width from army recognition site,

If your assumption that the man who did the top view drawing was correct he should have given the dimensions like in the BHARATH RAKSHAK side view drawing.
[/B]

Now there is no room any claim of 2750 mm width for arjun turret.

he did give the dimensions, but not in the picture:

Arjun Mk-I main battle tank technical data sheet specifications information description intelligence�-�Army Recognition�-�Army Recognition

you can also see they have plenty of copyrighted pictures of the arjun there, so they've actually been on and around the Arjun tank, to take measures for that line drawing.

FAS gives width with skirts as 3.85m, and width over tracks as 3.5m
http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/row/arjun.htm

 

[STGN]

What you cannot understand with your level of drawing skill is ,
if you put your 18cm blue lines one by one on the crew hatch black hole you can fit at least 3.5 18 cms blue lines into it.
So as per your level of math the crew hatch radius will be around (3.5x180mm=630 mm+170 mm for perspective reduction considering the analogy of the gun and the crew man's head in the above photo)800 mm, if we accept your pixel based calculation.Which is wrong given the hatch measures no more than 500 mm across in reality.

So please don't try too hard.This pixel based measurement of convenience will never add up to any original dimension no matter how many red and blue lines you draw on it.

Question is which soldier is the tallest?
STGN

 

[Kunal Biswas]

Good for video game making.. Seriously

 

[STGN]

See you only accurate side view with dimensions is available in BHARATH RAKSHAK website, the top view is without any dimensions , so it is wrong on your part to say that you got the hull width from army recognition site,

If your assumption that the man who did the top view drawing was correct he should have given the dimensions like in the BHARATH RAKSHAK side view drawing.

And still no one here is sure whether the partial wider frontal side skirts are included in the hull width of 3800 mm or not.

What you did was to take the BHARATH RAKSHAK side view with dimensions and impose the dimensionless top view with no dimensions and arrived at a conclusion .

Why I am so certain is that if the distance between the center points s of two crew hatches is 120 cm,

Then from edge to edge you can fit 3 120 cm lines on the hull width,

then it is pretty obvious that only 300 mm space is left on the hull besides the turret, and 900 mm space available there for elbow room for TC + side turret armor is between the center point of the crew hole and the outer edge of the turret.

Just take the top view of the tank,

All objects in the top view are located in symmetrical fashion.

fix three 120 cms lines on the axis which runs through the center points of the two crew hatches across the width of the turret.

The first line will start at the top edge of the hull and stop at the center of the top crew hatch,

The second line will have both it's ends on two crew hatch centers,

The third line will start from bottom crew hatch and stop at the bottom edge of the hull.

All three lines will be almost equal in length is my idea from plain view.

In fact I did a measurement on screen each of these three lines will measure 200 mm on plain scale on the screen.

And the total width of the turret measures 600 mm across on plain scale on screen method.

3x120 cms =3600 mm as close to the hull width as possible.So there can be no room for any error in this simple measurement technique.

So 3800mm-(2x300mm=600 mm) is 3200 mm is the turret width if the partial frontal side skirts are not included in the hull width.


You can get a much more easy and clear picture.

Now there is no room any claim of 2750 mm width for arjun turret.

Just to be clear, you agree that for the turret to be near 3.2m the skirts has to not be counted?
So the overall width of the vehicle (including skirts) is over 3.864m? (using the DRDO width numbers)
Do you agree that from looking at this picture http://www.military-today.com/tanks/arjun_l1.jpg that the width over tracks is very close to 3.864m then?
STGN

 

[Kunal Biswas]

For Keyboard warriors, first go and smell a tank and come back talk to me..

 

[STGN]

Good for video game making.. Seriously

Would you swear that you are 100% sure turret is 3.2m from side edge to side edge of the front of the turret?
STGN

 

[STGN]

For Keyboard warriors, first go and smell a tank and come back talk to me..

I have smelled a tank, actually done maintenance on a Leopard1A5 DK this is off cause completely irrelevant to the discussion. Oh an please don't delete my comment to get out of answering questions, my question was not a threat or insult please explain how you justify deleting it. Thinking about it again I guess it should have been "swear on your life" but I still don't see how you justify deleting it?
STGN

 

[Dejawolf]

For Keyboard warriors, first go and smell a tank and come back talk to me..

been there, done that:

 

[Kunal Biswas]

Would you swear that you really smelled a tank ?, I smell is very much relevant to topic here..

Would you swear that you are 100% sure turret is 3.2m from side edge to side edge of the front of the turret?STGN

I have smelled a tank, actually done maintenance on a Leopard1A5 DK this is off cause completely irrelevant to the discussion. STGN

-----------------------------------------------------

Good job, you do know how to scale..

been there, done that:

 

[Kunal Biswas]

If you been worked inside and outside so does served in a tank, how come this BS is still on.. ??

Answers ?

 

[Dejawolf]

Good job, you do know how to scale..

i had to in order to make this:

and this:

 

[STGN]

Would you swear that you really smelled a tank ?, I smell is very much relevant to topic here..





-----------------------------------------------------

Good job, you do know how to scale..

Yes I would swear on my life that I have done maintenance on a Danish Leo 1 tank.
STGN

 

[STGN]

If you been worked inside and outside so does served in a tank, how come this BS is still on.. ??

Answers ?

I have not served in tank, I did maintenance on one. But that is really irrelevant to the subject at hand. What is relevant is your claim of turret being 3.2m wide over the front. Now off cause being far away from an Arjun tank I have two sources for dimensions you and DRDO and both numbers does not add up if you are correct that the turret is 3.2m wide then the Arjun is the biggest MBT in the world. it would be 4m+ wide have 30"+ wide tracks, thats ~5" more than an Abrams or Leopard2. And I guess its just how I have turned out, never believe something based only on authority, just because you say so doesn't make it a physical reality/true and in this case something is really off. Because either you are wrong or DRDO is wrong, they say the roof of the turret is 2.32m of the ground and the tank 3.864m wide overall which makes for a height to width relation of 1:1.67 yet as even ersakthivel now seems to agree the turret can only be this wide if skirts are not counted which means that the overall width of the tank is ~4.2m you can check out that low distortion frontal shot of the tank if you doubt me, giving height to width relation of 1:1.81. 1.67 and 1.81 is no where near the same. Then I am left with a dilemma, believe a guy who says so because he has seen it or believe photos of the tank which give results much closer to 1:67 than 1:81. The problem with how some people seem to approach this argument is that they compartmentalize measurements, completely forgetting that all measurements not immediately necessary, then its relatively easy to make the numbers fit their misconception but when you apply the same numbers to those other parts they fall apart they don't fit. all measurements have to fit together granted doing this on photos there is gonna be some inaccuracy, but still every thing should fit together. But if you have the measurements to prove it I will gladly discard DRDO numbers but then at the same time every other dimension given by DRDO goes too, unfortunately so length, width and height out the window. And suddenly the tank is ~4.2m wide, roof is ~2.52m high and the tank is ~11.5m long. when you inflate one measurements everything is inflated too, to keep the relation to each other the same.(unless India dosen't really use same metric system as we do and this is all a big misunderstanding)
I have sworn that I did in fact do maintenance on a Leo 1 now its a long time ago and I don't have a photo. But I remember switching the gel used to keep the internal of the hydraulics dry it was a redish/pinkish gel and I was told it could possibly give you cancer if you got it on you it was placed in small cylinder formed case of transparent plastic. I also calibrated the FCS this was done by mounting a special mirror on the out side of the FCS house and then inside the tank you would look into the FCS and see the reticle and the mirror image then you had to align the two to be exactly on top of each other, can't clearly recall if you did that with knobs or buttons but I think it was knobs.
Are you 100% sure you didn't make mistake in estimating the turret when you saw it?
STGN

 

[JAISWAL]

India Reverses Gear, Puts Arjun Tank Back in Production


by admin


SOURCE: http://idrw.org/?p=17968

India's indigenous Arjun tank project began in 1974, and originally aimed to replace the Russian T-54 and T-72 tanks which made up the bulk of that country's armored firepower. As has often been the case in India, its DRDO government weapons development agency sought an entirely made in India solution, even though this would require major advances on a number of fronts for Indian industry. As has often been the case in India, the result was a long and checkered history filled with development delays, performance issues, mid-project specifications changes by India's military, and the eventual purchase of both foreign substitutions within the project (now 58% of the tank's cost) and foreign competitors from outside it (the T-90S).
The 58.5 tonne Arjun tank wasn't fielded with the Indian Army until May 2009. In contrast, Pakistan's much more time-limited, scope-limited, and budget conscious approach in developing and successfully fielding its T-80UD "Al-Khalid" tank is often cited by Arjun's detractors.
The Russian T-90S will form the mainstay of India's future force, despite that tank'sperformance issues in hot weather. That won't change, but after beating the T-90 in a number of trials, the Arjun now has a clear future in India"¦


Arjun Cap, and T-90S Trade


The Arjun is an indigenous project, but not wholly so. Imported items such as the engine/ power pack, gunner's main sight, and other components account for 58% of each tank's cost. This is not uncommon around the world. Israel's Merkava tank family also relies on a foreign-built engine, for instance, as does France's Leclerc.
It is uncommon among Indian policy-makers, but the reality is that a series of project failures gave them little choice. The Arjun has been plagued with a mix of problems over its 36-year development history, including its fire control system, suspension issues, and poor mobility due to excessive weight. It has also grown from a 40-tonne tank with a 105mm gun, to a 62-67 tonne tank with a 120mm gun. Predictably, project costs spiraled up from Rs 15.5 crore in 1974 to Rs 306 crore (INR 3.06 trillion). The army was not pleased. In an unusual stance, they accepted the tank only after a third-party audit by an international tank manufacturer, and orders were strictly limited.
The Indian army didn't even stand up its 1st Arjun armored regiment until May 2009, 35 years after the program began. To underscore the point, even that milestone followed a development that seemed to end the platform's future. In July 2008, India had announced that production of the Arjun would be capped at the already-committed total of 124 vehicles. Instead, development would begin on a new next-generation tank, designed to survive and serve until 2040 or so.
That appeared to close the book on a failed project, but opinion in India was sharply split. Many observers cited this as the final failure. Other were noting the problems with the T-90s, and the Army's refusal to conduct side-by-side tests, alongside recent test successes that began earning the Arun some military fans. In May 2010 desert trials alongside the T-90S, the Arjun did surprisingly well.
In response, the government and the Army changed course somewhat. Arjun production would double to 248. That's an improvement, but DRDO insists that a 500 vehicle order is needed to give them the volume needed to iron out all production difficulties, and provide a platform for future development.
The Army's plan still calls for 1,657 T-90S "Bhishma" tanks at about 12 crore (INR 120 million, about $2.78 million) each if prices remain stable. About 1,000 of those are slated to be built in India by Avadi Heavy Industries, the same firm that builds the Arjuns. They will be joined by just 248 Arjuns at about 16.8 crore (INR 168 million, about $3.92 million) each, as well as 692 older T-72 tanks upgraded to the T-72M1 "Ajeya" standard. This overall plan changes the force structure proposed in 2006, from 3,780 tanks (1,302 T-90s and 2,480 T-72s) to 2,597 higher-end tanks.

Contracts & Key Events


2012 – 2013


Aug 10/12: What's in Mk2? An article for FORCE Magazine clarifies some of the Arkun Mk.2?s differences from the first version, with cooperation from India's Combat Vehicles Research & Development Establishment (CVRDE).
Improvements include the ability to fire the Israeli LAHAT missile from its 120mm rifled gun barrel, Explosive Reactive Armor for added defense, a mine plough attachment, and a shock-absorbing suspended driver's seat. Mechanical changes include a suspension upgraded to 70 tonne capacity, increased horn length (19 mm) on the German-built tracks to counter track-shedding, and slightly bigger wheels. Despite an overall weight increase from 62 tonnes to 67 tonnes, the original engine is being kept, but the gear reduction ratio has increased from 4.4 to 5.3. That will lower top speed, but reportedly keeps acceleration as good or better. Fuel efficiency is reportedly the same as the Mk.1.
The Indian Army also wants a wider range of ammunition types, which have been an issue with the Arjun. Unfortunately, DRDO's history here isn't reassuring. The article also mentions that the Mk.2 contract will involve just 116 tanks, bringing the entire ordered Arjun fleet to 240. The first Arjun Mk-2 tank is scheduled to enter operational service in 2016. With HVF Avadi looking at a production rate of 30 tanks a year, all 116 tanks will be delivered by 2020. Livefist.

2009 – 2010

Cap removed, Arjun Mk.2 production approved; Work on Future MBT begins.
Aug 10/10: Beyond Arjun. DRDO describes its Future Main Battle Tank program to India's Business Standard, who says:
"While costs are still being evaluated, the projections are mind-boggling. The development cost alone could be Rs 5,000 crore. Then, the replacement cost of the Indian Army's 4,000 tanks – at a conservative Rs 25 crore per FMBT – adds to Rs 1,00,000 [sic] crore."
That's about $1.085 billion for development, with a potential total of $21.7 billion for the program, assuming no major cost inflation or overruns. DRDO's chief and Scientific Advisor to the Defence Minister, V K Saraswat says that unlike the FICV armored infantry carrier, DRDO will develop the FMBT just as it did Arjun. He projects about 7-8 years from the time the project is formally sanctioned, though DRDO has been very wrong before.
The Preliminary Specifications Qualitative Requirement (PSQR) calls for a light 50-tonne tank, Explosive Reactive Armor plates, full networking and situational awareness even with hatches closed, and the ability to protect crews from radiation on a nuclear-contaminated battlefield. Note that France's AMX-56 LeClerc tank, which already meets many of these requirements, is around 55 tonnes. DRDO is likely to find that weight is a serious risk and cost issue, as it did with Arjun.
Aug 9/10: Mk2. In a written Parliamentary reply to Shri BP Tarai and Shri Prabodh Panda, Defence Minister Shri AK Antony confirms that the Indian Army is placing an order for "124 Arjun Tanks Mark – II in addition to the equal number of Mark – I ordered earlier." The difference between the 2 versions is not yet clear, and neither is the price. Indian MoD.
May 17/10: Arjun Mk2 OKed. India decides that it will remove the production cap, and double production of the Arjun Mk I tank. So far, 75 of the 124 ordered Arjuns have been delivered, and the remaining 49 were to be delivered by mid-2010. Now, the production line will be extended:
"The Army has decided to place fresh order for an additional home-built 124 Main Battle Tank (MBT) Arjun"¦ [after] the success of the indigenous MBT Arjun in the recent gruelling desert trials. The project for the design and development of the MBT Arjun was approved by the Government in 1974"¦ After many years of trial and tribulation it has now proved its worth by its superb performance under various circumstances, such as driving cross-country over rugged sand dunes, detecting, observing and quickly engaging targets, accurately hitting targets – both stationary and moving, with pin pointed accuracy."
Even so, the mainstay of India's future tank fleet with remain the Russian T-90S. The government's DRDO agency still wants a minimum of 500 Arjuns ordered, to stabilize production lines until it can develop a Mark-II version. Indian government PIB release | India's Business Standard | Deccan Chronicle | domain-b |Hindustan Times | Times of India.
Arjun Mk.2 approved, production cap removed


May 13/10: Arjun-II. The Indian government gives its approval to restructure the DRDO. Among the continued programs, however, is development of an MBT ArjunMk-II tank. Indian government release | Defense News.
March 25/10: Arjun aces trials. The Hindu Business Standard: "Arjun tank outruns, outguns Russian T-90." Excerpts:
"The importance of this comparative trial can be gauged from a list of those who attended"¦ "The senior officers who attended the trials were taken aback by the Arjun's strong performance", an army officer who was present through the trials frankly stated"¦ The army's Directorate General of Mechanised Forces (DGMF), which has bitterly opposed buying more Arjuns, will now find it difficult to sustain that opposition"¦ The current order of 124 Arjuns is equipping the army's 140 Armoured Brigade in Jaisalmer. With that order almost completed, the Arjun production line at the Heavy Vehicles Factory (HVF) in Avadi, near Chennai, needs more orders urgently. The Rs 50 crore facility can churn out 50 Arjuns annually"¦ The Arjun's sterling performance in the desert raises another far-reaching question: should the Arjun — with its proven mobility, firepower and armour protection — be restricted to a defensive role or should it equip the army's strike corps"¦ Each strike corps has 8-9 tank regiments. If the army recommends the Arjun for a strike role, that would mean an additional order of about 500 Arjuns."
Note also the comparative chart, showing the Arjun compared to many international tanks.
Jan 16/10: Competitive trials. IANS reports that the Arjun main battle tank will get its long-requested trials beside the Russian built T-90S tanks, in desert trials at the at Mahajan Range in Rajasthan on March 1st.
"Our aim is not to determine a winner in these trials, but to test the core strength of the tanks," a senior official of the Indian Army said, wishing anonymity."
Despite that assurance, it's generally acknowledged that poor performance in these tests would have consequences for the Arjun platform.

2008 – 2009

Arjun production capped at 124; Arjun indicted.
June 4/09: Exports? An article in The Hindu Business Line by a former member of the state-run Factory Ordnance Board, states that the Arjun may be attracting some export interest:
"Miffed at the continued reluctance of the Army and armed with the credentials certified by independent audit, the DRDO is challenging the former to conduct comparative trials of T-90 and Arjun. The Army stalled such an exercise by first wanting at least 45 tanks in the regiment and then postponing the trials to October. The Army is also inserting tactical elements in the test directives"¦ However, happily for HVF and the DRDO, it appears that a serious RFP (Request For Proposal) has been received from a Latin American country."
May 25/09: Induction. The Indian Army inducts its first Arjun Main Battle Tank armored regiment, adding 16 delivered tanks to bring the 43rd Armored Regiment up to its strength of 45. Lieutenant General D Bhardwaj, Director General Mechanized Forces (DGMF), accepts the new tanks during the induction ceremony. StratPost.
Arjun Mk.1 inducted


July 22/08: Industrial. ANI reports from India's Technology Seminar on 'Future Infantry Combat Vehicle and Future Main Battle Tank,' and the winds all appear to be blowing toward greater private sector involvement.
Current Defence Minister A K Antony noted that the new defense purchase policy envisages a greater role for the private sector in supplying much needed equipment to the country's armed forces, and added that the focus of the new rules and procedures in the defense procurement procedures 2008 (DPP 2008) is on ensuring speedier procurements. Also:
""¦Chief of the Army Staff, General Deepak Kapoor, pointed out that while technology was critical for any nation's defence system, "what was also needed was the need to check any time and procedural delays." He said that while it was important to stress on indigenisation and collaborative approach, "we should not compromise on our operational capabilities."
"¦Lt. Gen. Dalip Bhardwaj, Director-General Mechanised Forces, said that the time was right for greater private sector involvement in supplying defence equipment. "However, the industry must keep in mind the defence sector's end needs and not just the technology." According to him what the industry needs to do is to develop products that have a longer shelf life."
July 21/08: Beyond Arjun. India and Russia may be gearing up to develop the T-90?s successor as a joint project. Rediff quotes Nikolai Malykh, director general of Russia's biggest tank producer Uralvagonzavod:
"We put forward this idea (of developing the tank) at the turn of the 21st century. The Indian side has now come up with a similar proposal"¦ We will take the first step when our experts go to India to attend a conference on the future tank and prospects for the tank-building industry."
Moscow Defence Brief magazine claims that the new tank may have a new main gun of up to 152 mm caliber, higher speed, a smoother ride, improved networking, and an armor-protected crew compartment sealed from an unmanned turret equipped with an automatic loader. A new hunter-killer fire control system would include target acquisition in optical, thermal, infrared and radar spectrum that will be accessible both to the gunner and tank commander.
This is interesting on 2 levels. One item worth noting is their use of the BrahMos program as a model. If adopted, the successor program to the Arun tank is likely to have far less DRDO involvement and control. The second item is the feature set itself, which reflects Russian thinking. It's worth reminding oneself, however, no deal has been signed as of yet. Initial wish lists for features are just that, until a working model is fielded. Rediff report.
July 7/08: Capped. India decides to cap production of the Arjun tank at 124. Jane's | Times of India | Indian Business Standard(pro) | Hindustan Times | domain-B | Thaindian News |Thaindian News (re: sabotage) | Business Standard (April, pro)| Rediff (April, pro).
Production capped

 

[ersakthivel]

i had to in order to make this:

and this:

If you do such complex projections, why don't you do this simple thing on the top view drawing of arjun,

Just take the top view of the tank,

All objects in the top view are located in symmetrical fashion.

fix three 120 cms lines on the axis which runs through the center points of the two crew hatches across the width of the turret.

The first line will start at the top edge of the hull and stop at the center of the top crew hatch,

The second line will have both it's ends on two crew hatch centers,

The third line will start from bottom crew hatch and stop at the bottom edge of the hull.

All three lines will be almost equal in length is my idea from plain view.

In fact I did a measurement on screen each of these three lines will measure 200 mm on plain scale on the screen.

And the total width of the turret measures 600 mm across on plain scale on screen method.

3x120 cms =3600 mm as close to the hull width as possible.So there can be no room for any error in this simple measurement technique.

So 3800mm-(2x300mm=600 mm) is 3200 mm is the turret width if the partial frontal side skirts are not included in the hull width.


You can get a much more easy and clear picture.

 

[ersakthivel]

Just to be clear, you agree that for the turret to be near 3.2m the skirts has to not be counted?
So the overall width of the vehicle (including skirts) is over 3.864m? (using the DRDO width numbers)
Do you agree that from looking at this picture http://www.military-today.com/tanks/arjun_l1.jpg that the width over tracks is very close to 3.864m then?
STGN

if the track width itself is 3540 mm ,then you can use your experience and arrive at what can be the hull width including side skirts?

How many mm will side skirt extend over track?

 

[Dejawolf]

If you do such complex projections, why don't you do this simple thing on the top view drawing of arjun,

i have.... and posted pictures of it several times here on this forum...

 

[Dejawolf]

If you do such complex projections, why don't you do this simple thing on the top view drawing of arjun,

i have.... and posted pictures of it several times here on this forum...

 

[Dejawolf]

if the track width itself is 3540 mm ,then you can use your experience and arrive at what can be the hull width including side skirts?

How many mm will side skirt extend over track?

3.86m, according to measures on this image:

we can also derive the hull width, approximately 2m.

and then 3.86-3,54 = 32
32*2 = 64
3.54-64 = 290cm
i still say 2.84 though, since the 18+18 on the factory picture were short by a few pixels of the turret width.