Main Battle Tanks and Armour Technology

[Dazzler]

T-95 pics courtesy @Andrei_bt

 

[abhi_the _gr8_maratha]

the word about kanchan can stand against ammo of pakistan are of damian
.
here are his golden words :- " should remember that in the
region, most potent kinetic energy
projectiles in such countries like India,
Pakistan or China, have penetration
capabilities of approx ~500-550mm
RHA at 2,000m at best (some types
perhaps can achieve ~600mm), which
means it is the late 1980's and early
1990's level, and could not be effective
against frontal protection of T-80UD.
Of course this works the other way as
well, and Indian T-90S will also be
relatively well protected against
Pakistani projectiles and Arjun should
be as well."
.
T-80UD Main Battle Tank - A Pakistani Perspective
.
kanchan has been tested successfully against same quality of ammo that pakis uses right now ( in 1998 against israel given ammo)

 

[SajeevJino]

.

It's Just Announced That Israel Sells Merkava 4 MBT to someother Country ..But Didn't Disclose the Country's Name

 

[hitesh]

@hitesh



.

unless you know alkhalid's composite and ERA components and exact thickness, this is not true


this is old but still good.. whats of note is the fired shell could not penetrate the first layer, modern AK uses more advanced armour. Can you show me a similar pic where Arjun's armour is being tested?










Nope, ammo in MS is placed exactly where it was in the T-90S i.e.. in the carousel and the hull, armour bins.




if achieved, it would be good





quite needed, it has many




true



no harm in keeping a high pressure rifled gun, all that is needed is a lethal, high penetrating apfsds round that could bust 700+ composite armour, otherwise, go for smooth bore and buy apfsds rounds off the shelf


Always required

T90 MS has different arrangement for ammo storage then previous T90S

Regarding Alkhalid armor protection the images proves nothing i can too quote excepts from article where it says Kanchan Armour took a point blank shot of 125 mm & survived but unless we dont have data about round used & other details its all chest thumping but the level of confidence on kanchan Armour the Indians had that they used the same armor on locally assembled T90s which says all about its effectiveness .

 

[Kunal Biswas]

Actaully they did and that is why its mobility is better than those original T-tanks in these areas, Don`t Ukrainian provided you with NBC Filters ..

i am sure DRDO. Indian army never intended/ wanted a 68 ton tank for a possible Thar/ Rajhistan/ Cholistan desert. The dust is too fine to hamper engine performance, temperature soars above 52 Celsius often.

 

[Twinblade]

Repeat:
India - 3BM42: 430-460mm RHA at 2000m
Pak. Naiza-2: 550mm RHA at 2000m

This is difrence.

Repeat.
500 RHA penetrator for 125mm, MkII round. this goes into production late this year/early next year. It has been in testing since 2010.

 

[Kunal Biswas]

Just saying BM-42 penetration is 500mm RHA from 2000ms at 30degrees from 0 degree the penetration is somewhat 50mm more ..

 

[militarysta]

Just saying BM-42 penetration is 500mm RHA from 2000ms at 30degrees from 0 degree the penetration is somewhat 50mm more ..

No it's not, sucht data is bullshit.
Last year on russia arms exebition russians show oficial values for 3BM42 - guaranteed 430mm RHA at 2000m, achivable circa 460mm RHA at 2000m.
Any difrent value now is pure manipulation or misinformation.
What more: BM42 is shorter (rod) have difrent penetrator build as monoblock DM33A1 wchich have 470mm RHA at 2000m. So first is unable to achive biger value then DM33A1 second -we know oficial value for Factory no.9 exibition in Russia so there is no point to discuss here.

Anyway - soviet ammo values for 2000m
A - achivable
G - guaranteed

3BM-26: A: 440mm G: ~400mm
3BM-29: A: 450mm G: ~410mm
3BM-32: A: 500mm G: ~460mm
3BM-42: A: 460mm G: ~430mm

 

[militarysta]

Repeat.
500 RHA penetrator for 125mm, MkII round. this goes into production late this year/early next year. It has been in testing since 2010.

I mentioned it here:

IMI/Indian 125mm had 500mm RHA at 2000m -but this ammo is not existing now in IA (IMI on black list)

And still - this amo is not in service.
But IA bought 300% overpriced 3BM42 Mango (DOI 1986) -.-

Shoud I remaind how looks 125mm APFSDS ammo case in India?

1. Firstly DRDO/ OFB had made it's own 125mm APFSDS "mixing and matching DRDO penetrators with imported Russian propellant, which leaked when the Army stored them in high heat conditions" so wchole bath was destroyed (20k!)
This round mark is Mk.1 and yes -it's not existing couse falitures and dangerous for crew. And the worst possible quality...

2. Then IA choose IMI rods and how-know to build pretty close to the polish Pronit rounds whit almoust the same penetration values.

3. In the same time as 2) to India went 3BM42 Mango whit T-90. Russian do not let to put IMI rounds in T-90 (balistic computer etc)

4. After that Israel offers new 125mm rounds with performance better than the CL3254M that had been originally sold to India. But MOD blacklisted IMI so all program IMI - DRDO/FOB cooperation whit new APFSDS was stopped and again - SNAFU..

5. So what must done IA? Of course - bought from Russia 3BM42 Mango - overpriced at 300% and in big number (66k)
But of course DRDO start developed it's ovn rounds Mk.2 125mm APFSDS which is teh same branch as polish pronit and it's orgins is the same CL3254M. O course it's slighty better. How about this? Well it was redy to test in 2010 and...nothing happen.
Pitty becouse it was the same as polish ones analogues circa 530-540mm at 2000m. But it's not DOI, not IA, nothing happen :/

5. The last idea about IA 125mm APFSDS is unoffcial name Mk.3 whit penetration circa 600mm RHA at 2000m.
Why sucht value? The stated requirement of the IA for the new round is per what they were getting from the international market from Israel, till corruption allegations put paid to the procurement. That round, the latest available for the 125mm class from Israel, was stated as at least 600mm. A similar statement is made by the ex head of DRDO in an interview in 2012 IIRC wherein he mentions that requirement.


----------------
All infos above are thanks to Archer user, who is propbalu only person here which can recognize whole mess whit APFSDS ammo in IA.

More or less - still no modern amo 125mm APFSDS in IA
And still - Naiza-1 and aiza-2 have better perforation values then 3BM42M Mango and Mk.1 and Mk.2.

 

[militarysta]

A little correction here, Naiza 1 has guaranteed penetration of 560mm RHA at 2000m, Naiza 2 is not well known but is rumoured to cross 650 mm at 2000 but this is not confirmed. During my tour to ARDE few years ago, i saw many goodies there but cant say further.

Intresting - in polish sources they are only present:

Naiza - WHA rods, pretty close to the 3Bm42 and it's chineese clones, and whit max 450mm RHA at 2000m
Naiza - 2 whit DU whit circa 100-110mm better perforation.
No infos about better Naiza version, but of course it's possible (reacht circa 600mm)

 

[Damian]

Not to refute anything you mentioned about hydrogas suspension but hydrogas suspension was tested on two AK prototypes with unsatisfactory results. Too heavy and complex hence difficult to maintain, otherwise, both suspensions have their advantages and disadvantages. Both are used by various mbts. Leo-2 also use torsion bar suspension

Then this means you had problems with your hydrogas suspension system, probably solvable but expensive. It is tuth that Hydrogas had it's problems in the past, Leopard 2 was also tested with MBT-70's hydrogas suspension system, and torsion bars proved to have better overall performance.

It all really depends on design, as a comparrision, Americans tested M1 prototypes with hydrogas suspension system, and they found that it was overall better and 1 metric ton lighter than torsion bars suspension system.

But as you said, all these suspension systems have their stronger and weaker sides.

 

[Kunal Biswas]

Wht`s the angle ? a very important fact ..

No it's not, sucht data is bullshit.Last year on russia arms exebition russians show oficial values for 3BM42 - guaranteed 430mm RHA at 2000m, achivable circa 460mm RHA at 2000m.Any difrent value now is pure manipulation or misinformation.

================
================

There is nothing call MK3 of 125mm, Its MK2 of 120mm for Arjun ..

Check again, Polish / IMI rod length and weight of the penetrator compare to Indian one..

But of course DRDO start developed it's ovn rounds Mk.2 125mm APFSDS which is teh same branch as polish pronit and it's orgins is the same CL3254M. O course it's slighty better. How about this? Well it was redy to test in 2010 and...nothing happen. Pitty becouse it was the same as polish ones analogues circa 530-540mm at 2000m. But it's not DOI, not IA, nothing happen :/ 5. The last idea about IA 125mm APFSDS is unoffcial name Mk.3 whit penetration circa 600mm RHA at 2000m.

 

[ttnt33]

Wht`s the angle ? a very important fact ..

In the brochure, the Russians state that the 3VBM17 round with 3BM42 projectile can penetrate 230mm RHA at 2000m/60 degrees angle.
http://www.military-today.com/russian_land_forces.pdf(page 35)

 

[militarysta]

.
kanchan has been tested successfully against same quality of ammo that pakis uses right now ( in 1998 against israel given ammo)

In fact pakistani T-80UD have armour on very very good level - this armour was developed to stop M829A1 and DM42 etc so rounds whit circa 550-600mm RHA penetration.
It shoud be (for +/- 30. degree for turret longitiudal axis) almoust "impenetrable" for this all 3BM42 or Mk.2 IMI/FOB.
Here is not rocket sience.
What more - I had a very very accurate factory draw and descripsion about T-80U armour. And this armour for 30 degree is
like circa 500mm RHA and for 0 degree (turret front) is circa 630mm RHA. Plus ERA of course.
More or less whit ERA it can be as 620-750mm RHA vs APFSDS. Whit ERA of course.
It's far far above all existing APFSDS now in India - 120 and 125mm.

Against HEAT warhed base this T-80U armour was circa 1100-1300mm vs HEAT.

Those values are preatty big...

How good armour have Al Chalid-1? We don't know that, but Al Chalid as child Chineese-Pakistani cooperation whit domestic Frencht and Ukrainian solution should be preatty close to the T-80UD cose front armour have similar tchickness and sucht armour layout (weak turret sides protection) give posibility to put almoust whole turret armour on front -at it can be seriously heavy whit many heavy componnets. So IMHO circa 600mm vs APFSDS is really possible. If not better.


From the other hand we don't know Kanchan armour layout. Known descripsion erly Kanchan give us armour layout preatty close to the polish CAWA-2 armour. So in given layout it's possible that Kanchan is enought even against Naiza-1 and Naiza-2 DU

But whit Arjun it's other problem - big weak spot (enormous huge gun mantled mask) and weak spot after main sight. This plase IMHO are possible to penetarte by rounds whit more then 550mm RHA. There is just to small space for special armour in that place.
T-90 Bishma have mucht better placed armour whit better turret geometry so Kanchan inside T-90 IA shoud be enought.

 

[militarysta]

Wht`s the angle ? a very important fact ..
max 460mm RHA 2000m NATO 90.

There is nothing call MK3 of 125mm, Its MK2 of 120mm for Arjun ..

They are 3 rounds "Mk.x"
MK.1 FOB - those falitures and rejected
Mk.2 FOB/ IMI - present now but nod DOI (this round is preatty close to the pronit)
Not offcial named yet "new" 125mm APFSDS -this last one mentioned in this log post about IA 125mm APFSDS.

Check again, Polish / IMI rod length and weight of the penetrator compare to Indian one..

?

 

[methos]

Then this means you had problems with your hydrogas suspension system, probably solvable but expensive. It is tuth that Hydrogas had it's problems in the past, Leopard 2 was also tested with MBT-70's hydrogas suspension system, and torsion bars proved to have better overall performance.

There is too much half-knowledge regarding the advantages and disadvantages of hydropneumatic supensions. A hydropneumatic suspension does not guarantee a smoother ride, a badly made hydropneumatic suspension will be worse than a average torsion bar suspension regarding performance.

The important performance indicator of a suspension is the suspension travel also known as roadwheel travel. It is the measurement of how many milimeters the roadwheel can travel within the suspension from top-most to bottom-most position in order to egalize the profile of the ground.
R. Hilmes writes that the Leopard 2 has a roadwheel travel of more than 500 mm (thanks to 500 mm long swing arms and a maximum torsion angle of 61° in combination with a specially developed steel alloy), but other sources provide a more specific value with 530 mm. The Challenger 2 with it's hydropneumatic suspension has a roadwheel travel of only 450 mm, and that's why it doesn't perform better (in fact it did perform worse) than the Leopard 2.

According to the DRDO techfocus No. 2 from April 2014 the roadwheel travel of the Arjun's HSU is 535 mm. The MBT-70's hydropneumatic supension on the other hand was designed with a roadwheel travel of 600 mm and thus has better performance than the DRDO's design.
The Isreali Merkava series of tanks has some of the most optimized suspension systems, e.g. the Merkava III has a roadwheel travel of 604 mm! That's why the Merkava series still uses some actually outdated spring-based suspension design compared to torsion bar suspensions or hydroprop suspensions in Western and Eastern AFVs.

Hydropneumatic suspensions for heavy-weight fighting vehicles have one of two problems:
- They don't perform any significant amount better than torsion bar suspensions
- They are bulky and heavy-weight

The reason for this problem lies in the high pressures encountered in combination with high wheel-loads (Radlasten) and/or the increase in suspension travel length. The Japenese Type 74's hydropneumatic suspension allowed a maximum travel of only 450 mmm, which resulted in a quite acceptable pressure of 300 bar. In case of the MBT-70 the maximum measured pressure in the hydropneumatic suspension was between 800 and 900 bar, which is too much for archieving the normal reliability and component lifetime of a torsion bar suspension!
During the developments of a new hydropneumatic suspension in the 1980s in Germany, this problem was considered solved, but in order to do this, the weight per suspension unit increased to 250 kg (which means 3,500 kg (!) suspension weight for a 7 roadwheel vehicle like the Leopard 2).

Germany has done a lot of research regarding hydropneumatic suspension in the past on various different projects. Vehicles with hydropneumatic suspensions developed in Germany:
- Leopard 1 prototype of Arbeitsgruppe B
- Schützenpanzer Neu with prototypes like Ru 264 (with 575 mm travel)
- MBT-70 (600 mm travel)
- a number of Leopard 2 prototypes like PT 11
- mid-1980s developments for a future MBT (650 mm suspension travel)
- the current Puma IFV

The Germans did test hydropneumatic suspensions at various different times (as previously mentioned pretty much constantly since the early 1960s) of different construction types, but ultimately they sticked with torsion bar suspensions in most cases. The only two times where hydropneumatic suspensions were favoured, it wasn't the result of greater performance: The MBT-70 had a hydropneumatic suspension, because the ability too adjust the ground clearance was considered a mayor advantage in defensive warfare (because once the hull is at least partial covered, a reduction of the ground clearance by 30 cm results in about 1 m² less frontal surface); while the Puma uses only a hydropneumatic suspension, because this allowed the engineers to go with a decoupled suspension design - due to this, the hull is not penetrated by the suspension and a higher level of mine protection could be achieved.

The Japanese went for hydropneumatic suspensions on their tanks for exactly the same reasons as the Germans and Americans during the MBT-70 development: For the ability to adjust the ground clearance. The same has to be sad about the Swedish Strv 103: Without the ability too adjust it's ground clearance, the Strv 103 would not be able to aim at different ranges (because the gun is fixed into the tank).

In the end a difference in suspension travel in the range up to 50 mm or even 100 mm might lead to no noticeable difference, given that the suspension provides a given minimum of max travel. The differences between the supension of the Leopard 1 and the Leopard 2's suspension are quite considerable (with the latter having 25% greater roadwheel travel), but regarding the actual performance the differences are not that noticeable, especially because of the stabilized main gun and stabilized sights (in case of the EMES-18).
The differences in the past were much greater; the Panther tank had more than twice as much roadwheel travel as many contemporary tanks.

As reference I used Rolf Hilmes' "Kampfpanzer Heute und Morgen" as well as "Kampfpanzer Entwicklungen der Nachkriegszeit", the DRDO Techfocus and the Challenger 2 title of the Osprey New Vanguard series.


So, to sum up:
- Hydropneumatic suspension are not neccessarily better than torsion bar ones
- The Arjun's hydropneumatic suspension is mediocre and not better than most torsion bar suspensions (esp. in combination with it's medicocre road wheels)
- The suspension performance of most modern tanks is very well

 

[militarysta]

- the current Puma IFV

; while the Puma uses only a hydropneumatic suspension, because this allowed the engineers to go with a decoupled suspension design - due to this, the hull is not penetrated by the suspension and a higher level of mine protection could be achieved.

Two more thinks.
SPz Puma suspension is almoust the same as tested in EGS -you can compare photos. it's sescribed too in Hilmes.
And sucht suspencion in SPz Puma allowed to put in side sponsosn whit suspension fual tanks - whole layout incares protection for hull sides against RPGs and EFP mines.
About rest post -I fully agree. Very valuable post.

 

[Damian]

@methos I agree that hydrogas is not allways, and not nececary better than torsion bars or any other suspension system. Everything have it's strong and weak sides.

BTW Methos.

L-3 Communications Combat Propulsion Systems

L-3 hydrogas suspension system for M1 tank have such characteristics:

Wheel travel : 381mm jounce and 127mm rebound, so total 508mm.

Weight: 173 kg damped, 171 kg undamped.

Although I wonder about other suspension types like the In-Arm system developed by Cadillac Gage.

So in performance perhaps not better, but have it's advantages. Just like boggie suspension.

It is perhaps the question of requirements than purely technical issues.

 

[Kunal Biswas]

Wrong, BM-42 penetration is 500mm RHA @2000ms at 90degree, Sources said so, Why should you be right then ?

You got facts wrong or made wrong ?

max 460mm RHA 2000m NATO 90.

They are 3 rounds "Mk.x"
MK.1 FOB - those falitures and rejected
Mk.2 FOB/ IMI - present now but nod DOI (this round is preatty close to the pronit)
Not offcial named yet "new" 125mm APFSDS -this last one mentioned in this log post about IA 125mm APFSDS.?

 

[Dazzler]

Intresting - in polish sources they are only present:

Naiza - WHA rods, pretty close to the 3Bm42 and it's chineese clones, and whit max 450mm RHA at 2000m
Naiza - 2 whit DU whit circa 100-110mm better perforation.
No infos about better Naiza version, but of course it's possible (reacht circa 600mm)

* that round isPOF 125mm, 460mm @2000m

* Naiza series is exclusively DU based, two versions, Naiza 1 is 550-60mm @2000m and Naiza2 does 650 mm @2000, later is not known in media. Developed by NDC and PAEC.

* ARDE produces the improved tungsten penetrator based on chinese type-2m round, penetration is 600+mm at2000m.


http://pof.gov.pk/TAT_125mmapfsds.aspx

pof 125mm....