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Mighty_Zuk

Excommunicated
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  1. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk reacted to LoooSeR in Contemporary Western Tank Rumble!   
    You don't need that in our age of MMPs, Spikes, ALAS, AFT-10s and so on.
  2. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk reacted to skylancer-3441 in General AFV Thread   
    from Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sompong.nondhasa/posts/1722926777810426 - some 8x8 from Thailand
     
    (Thai->En via Google Translate)
     


     
     
  3. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from Lord_James in Bar / Cage armour + LASSO + RPGnet   
    "Luke - I'm your fun uncle"
     

     
     
    In case anyone wondered, this is how the Swedish planned the chain armor equipped tank to look like:
     

  4. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk reacted to LoooSeR in GLORIOUS T-14 ARMATA PICTURES.   
  5. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk reacted to Wiedzmin in Israeli AFVs   
    gettyimages now have much higher res previews 
     







  6. Funny
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from Panzzer in Non-exploding infantry hardware thread.   
    Imagine taking a ride on your favorite donkey for some alone time in the woods, and seeing this shit staring at you:

  7. Metal
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from Molota_477 in Explosive Reactive Armor   
    Not only ERA but didn't find a proper thread:
     
  8. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from Zyklon in Israeli AFVs   
    Pre-serial production variant.

     
    Prototype:

     
    Noticeable differences:
    Lower (fog?) lights are protected. Storage boxes on the sides appear to be somewhat extended downwards, with the central one being significantly enlarged. UFP has a little bump in the middle. Rear sponsons were somewhat changed. Smoke grenade launchers were removed. New commander's cupola? Sides are now protruding outwards, due to the installation of the new armor modules. New tires and wheel design. Different headlights.  
     
  9. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk reacted to Laviduce in French flair   
    For the mean time:
     
     
    Updated Special Armor Locations:
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Fuel Tank Locations:
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Main Gun Ammunition Locations:
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Crew Locations:
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Armament Locations:
     
     
     
     
     
    Powerpack Location:
     
     
     
     
     
     
  10. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk reacted to David Moyes in French flair   
    https://twitter.com/armeedeterre/status/1105496693062189056



    https://www.defense.gouv.fr/terre/actu-terre/dans-les-coulisses-de-fabrication-du-griffon
  11. Metal
    Mighty_Zuk reacted to LoooSeR in Tanks guns and ammunition.   
    Was posted on otvaga - diploma work on ramjet APFSDS design (in russian). PDF

     
     
  12. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from alanch90 in Israeli AFVs   
    I've considered it. What next? Several designs were shown here, including one with an armored LFP in an Abrams-like fashion.
     
     
    https://yadlashiryon.com/news/התובה-של-טנק-המרכבה-סימן-4/
     
     
    Are you even aware that the Namer and Merkava 4 are using the SAME armor module on the hull front? The Namer is able to achieve that, however, by increasing the height of the vehicle.
     
     
    I don't know what their considerations were. They at least tried it on the Merkava 3 in a demonstration for the Mark 4, but no figures about weight, or weight distribution, were given in that demonstration.
     
     
    What is it with you and the constant need to insult people to overcome deficiencies? If you want to have a proper debate, engage with the person you want to debate with. 
    Yes, you are correct about the length, but perhaps I should have rephrased. In the relevant parameters, the new powerpack is smaller than the Merkava 3's, and organized better. It allows for more room for armor.
    But what's bothering me about these figures is that it seems as though the transmission is taller than the engine, when in reality it seems the other way around:

     
    The new powerpack, at least externally seems more suitable for the task because of its shape, and according to your own figures, is quite substantially lower. Indeed, I was incorrect about length. I am more used to talk from my gut about info I remember from a long time ago, and don't keep track of every single piece of data I stumble across. The more relevant parameter seems to be height, with length also being important but to a lesser extent, and with width being the least important parameter.
     
     
    Correction on the figures - 50%-55% is the usual in the west, and 70%-80% in the Merkava. 
    Finding a source on this claim is also difficult, because again it's a very old one. But I'll do my best to find it in the morning.
    So far all I've found is that the source is David Eshel's "Merkava 3: Israel's New Spearhead".
     
     
    The Abrams is so far the only MBT that fully separates ammo from the crew compartment. Back in the 70's it was deemed a good solution to keep the ammo below the turret ring, because an Abrams-like setup made a K-kill still quite likely, as a piercing APFSDS would have a chance at piercing the armored doors, in which case the blow-out panels are not going to fulfill their task.
    It remains one of the only points of criticism I have towards the Merkava's design, and the decision to still place the ammo in the hull in the Mark 4, but at least at RAPAT they've realized that this is an issue, and any future AFV is going to have a separated ammo.
     
     
    The very close cooperation they have with allied nations' tank and AFV programs?
    Sure, the IDF hasn't really done anything with rear-engine tanks since the light tank project in the 90's, but why do something twice when you can draw from the experience of others?
     
     
    Define roof. If you mean the "tunnel"-like setup it has, similar to the Leopard 2A0-2A4's gunner's sight, then no. It compromises the turret's protection. What I mean is something along the lines of what the Merkava 4 has.
     
     
    As I've said, every major variant of the Merkava has seen substantial amounts of combat, and enough to draw conclusions from. Throughout its entire history, the Merkava has performed as expected, or above expectations, at least in terms of crew survivability.
     
     
    https://yadlashiryon.com/news/התובה-של-טנק-המרכבה-סימן-4/
     
    I'm not sure what you're trying to show me here. All these photos show, on the hull front, a UFP modular armor kit, and an LFP-attached mount that holds the belly armor. None of these has an LFP armor kit.
     
    What is it you're trying to compensate for, with all these attempts to insult me? We've had quite a few disagreements so far, you and me. Have you seen me trying to insult you for that? No. But I've witnessed quite a lot of outright childish behavior coming from you, and I expect better if you wish to maintain a debate. Please revise your strategy when approaching a debate.
  13. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from Serge in Israeli AFVs   
    Pre-serial production variant.

     
    Prototype:

     
    Noticeable differences:
    Lower (fog?) lights are protected. Storage boxes on the sides appear to be somewhat extended downwards, with the central one being significantly enlarged. UFP has a little bump in the middle. Rear sponsons were somewhat changed. Smoke grenade launchers were removed. New commander's cupola? Sides are now protruding outwards, due to the installation of the new armor modules. New tires and wheel design. Different headlights.  
     
  14. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from Adraste in Israeli AFVs   
    Pre-serial production variant.

     
    Prototype:

     
    Noticeable differences:
    Lower (fog?) lights are protected. Storage boxes on the sides appear to be somewhat extended downwards, with the central one being significantly enlarged. UFP has a little bump in the middle. Rear sponsons were somewhat changed. Smoke grenade launchers were removed. New commander's cupola? Sides are now protruding outwards, due to the installation of the new armor modules. New tires and wheel design. Different headlights.  
     
  15. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from LoooSeR in Israeli AFVs   
    Pre-serial production variant.

     
    Prototype:

     
    Noticeable differences:
    Lower (fog?) lights are protected. Storage boxes on the sides appear to be somewhat extended downwards, with the central one being significantly enlarged. UFP has a little bump in the middle. Rear sponsons were somewhat changed. Smoke grenade launchers were removed. New commander's cupola? Sides are now protruding outwards, due to the installation of the new armor modules. New tires and wheel design. Different headlights.  
     
  16. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from skylancer-3441 in Israeli AFVs   
    Pre-serial production variant.

     
    Prototype:

     
    Noticeable differences:
    Lower (fog?) lights are protected. Storage boxes on the sides appear to be somewhat extended downwards, with the central one being significantly enlarged. UFP has a little bump in the middle. Rear sponsons were somewhat changed. Smoke grenade launchers were removed. New commander's cupola? Sides are now protruding outwards, due to the installation of the new armor modules. New tires and wheel design. Different headlights.  
     
  17. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from MRose in Israeli AFVs   
    Eitan to be accessible to the public in an expo:

  18. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from alanch90 in Israeli AFVs   
    Time to play smack-a-gentile.
    This absolute madlad called @RedEffect put out a video with quite a few claims about, specifically, problems with the Merkava. I know the problems with the Merkava, and what he raised is either inaccurate, or misunderstood.
     
    Here's the video:
     
    The claims are, as following:
    Significant heat signature on the front. Engine can get easily damaged. Heat can obscure the thermal vision of the gunner, so gunner has to turn away the turret. Fuel tanks can catch fire.  LFP bad, UFP not so bad. Can't stop APFSDS or ATGMs though. Does not have any blow-out panels. Armor is "fragile" so hits in the same area can damage it. Wedge shaped armor is bad, only strong in the center. Still uses L/44 gun, while L/55 is better. Trophy is god-tier amazing but the Merkava is still held back by its thermal signature. And here's the rebuttal:
           1. Not true, and it's flawed logic if one arrives at this conclusion by looking at photos of other tanks' rear sections and seeing their apparent thermal signature on the engine compartment. The reason is very simple - on conventional tanks, it's not nearly as important to mask the thermal signature from the engine, because when looking roughly at the front of the tank (the deviation from the front grows smaller as the range increases), the engine's signature is masked. For the Merkava it's more important, and the engine is not covered by thin sheets, and the exhaust isn't just blown wherever. The entire area above the engine is thick armor, and the exhaust air is cooled and thrown downward. The engine cover is not hot, but the exhaust is. It adds only a very small portion to the heat signature. 
    You can see it here:
           2. In the Merkavas 1-3 I would say that it is true. The engine is overly vulnerable. In the Merkava 4 that has proper armor in the front, that's not the case. If the engine is damaged by a penetrating shot, then in a conventional design it would have been a dead crew. Against an APFSDS the engine indeed would not add much protection, but even today the most proliferated threat to armor is ATGMs. Even in a peer-peer combat, due to the nature of combined arms combat, the tank would still be highly threatened by many different assets other than tanks - helicopters and infantry employing ATGMs, planes employing either ATGMs or JDAMs, artillery, etc. Against these, protection against HEAT is extremely valuable.
           3. Unsubstantiated, and so far I haven't heard of any firing drill that involves rotating the turret away from the exhaust.
           4. Fuel tanks in any tank can catch fire. That's not unique to the Merkava. In the Merkava it may fry the engine. In another tank it could fry the driver.
           5. RAPAT (Israeli equivalent of TARDEC) believe the armor suit they developed for the Merkava 4 is one where they didn't have to make any compromises, and could make it work against the perceived threats. None tried to fire an APFSDS against this tank so I wouldn't know. Additionally, he mentions the Kornet ATGM, and that one specifically was said to have been fired at the front section of the tank but without success. They didn't specify what "front" means, but since Hezbollah were smart enough to fire not only at the sides, but specifically at the ammo stowage compartment at times, makes me believe they were also smart enough to occasionally fire specifically at the hull.
           6. Entirely false. The hull isn't equipped with blow-out panels but the turret is. Since he mentions the Leopard as an example of a tank with such panels, despite having a huge ammo rack at the front with no panels, makes me believe he did not mean the entire ammo, but even parts of the ammo. So again, false.
           7. That was a problem with the Merkava 4A, but not the Mark 4B and subsequent variants.
           8. Theoretically true, but the upper portion of the turret is completely inert because it's actually just the roof armor and storage bins, and the lower portion is to some extent covered by the hull. Yep, the hull's armor extends above the actual roof of the hull to hide the turret ring. You have to actually be on a pretty nice elevation to see the turret ring.
           9. L/55 is better if you only take raw penetration into account. But that is not the only consideration. With urban combat growing in frequency, shorter barrels still show some clear advantages. An L/55 is a whole 1,320mm longer than the L/44, and that makes it hard to traverse in narrow city streets. That is, when considering that any tank with the L/44 is already pretty bulky for streets. The Merkava's turret was built in a way that allows for substantial growth in firepower - up to 140mm. Accepting an L/55 gun is a no biggie. But there is no operational need for such a gun, and it's possible the IDF will skip right to the 130mm or whatever the next gun may be.
           10. Similar to point 1, but you can see in the photo I added there that the radars are actually just as hot, if not hotter than the exhaust air.
  19. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from FORMATOSE in Israeli AFVs   
    Time to play smack-a-gentile.
    This absolute madlad called @RedEffect put out a video with quite a few claims about, specifically, problems with the Merkava. I know the problems with the Merkava, and what he raised is either inaccurate, or misunderstood.
     
    Here's the video:
     
    The claims are, as following:
    Significant heat signature on the front. Engine can get easily damaged. Heat can obscure the thermal vision of the gunner, so gunner has to turn away the turret. Fuel tanks can catch fire.  LFP bad, UFP not so bad. Can't stop APFSDS or ATGMs though. Does not have any blow-out panels. Armor is "fragile" so hits in the same area can damage it. Wedge shaped armor is bad, only strong in the center. Still uses L/44 gun, while L/55 is better. Trophy is god-tier amazing but the Merkava is still held back by its thermal signature. And here's the rebuttal:
           1. Not true, and it's flawed logic if one arrives at this conclusion by looking at photos of other tanks' rear sections and seeing their apparent thermal signature on the engine compartment. The reason is very simple - on conventional tanks, it's not nearly as important to mask the thermal signature from the engine, because when looking roughly at the front of the tank (the deviation from the front grows smaller as the range increases), the engine's signature is masked. For the Merkava it's more important, and the engine is not covered by thin sheets, and the exhaust isn't just blown wherever. The entire area above the engine is thick armor, and the exhaust air is cooled and thrown downward. The engine cover is not hot, but the exhaust is. It adds only a very small portion to the heat signature. 
    You can see it here:
           2. In the Merkavas 1-3 I would say that it is true. The engine is overly vulnerable. In the Merkava 4 that has proper armor in the front, that's not the case. If the engine is damaged by a penetrating shot, then in a conventional design it would have been a dead crew. Against an APFSDS the engine indeed would not add much protection, but even today the most proliferated threat to armor is ATGMs. Even in a peer-peer combat, due to the nature of combined arms combat, the tank would still be highly threatened by many different assets other than tanks - helicopters and infantry employing ATGMs, planes employing either ATGMs or JDAMs, artillery, etc. Against these, protection against HEAT is extremely valuable.
           3. Unsubstantiated, and so far I haven't heard of any firing drill that involves rotating the turret away from the exhaust.
           4. Fuel tanks in any tank can catch fire. That's not unique to the Merkava. In the Merkava it may fry the engine. In another tank it could fry the driver.
           5. RAPAT (Israeli equivalent of TARDEC) believe the armor suit they developed for the Merkava 4 is one where they didn't have to make any compromises, and could make it work against the perceived threats. None tried to fire an APFSDS against this tank so I wouldn't know. Additionally, he mentions the Kornet ATGM, and that one specifically was said to have been fired at the front section of the tank but without success. They didn't specify what "front" means, but since Hezbollah were smart enough to fire not only at the sides, but specifically at the ammo stowage compartment at times, makes me believe they were also smart enough to occasionally fire specifically at the hull.
           6. Entirely false. The hull isn't equipped with blow-out panels but the turret is. Since he mentions the Leopard as an example of a tank with such panels, despite having a huge ammo rack at the front with no panels, makes me believe he did not mean the entire ammo, but even parts of the ammo. So again, false.
           7. That was a problem with the Merkava 4A, but not the Mark 4B and subsequent variants.
           8. Theoretically true, but the upper portion of the turret is completely inert because it's actually just the roof armor and storage bins, and the lower portion is to some extent covered by the hull. Yep, the hull's armor extends above the actual roof of the hull to hide the turret ring. You have to actually be on a pretty nice elevation to see the turret ring.
           9. L/55 is better if you only take raw penetration into account. But that is not the only consideration. With urban combat growing in frequency, shorter barrels still show some clear advantages. An L/55 is a whole 1,320mm longer than the L/44, and that makes it hard to traverse in narrow city streets. That is, when considering that any tank with the L/44 is already pretty bulky for streets. The Merkava's turret was built in a way that allows for substantial growth in firepower - up to 140mm. Accepting an L/55 gun is a no biggie. But there is no operational need for such a gun, and it's possible the IDF will skip right to the 130mm or whatever the next gun may be.
           10. Similar to point 1, but you can see in the photo I added there that the radars are actually just as hot, if not hotter than the exhaust air.
  20. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from FORMATOSE in General AFV Thread   
    It also doesn't mention that it's not current day prices, but prices taken out of any random phase of production. I remember about a decade ago people would actually say the Leclerc is so fancy because it's so expensive, and then the K2 is so fancy because it's so expensive, citing figures of $8 million to $14 million, not knowing those are figures for early tranches, with a lot of the development costs built in.
     
    Type 99 also seems somewhat misplaced - not too long ago we've heard China prefers now to rely more on Type 96 tanks because the Type 99 are too expensive to produce in such quantities. For an economy like China, making thousands of tanks worth $2.6 million each sounds dirt cheap.
     
    The figure for the Merkava 4 is definitely wrong. In 2010 in Eurosatory, SIBAT officials (defense export agency for the IDF) said the price of a single tank is $4.5 million, for export. The unit price for export will always be greater than what the IDF pays to procure it.
    The topic has been only raised few times since then, but it always concluded in a "we don't know". The IDF buys parts for the tanks in bulk. And by 'bulk' I mean they always stock up on enough parts to keep production going for several years even if there's a complete supply chain shutdown. A lot of the procurement is completely independent of the desired amount of tanks, because the production goes on indefinitely. It's almost impossible to assess the true cost of a single unit. 
    Of course, the IDF does not buy the tank as a complete system from a private company, but the tank is for the most part privatized, and the IDF even pays premium, and prioritizes contracts, for companies in suburban areas. 
     
    There are also typos in the headline, and it appears the K2 image is this nice but ultimately failed attempt at a computerized model (main issue is the hull front shape):
     
  21. Tank You
  22. Sad
  23. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk reacted to Wiedzmin in Israeli AFVs   
    mk4 turret front plates?
  24. Funny
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from HAKI2019 in Israeli AFVs   
    The missiles seem to be launched one by one. To ensure defeat of the Trophy, you'd have to launch them simultaneously.
     
    Additionally, since the Trophy adds a slew-to-cue feature, i.e it points the gun at the launch source, you'll basically have the turret front facing the two missiles. Since Trophy, in all current known implementations, has significant overlapping coverage zones, both its launchers can be activated to defeat both missiles.
     
    Last but not least, one of the arguments against the RPG-30 was that statistically, any projectile flying directly behind another projectile, is basically guaranteed to be hit by one of the EFPs of the Trophy's interceptor.
    Same goes for this new demonstration with the Red Arrow ATGM.
     
    It was designed to defeat APS. At some point, because Trophy was the only APS in service at the time, and still is, someone decided to claim it's designed to defeat Trophy, to which Rafael simply replied that the RPG-30 is too primitive in its design to defeat Trophy, and features nothing that could improve its chances over a typical RPG.
  25. Tank You
    Mighty_Zuk got a reaction from skylancer-3441 in Israeli AFVs   
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