That_Baka

Depends on the angle. 

Bomblets can be countered by NERA/MERA/ERA on turret roof. I think Trophy can engage targets at rather high angles relatively to many other APS.

The clear problem is that it wasn't designed by superior teutonic engineers.

I think there is something missing, there should be some sort of small nuance that ruin this weapon system, which is a reason why nobody bothers to actually produce those. I think there is some sort of technical limitation that make this weapon not fit for service.

So, if you're reading this I assume you know what Nozh is and how it's supposed to work. Just a quick tl;dr to refresh your minds: Nozh is supposed to work by cutting a penetrator with the use of multiple shaped charges, like this: 

 
 
The thing is that it cannot work as advertised, for a plethora of reasons. Most of these reasons have to do with the formation of a shaped charge jet.
 
So lets go.
 
The thing I realised when looking at Nozh is that I usually assume that shaped charges are initiated correctly. That is to say, on the centre axis exactly in line with the 'point' of the liner and a bit behind the liner to get a uniform shock front going. This is not the case with Nozh. Both the 'primary' charge (the one being actually hit by the penetrator) and the secondary charges are initiated badly, but the primary moreso than the secondaries. The problem with this is that shaped charges are ridiculously sensitive to position of the initiation point. And I do mean ridiculously sensitive. A drifting jet will already be formed with an initiation point that is less than 0.01 CD off-center. And the further off-center it is, the higher the drift.

 

(Both pictures from "The influence of asymmetries in shaped charge performance", by Ayisit)
 
It gets even worse when you ramp up the eccentric initiation even further:


(Both pictures from "Studies of Shaped Charges with Built-In Asymmetries. Part 11: Modelling" by Brown et al.)
 
As you can see there is quite the amount of drift present (and it's drifting away from an incoming penetrator). But this is still a shaped charge that is otherwise completely intact. So we'll look at damaged shaped charges as well. And oh boy.
 
So since the ERA is getting hit with a penetrator the ERA casing will get deformed and most likely damage nearby liner charges. Not only that, the detonating liner charges will most likely damage the liner charges next to it too. So lets see what happens when the explosive filler in a shaped charge is damaged:


(Pictures from "Effect of Fragment Impact on Shaped Charge Functioning" by Chanteret)
 
Not that exciting, it has the same effect as off-center initiation; the jet drifts.
 
But what happens when the explosive *and* liner are damaged?


(Pictures from "Effect of Fragment Impact on Shaped Charge Functioning" by Chanteret)
 
That a significantly worse jet, there's no coherent tip and there isn't really a slug being formed either. That's pretty bad. The most important part of the Nozh ERA (the tip) is basically non-existant. But it gets even worse when you introduce actually moving projectiles instead of just static damage:

(Pictures from "Effect of Fragment Impact on Shaped Charge Functioning" by Chanteret)
 
There's basically no jet and there's no coherent slug being formed. Effectively, this charge is close to useless. But lets look at a couple more results:


(Pictures from "Effect of Fragment Impact on Shaped Charge Functioning" by Chanteret)
 
This is what Chanteret himself has to say:
 
So a proper shaped charge can have a penetration loss of more than 70%. This is significant considering these are proper HEAT charges, not EFPs like the ones used in Nozh. I'll get back to that later.
 
But all these things directly affect the shaped charge, what if we introduce obstructions in the liner cavity? In theory that means that a proper HEAT jet can't be formed, and in practice...:
 

 

(Pictures from "Investigation of Several Possibilities to Disturb the Jetting Process of 40 mm / 60° Charges" by Voumard et al.)
 
...it's exactly what happens.
 
 
Sadly I haven't been able to find a study which combined all these defects, but I guess we already know the results of those tests: "No jet, only dust".
 
 
Now apply all these things to an EFP (which the liner charges in Nozh are). They are hemispherical liners, which, unless you know what you're doing, have lower penetration than conical liners. They're also slower so they'll intercept the penetrator at a later point than conical liners. And they're drifting away from the penetrator because of off-center initiation. And they're most likely damaged liners so the jet formed will inherently be worse. And the jet formation will probably be obstructed, so the jet can't even form properly in the first place. And the formed jet has to penetrate a thick 'flyer' plate, so the tip velocity will be even lower. And then a slow, eroded and strongly perturbed copper jet will intercept a wolfram penetrator. Now, how was that supposed to cut a penetrator again?
 
 
 
...yeah I realise this became more of a rant about how ridiculously sensitive shaped charges themselves are and less about how bad Nozh is. And I didn't even talk about everything that influences the formation of a jet. What about grain size? What about cavities in the explosive filler? What about an explosive filler detached from the liner? What about a liner with an asymetric thickness? What about an explosive filler detached from the casing?
All of these things have a negative effect on the jet formation. As we already know HEAT warheads in rockets are worse than in ATGMs (afaik due to a cheaper manufacturing process), there is no way that the liner charges in Nozh are of high quality.
 
 
Nozh is bad.
 
 
You also know its bad when you look at this picture from a patent:

 
Now tell me, what's wrong with that drawing?
 
 
So why does Nozh 'work'?
 
Well, it's a relatively giant amount of explosives with a thick flyer plate. Soooo.... it's basically 'Heavy ERA'. REALLY REALLY HEAVY ERA.
 
 
Nozh just gets one giant fucking "...what?" from me.
 
 
 
....discuss away gentlemen, because I think @Collimatrix and I are the only ones that claim that Nozh doesn't fucking work.

According to the video in this link, Curtiss Wright will improve the turret of your M60 so that it can quickly engage 6 pounder anti-tank guns.
 

 
 

https://oleggranovsky.livejournal.com/67621.html
   Some Nagmapop schematics (Nagmapop is reconnaissance variant "Nagmakhon" with a telescopic mast with recon equipment installed on it, early 2000s, only several were made). Recently, on the official site of the IDF, a file in pdf format has been uploaded - "Parts Catalog for Nagmapop", which is where those schematics were found. Some details in the link.
 
Photos of this thing:

 
 

 
 

Hi LoooSerR,
 
After the end of the Six Day War, the IDF absorbed into service approximately 150 T-54s and T-55s as Tiran 4 and 5s. A substantial stock of other intact and damaged tanks were kept for spare parts.
 
After the end of the Yom Kippur war, the original intention was to replace losses by introducing two entire, new armoured divisions (Division 440 and Division 880) made up of captured and then upgraded T series tanks. along with captured BTR-50, Topaz APCs and BDRMs. 
 
Of the 139 captured T-62s in running order 79 were in excellent condition and introduced into service as an independent brigade  of Tiran 6s to be allocated to Division 440. The Tiran 6s kept their 115mm weapons. Although the IDF was impressed by its performance,  the original intention was eventually to replace the 115 with the 105 mm gun because of ammunition shortages
 
Initially another 330 Tiran 4s and 5s were absorbed as war booty by the end of 1974. Upgrades were limited to new radios, optics and machine guns. The intent was that all the Tirans would have their gun replaced with the 105 mm , potential power-pack replacement and other profound upgrades as part of Project Samovar. Many hundreds of T-54s and T-55s in various states of repair were held as a store of spare parts.
 
The IDF planned to absorb another 400-500 Tirans by the end of 1976. This was never carried out, and Division 880 was not introduced with ex Soviet equipment, nor was Project Samovar  carried out. This was because the US sold sufficient M48s and M60s to rebuild the Armoured corps with Western equipment. If not for this, the Israelis would have been one of the largest users of T54s and T-55s outside of the Warsaw Pact. The irony.
 
The numbers are accurate. A friend of mine "Camera" translated the  Hebrew text to English from the second of volume of the History of the Ordnance Corps, written by the military historian Amira Shahar and offered for free download on the site of the Foundation of the Veterans of the Ordnance Corps. The Hebrew name of the volume is ‘The Ordnance Corps as a force multiplier – the history of the Ordnance Corps in the years 1967-1985’:http://himush.co.il/himush.co.il/ori...s1967-1985.pdf. The study is an excellent "warts and all" account pointing out serious shortcomings of the IDF, but also underlining just how important rapid battlefield recovery and vehicle repair was during the 1973 war.
 
cheers
Marsh

Tiran-6, 1970s.

 
 

UPDATE:
In light of a low profile "scandal" in the Artillery acquisition program, to replace the M109 with an Elbit's solution, a commission was set in May this year, to debate the issue as well as the future needs of the artillery corps. Among the topics were also the number of artillery pieces eventually required by the IDF, in this 1.5 billion dollar program (likely price for first batches, as usual).
On 03/08/17, the commission brought its recommendations to the Minister of Defense and were approved. 
 
The recommendations were not released and are still classified, however it is assumed that some of them were to go ahead with Elbit's proposal and not renew the bid, in which South Korean and German firms were also involved, in cooperation with Israeli companies IMI and IAI. 
 
Approval of the recommendation allows to continue the development work of the Elbit's artillery piece, to be constructed in Soltam facilities in Israel.
 
Reasons for the necessity of the commission, brought by other Israeli defense companies (IAI and IMI) and various sources:
Elbit's solution is still developmental and not yet fielded elsewhere, whereas their solutions are proven and fielded, or no longer developmental. Their solutions technically do meet all IDF's requirements for an artillery system, thus should not be so quickly disqualified. The IMoD was not transparent with them on several topics including the decision to disqualify them. Meanwhile the IMoD had been in constant talks with Elbit without the knowledge of these companies, and while the process with them was practically frozen due to lack of communication on IMoD's part.  
TL;DR
The plan to equip the IDF with cannon artillery has been approved and embedded into the Gideon multi-year plan. However there's something fishy in this program, and I would not be surprised if we'll hear a corruption case eventually.

New images.
Turret details:

 
Clockwise from the top:
1) Commander's sight.
2) Dual missile launcher.
3) 4x Trophy radar.
4) 60mm mortar.
5) Gunner's sight.
6) 30-40mm cannon with dual feed, 400 bullets.
7) Smoke grenades.
8) Coaxial machine gun 7.62mm, 700 bullets.
 
Illustration on the Eitan. Presentation had low res unfortunately:

Badger, SAR

 

That old language barrier thing. 

http://cnki.com.cn/index.htm
 
...enjoy?

A M5 Light Tank and a M4 Medium Tank from the US 755th Tank Battalion (attached to the 3rd Regiment of ‘Tirailleur Algériens’) pose near the center of the small Italian town of Coreno Ausonio, which they had occupied one hour before. Gustav Line, Italy, afternoon of May 14, 1944. - WWII Colorized Photos.
 

Am I too late to express my desire for 152 mm HESH fired from ancient ISU-152s against Armatas in Syrian Civil War II?

@Bronezhilet, @Collimatrix, @Scolopax
Syrian war is leaking.

T-72 and bunch of cars cosplaying ISIS/HTS.
 
 
 

Right next to the T-64, also a well known completely Ukrainian invention that was made without help of pesky Moscovites. 

@Andrei_bt
https://andrei-bt.livejournal.com/612089.html
 
Фотографии (мои) той же машины, выкладывал в прошлом году на отваге (форум и на сайте):
http://otvaga2004.ru/fotoreportazhi/vystavki-vooruzheniya/t72b1-dlya-vs-nikaragua/

To be fair, it might not be too wise to put the Oplot-M into mass service.
Best course of action IMO would be to give just a handful to an experimental weapons unit, pair a few military photographers to them, and send them off to limited operations. Then market them as combat proven, with combat footage being made available to top military brass tasked with procurement. Boost sales and for every sold piece, buy several cheaper derivatives for the Ukrainian army. They can make do with what they have.

Oplot-BMs? None. Oplots (older vserion) - like 10 or something like that. Never were used outside of parades and PR events.

I meant that the GTD-1250 transmission would have to be completely different than the GTD-1000 transmission, which does appear to be the case.

So, correct me if I'm wrong, but couldn't you get a sort of poor man's neutral steer with the BKP by setting one to first gear and the other to reverse?
 
Do you happen to know which transmission the Oplot has?