TINDALOS

Funny little side story: he also bashed the whole "tank is becoming obsolete and UAVs are going to takeover" theory. 

He pointed out the three main flaws of modern domestic tanks:

1. Low cross country speed

2. Lack of means of hard-kill active protection

3. Low commonalities (or shared characteristics?) between platforms (I'm not sure about this one, my interpretation on this might be totally off)

He then pointed out three positive characteristics about domestic tanks:

1. Low weight and profile (obviously, when compared with western tanks instead of Russian tanks)

2. First class protection

3. Strong fire power

Also, he seems quite admire T-14's design except the X shaped A-85 engine. He think that placing the crew in a separate and protected compartment is a great idea to improve crew comfort and possibility of survival. He also praised the modular design of the whole Armata family.

Recently, ZTZ-99A's chief designer Mao Ming gave a speech at North China University （a university deeply related to Chinese defense industry) about the modern development of domestic and foreign tanks.

On 4/14/2021 at 12:57 PM, AssaultPlazma said:

I'm shocked MPF hasn't been canceled yet.... Even if it passes trials I wonder if in the end the Army will actually buy them.

And they came up with those "medium tank" concepts... Seriously, whats wrong woth these people?

On 4/17/2021 at 1:01 PM, AssaultPlazma said:

If they want to use the Bradley chassis that bad why not just stick that 30MM Stryker turret on it? It's already been made and means ammo commonality....

Isn't that a single man turret?

If anyone is interested in the history behind the development of Chinese third generation tanks, I strongly recommend this article (written in Chinese):

Part one
https://weibo.com/ttarticle/x/m/show/id/2309404519105649574380?_wb_client_=1

Part two

https://weibo.com/ttarticle/x/m/show/id/2309404531003560690005?_wb_client_=1

Part three

https://weibo.com/ttarticle/x/m/show/id/2309404571464467873891?_wb_client_=1

3 hours ago, Wiedzmin said:

not very interesting test, but real tank(Tyep99) test in interesting, there was also photos of ballistic test of type 99 UFP, is there any info about this test  ?

 

 

I would like to take a look at those photos, seems interesting. I never heard about that there were photos of ZTZ99's protection test.

Just now, barbaria said:

I remember when I got personally attacked a couple years ago for stating that the majority of the Chinese IFV's were lacking thermals. 

A lot has changed on this forum since then..

As a Chinese myself, I can confirm "the majority of Chinese ifv lacks a thermal sight" is pretty true. Basically every ifv before ZBD04A (if you don't count export model I guess) don't have it.

On 4/13/2021 at 6:40 AM, alanch90 said:

Where does the gunner sit in the Kurganets? Besides the driver and commander?

The Kurganets you see in the parade is probably a mock up, the real one (please reference zvezda's TV show on kurganets 25) has gunner and commander sit side by side while the driver is in the front of gunner or commander (sorry I realy don't remember wether the driver sits infront of the commander or the gunner)

1 hour ago, LoooSeR said:

   And i though situation with our IFVs was bad regarding FCS and sights.

ZBD04 (not ZBD04A, I think you guys call it ZBD08？) also don't have a thermal sight. For a pretty long time ZBD04A is the only ifv equipped with thermal sight in the PLA arsenal. For tanks, ZTZ-96A and ZTZ99's sight is pretty much T-90A level (one for thermal and one for daylight, just like ESSA+1G46M on T-90A). ZTZ-99A and VT4 has something similar to SOSNA-U, a multi channel combined day/night sight.

On 4/6/2021 at 9:32 PM, Atokara said:

I don't understand the need to make a single platform that does everything ok, but nothing really well. I thought everyone realized this when the North Korean's started putting both ATGM's and MANPADS on their MBTs. Let's say you send one of these out to patrol with a few infantry squads and it gets destroyed. Congrats, now your fire support, air defense, and anti-tank power are gone from a single RPG/IED.

I mean... North Koreans have to so because they lack modern SPAAG/SHORAD and their tanks' main guns are pretty crappy as well. Adding existing ATGMs is a pretty easy way to significantly improve the tank's fire power when compared with creating a brand new high performance APFSDS shell from scratch. Same thing applies to MANPADS on tanks. They literally add 14.5mm AA machineguns and MANPADS on every single AFVs they have.

On 4/27/2020 at 6:03 AM, Wiedzmin said:

 

 

some HE tests on Type99 prototype ?

Yes, there was an actual study conducted in mid 90s about the possibility to use 125mm HE shells fired from type 99 tank as an anti tank weapon. The shelling test was conducted on a modified type 69 tank (with A LOT of additional add on composite amour and ERA to represent a T-80U).

On 3/17/2021 at 5:06 PM, LoooSeR said:

   Yuri Lyamin linked on otvaga - modernized ZBD-03. Changes on turret - looks like they added optics on gun mantlet and some sort of box on right cheek of the frontal turret armor.

 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

 

Fun fact: ZBL-08, ZBD-03, and ZBD-05 don't have thermal sight and dual plane stabilizer previous to this upgrade