Collimatrix

First time i see this type of cover for a tank used during exercises.

Have you ever thought that the ideal shape for an anti-ship or anti-tank missile is a large, angry sphere?

https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/f1/72/89/634aacb6736f87/US3045596.pdf

Well, neither has anyone else since the 1950s. Enjoy this bizarre patent.

The possible K2NO
 
Fitted with Trophy radars and Norwegian camo. It's said that this K2 will be spotted at the upcoming ADEX 2021 (along with the Desert K2 we've seen at expos in the past) so we may get more pictures and details then.
 

Proposed guided munition for a RPG-7
 

Karaok from Roketsan (Turkish Javelin like)


 

I don't see how this is a problem.  What's the risk; that the Australians carve out the core of their own submarine to make a bomb?

New Camo Experiment
 
 


 
 

3D models of kinetic energy ATGM that KBP is still working on.

 
 

With the kind permission of Colli, I present to you the 2021 update, as well as a certain retrospective, as I fairly recently dove head-first into this topic for the first time in years.
 
So what’s changed over the past year? In the field of GPUs, Nvidia have released their 30 series cards, to great joy and great anger, depending on who exactly you ask. There’s no question that the 30 series brings great performance gains (with the lower end currently available matching the higher end of the 20-series, for instance the 3060Ti is largely equivalent to the 2080 Super), and that the Founder’s Edition cooling solution is both affordable (being offered at MSRP and not above, unusually) and effective (the through-flow solution being fairly highly regarded).
 
AMD, likewise, has released its 6000-series, which appears to be lagging behind Nvidia’s offerings for performance at a given cost point, excepting some of the more over-priced Nvidia cards. In terms of raw capability, Nvidia cards put more of an emphasis on ray-tracing at any given performance category over plain ol rasterization, and slightly less on shaders, and a wide array of benchmarks show a distinct advantage there, with the latest AMD offerings falling behind the last gen Nvidia ones. 
So where is the controversy regarding these cards? Largely in the cost, marketing, and target market. The higher end, 3090s, 6900XTs,  and 3080s are marketed as gaming devices yet seem better suited to graphics workstations, and are very steeply priced. The lower end is perfectly acceptable, if you can get your hands on them.
The graphics card shortage is perhaps even worse than it was last year, though that shows signs of reversing as of mid August. The extremely high demand has been driven by 2 major factors - the first, the Cryptocurrency market, which exploded over the past year, and the second being lockdown-inspired demand for high performance desktops, both for “working from home” and for lockdown entertainment. 
 
Both of those, however, are showing certain signs of abating. The Crypto market took a few major hits over the past year, after its meteoric rise. Notably, the Chinese outlawing mining both tanked the value (reducing the value of mining in the civilized world), and flooded the Asian market with used graphics cards, with knock-on effects to the rest of the world. And with the end of serious lockdowns in most of the civilized world, the demand for high end gaming-capable computers is dying off and many are available secondhand (and indeed the buyers thereof aren’t competing for the latest and greatest equipment any more).

For what it’s worth, per the Steam hardware survey, the most popular of these newer cards is the 3070, followed by the 3080, then the 3060, with the 3090 falling far behind and the latest AMD cards not even making the list. The Nvidia 10 and 16 series still hold the lion’s share of the market, of course. Intel’s new foray into graphics cards, rather than just integrated graphics, may expand the market options from the current duopoly. The new line of Nvidia CPUs, if they venture into the consumer level and not just the datacenter class, will mean we’ll have 3 giants doing both CPUs and GPUs, which will hopefully only do good things on the consumer side.
In the field of CPUs, Intel still holds the lead in single thread performance, but the “11th-gen” flagship performance has left much to be desired, with the i9-11900k being noticeably worse than its predecessor, the i9-10900k, in many benchmarks, as an example. Popular opinion is that they were to a certain extent rushed out to maintain Intel’s image as the market leader, even if AMD is neck to neck if not overtaking them outright by this point. In fact, the perception of being a market leader is so important, that Intel is renaming their node size technology to better compete (though as we all know the “node size” in nm doesn’t actually correspond to any actual real physical measurement, and Intel have consistently squeezed more performance out of any arbitrary self-reported number than competitors). 

The Ryzen 5000 series is seriously kicking Intel in the nads, with the Ryzen 9 5900X, at comparable price to the  i9-11900k, offering many more cores, lower TDP, and only slightly lower clock speed, for what is a very spicy package Intel has a hard time matching. Intel’s 12th gen, which should be out any day now, may offer a worthwhile response, but then again may not. Other than for compatibility and stability reasons, it’s getting ever harder to recommend Intel, so they’ll have to step up if they want to not become the underdog themselves.
 
Unusually, this year also brings RAM news - DDR5 is right around the corner, once again offering increased capacities at higher speeds. Available likely in late Q4 2021, along with the Intel 12th gen CPUs which are reportedly the first which will be compatible.
 
In conclusion, it’s been quite a year, and competition is running hot. Hopefully the following year will bring more fancy new products.
 
So, where do I see this going?
Looking back 7 years, to when I was last really paying attention, we see a few interesting developments reaching their ends, and a few new ones opening up.
One development which appears to be reaching its end is screen technology. We now have screens which refresh faster than the brain can actually usefully recognize (240 Hz), and screens at resolutions greater than that of the human eye (4k, 27” monitors at reasonable distance from your face). Clearly, once those two factors are combined, perhaps even in a curved wide monitor which are ever more the rage these days, there won’t be much more to be done in that field, which also implies a limit to target performance for GPUs, at least for gaming applications. Doubly so, when one considers the various “AI” techniques being introduced such as DLSS, which reduce the workload of rasterization. Unless something major comes along which requires much more processing power, while the end is far away it definitely appears to be within sight. 
 
RAM, on the other hand, appears to be getting ever faster and ever larger, with the most interesting development being, in my opinion, Intel’s Optane, which is a kind of middle ground between SSDs and RAM, with most of the attendant advantages of either. Current programs do very much like their RAM, and that’s not a trend that’s showing any signs of stopping, either.
 
Another interesting development is the gradual reduction in number and types of cables, both from wireless communication and inductive power delivery, and by the USB standards slowly displacing everything else (other than graphics, though that too may change soon with USB4 allowing DisplayPort tunneling). This convergence has done much to address the e-waste problem, as well as the “rat’s nest” of cables of the computers of yore.
 
Along with the cables disappearing, so too have physical data storage media, to a very large extent. Internet-based “cloud” data storage, streaming services, and the like have entirely displaced such things as the CD, to the point where not only do many computers come without, they don’t even come with the bays required to install one. This has of course resulted in external, USB-powered ones, for those occasions where you do need to read one, which do unfortunately add clutter rather than remove it. 
And now, whither cloud storage?

Over the past few years, and the last year in particular, we’ve seen a rush to both get into the cloud business via an absurd explosion of streaming services all requiring a subscription to access their exclusive content, and to monetize existing formerly free internet services. Beyond the usual “freemium”, “free but tons of adds”, and “free but we steal all your data”, we’ve seen free services cut down significantly in favor of the paid versions, “software as a service”, and increased executive meddling in what you do on said platforms. While highly unpleasant if you are on the wrong end of things, it does once and for all answer the question of “who’s paying for all these free internet things”. But bottom line, if you’re one of those people who keeps all their data on the cloud, best ask yourself what happens when your data host decides to unperson you for wrongthink of whatever flavor, real or imagined. Doubly so if your data is also a source of income.
 
So, how should you store your data on your own PC?

The conventional wisdom of past years has been to have at least a small SSD for your OS and commonly used programs, and an HDD for the heavy lifting. In the current year, and doubly so in the near future, it appears that if you only intend on keeping around a small quantity of data, you can get away with only having an SSD, and no HDD at all. Of course, this approach isn’t fault-tolerable, and recovering data from a damaged SSD is not really possible in the same way it is from a damaged HDD. So it seems an HDD is still desirable for the near future, at least, and perhaps onwards. External HDDs are pretty cheap nowadays, and you likely have some digital media you really don’t want to lose, so getting a couple and storing one in a different building is not a bad idea. And if you’re into really long term read-only storage, for things like family photos, DVDs or Blu-Rays are pretty cheap and last basically forever, and are likely more forgiving of rough storage than the HDDs. 
 
That more or less wraps up my opinions on the topic, yours may of course vary.
 

Sadly there are no eng subs (only if you turn on auto translated ones, which are so-so), very informative video on Rys'-T helmet (Altyn's cheaper brother, made out of titanium as well).
   Guy shows real helmets and even helmets that were tested by NII Stali (Google translated NII Stali as "her steel", lol), plenty of close ups and so on.
 
   Protection provided by 3.8 mm of titanium, aramid backing, rated against steel core 7.62x25 mm bullets from Tokarev. Glass is rated for 2 shots of 9x18 from Makarov. Glass section is 2 layered, frame for glass is made out of worse metal alloy.  
   Compared to Altyn, Rys'-T is less repairable (use of rivets vs screws on some small components like clamps for fixing faceshield in open/closed positions), and overall somewhat cheaper (rubber on helmet titanuim plate edges was changed to cloth tape, for example).
   In 2014 rubles helmet costed more than 100 000. 4 years warranty, heh, 1.5 for radio. Rys'-T is no longer in production.
 

Su-57 new clothing line in military green:

This is a couple of months old but in all the Ajax shenanigans I forgot to post it:

British Army ‘reviewing’ MRV-P options
 
Multirole Vehicle-Protected is a British Army program to replace the myriad of mine resistant vehicles acquired during the "War on Terror" with a common platform for all force elements.

MRV-P Requirements


 
Variants required would be split into 3 groups:

Group 1 - General Purpose
Group 2 - Troop Carrier, Ambulance
Group 3 - Recovery

Fast forward to 2016:
In classic British Army fashion the whole point of the program was defeated when the L-ATV was chosen for Group 1 without competition. Bushmaster and Eagle V 6x6 would compete for Group 2.
No choices were selected for Group 3 but the Recovery variants of Penman Metras, Supacat HMT 600 and Eagle 6x6 were known bidders.

Group 3 Candidates

 
The Army tried to justify this decision saying that the L-ATV was closet to the requirements (wut?), could be acquired quickly and it's low base price meant that even with the necessary modifications (convert to right-hand drive) no other could compete. A unit was acquired and multi-year testing commenced.


 
It should be noted that all this came shortly after the Brexit Referendum. In the wake of the vote the Government announced a new Industrial Strategy and prosperity agenda. Basically, buy British.

It was pointed out that an L-ATV buy would go against this and any UK content/involvement would be limited.
Further a couple of years after the decision rumours began to circulate that the Army had totally miscalculated the extent of modifications needed and the price of a British spec'd L-ATV would not only be comparable to other platforms but might even be more expensive. A price bandied about was £750k per for a deployment ready unit.

Group 2 trials were only mentioned as ongoing and Group 3 disappeared, seemingly cancelled.

Final decision and buy was supposed to happen in 2020.

After MRV-P again failed to appear in the 2021 White Paper the British Army said it was reviewing the programs options:

https://www.army-technology.com/news/mrv-p-review/

As was stated when first announced, L-ATV does not meet Government prosperity requirements and the MoD has refused the buy.
Notoriously the Army often sees US equipment as the "gold-plated" option and is still pushing for L-ATV.
 
 
This review may simply be for show.

However if it's not there are a few options that have confirmed British production line:

Thales - Pushing Bushmaster and a Hawkei recently turned up at their Glasgow facility. But 2 different platforms and Hawkei is unproven.

Penman - Metras is built on the Mercedes UNIMOG chassis and meets basically all requirements. 4x4, 6x6 and many variants built and tested. Composite crew module and higher than average agility due to competing for Protected Patrol Vehicle that saw Foxhound win.
Small company and so originally bid with BAE but Rheinmetall merger and Boxer production line may mean they will have to look for a new partner.

General Dynamics - Eagle V also mostly meets requirements and is built on the In-UK-Service DURO platform. On going tensions between Army and company won't help.

There are also the two in-service platforms in General Dynamics's Foxhound and Supacat HMT to consider. Both have proposed required variants, modular design and are currently being used to test hybrid drive.
Adding to the fleet would theoretically be much faster if only new modules needed to be tested rather than the entire platform.
 



 
 

Block 1 Boxer with Lance 1.0 turret cleared for static firing of practice 30mm natures as part of the introduction into service. Turret conversion continues. 
 

 

 

 
Photo credit: LAC Solomon & PTE Hilton. 

Some photos from the same event that vid was taken at
 

 

K21 maintenance 
 

Polish-made picture of the Object 477A, claimed to be baised on real schematics.
 

 

 
Driver is sitting between 2 autoloaders, which feed a single autoloader in the middle of the hull, between gunner and commander.

K1A2s and K242s of the 30th Armored Brigade 
 
K1A2s

 
K242s

 

Holy shit, it's SuperComrade!

Note that the bottom-most row has twice the fittings for holding rounds. This is because once filled, those tubes tilt down and 5 more are placed between them and the rest of the rack. This allows better use of the space which would otherwise be inaccessible because of the torsion bars and other crap on the floor.
 
A similar solution is used in the turret rack:

Note that the edge rounds cannot be accessed until the center ones are removed.
The same solution is used in the Abrams:

 
Perhaps best illustrated by this pic of the 105mm Abrams rack:

 

Maximum angular resolution is a function of beam width.  Beam width is a function of antenna size and operating wavelength.  An AESA might be able to wring a slightly smaller beam width out of a given antenna size and a given wavelength, but it is still subject to these same limitations.  It's fundamental physics; you see similar-looking equations if you look into the maximum focal range of laser weapons.
 
L band is an order of magnitude longer wavelength than X band.  Wing antennas are narrower than nose-mounted radars.  This supposed "wing mounted L band AESA radar" is going to have less than a tenth the resolution of the nose radar.
 
Computer signal processing do a much better job of finding useful signals.  A more capable computer can find information that a weaker computer would have to throw away as noise.  But there are information theoretic limits.  Computers cannot create information that they weren't given in the first place.  Computers aren't magical.  They cannot improve the resolution of a grainy photo to show the face of the killer reflected in a raindrop.

If a radar has a small antenna relative to its operating wavelength then its beam will be quite wide.  If there are two targets within that beam width at the same distance moving at the same speed then there is no possible way that the computer will be able to tell whether it's one target or two.  There simply is not enough information for the computer to dig through to find out what is going on.
 
Likewise, if a radar has a wide beam and it's engaging a moving target, it is going to have a hard time figuring out where exactly in this wide beam the returns are coming from.  It can move the beam around until it stops getting return signal, but the edge of a radar beam isn't a clean and abrupt end, and if the target is moving it won't be able to do this quickly enough to get a precise location anyway.
 
These are fundamental problems with the amount of information that the antenna can provide the computer.  The computer won't be able to fill in the blanks.

It's an Actively Electronically Scanned Array (AESA), but that does not mean it is a radar.  AESA is just a type of antenna, it doesn't necessarily mean it's a radar antenna.  It could be a transmit-only antenna, or a receive-only antenna.
 
It can't be a radar.  Or if it were, it would be the world's most singularly useless radar.  This isn't a matter of experience or design finesse, this is a matter of fundamental radar antenna physics.  That is not a large enough antenna relative to the wavelength it's operating in.

It is almost certainly an IFF system, but one that uses an AESA.
 
The way IFF works is that the aircraft with the IFF system gets pinged by a radar, and the radar sends a coded interrogation signal.  The aircraft that receives this signal sends back a coded response, which identifies it to friendly forces.
 
The problem with this for a stealthy jet is that the IFF system is broadcasting radio waves, which is decidedly un-stealthy and could allow any radar with a passive seeker mode to get a bearing fix on the aircraft.
 
The solution Sukhoi is using here is an AESA IFF system.  Instead of a regular antenna, the response IFF signals are transmitted through the AESA, which allows it to confine the signal to a very narrow beam.  AESA has extremely high gain and very small sidelobes, so it can make the IFF beam much narrower than a conventional antenna.  That makes it much less likely that an enemy eavesdropper will detect these signals and use them to locate the PAK-FA.

I'm not sure if strong conclusions can be taken from that one video.  Different ammo types produce radically different amounts of recoil.  Discarding sabot training ammo doesn't produce too much recoil, while HE-FRAG is firing a big, heavy shell with a lot more momentum.
 
Aside from that, it occurs to me that the 120mm armed tanks listed are all heavier than the 125mm armed ones, although the weight of the K2 and T-14 overlap.
 
How a tank responds to the recoil of its gun firing is a function of the total momentum of the shot, the mass of the vehicle, the moment of inertia about the recoil axis (which is affected by which way the turret is facing), suspension stiffness, suspension damping, and recoil system length and forces.  You are correct in thinking that the stabilizer doesn't have very much to do with it.  In addition, I suspect that the K2 may enjoy very low recoil when firing from a stationary position, as it has adjustable suspension.  The rear hydropneumatic stations can be filled with additional gas pressure, which increases the K* of the stations, which reduces the amount that the tank rocks when firing provided the gun is pointed more or less forward.
 
The most effective way for light vehicles to deal with high trunnion loads from their cannons is to have very long recoil lengths for their cannons' recoil systems, but this comes at a cost.  The longer the recoil path of the cannon, the more empty space needs to be reserved to accommodate the movement of the breech.  This makes the turret more voluminous and taller.

I don't think that it's a significant cost driver.




*Compressed gas doesn't act exactly like a spring, but close enough.

Some photos of the K2M model. These were taken at the "Korea Defense Component & Equipment Fair 2021".
 

 

Yeah, P-38 is one of the exceptions.  Lockheed did such a good job streamlining it that it really didn't have a speed or drag disadvantage compared to contemporary fighters.  At higher altitudes, it actually had a big speed advantage.

According to this source, the thrust relative to drag on the P-38 was quite competitive:


 
On top of that, the P-38 had a hidden edge in acceleration that the raw power/weight figures don't show.  Because the props were counter-rotating the pilot could just firewall the throttles if he wanted to go fast.  The pilot didn't have to worry about torque, p-factor or adverse yaw, it was just acceleration.
 
On the earlier models the roll rate suffered, as you might expect from an aircraft with two heavy engines far out from the centerline.  However, the hydraulically boosted ailerons on the J apparently fixed this, and the J could roll at high speeds with nearly any other fighter.
 
So, by the last models, the P-38 didn't really suffer from most of the vices of twin-engined fighters because Lockheed just threw enough technology at it that the problems went away.