Main battle tanks of today.....

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Can you believe the IDIOTS up here are PROTESTING that we got them? They say that too many soldiers are dying in AFGANISTAN - - then complain that the Government bought the better armored LEP - 2's for the Army! Maybe we should go back to VALENTINE tanks! Huh?
 
I would not believe everthing in the book. If a tank was stuck and the Plt could not retrieve it, the normal procedure would be to bring in the Trp's M-88to pull it out. It that did not work then the Sqdrn's M88 would be brought in and the two of them could extract it. The M88 is a powerful mofo. It can drag a M1 across the ground without much trouble. The thermite is put inside the breach to destory the breachblock and maybe one on the engine. The helon fire surpression system is amazing. It detects fire in milli seconds. It was designed to reduce the damage to the interior electronics by removing the air from the crew compartments. If the M1 had the 105 mm cannon, it would have had trouble with a head on kill and 2 - 3 km but not at battle site, 800 m. Sounds like it was a good story though. It is hard to imagine a situation during the Gulf War when the area was not secured enough to extract an M1.
 
Was just thinking earlier tonight....(I know...just shut up will you!)... If Challenger II, Abrams and what not would be today's Sherman, T-34 etc.... what would the figures be for the equivalent of a Panther, Tiger and Tiger II if they'd have the same advantage today as they had in WWII?
 
Lucky13 said:
Aren't the Challenger II the fastest tank in the world, over rough terrain?
Click to expand...

I had heard it was the French Leclerc MBT due to it's high thrust-to-weight ratio; Wikipedia reports a top speed of 71 km/h for the Leclerc, v. 65 km/h for the Leapord II, 59 km/h for the Challenger II, and the Abrams a close second-place with 67.7 km/h. However, these are road speeds, not rough-terrain speeds; off-road speeds were not recorded for most of the tanks. I'm assuming there's a big difference between on-road off-road speeds due to the different suspensions; for instance, with the engine speed governor removed, Abrams tanks at the proving grounds supposedly acheived speeds in excess of 100 km/h on paved surfaces.
 
Are you asking what the next generation of MBT will look like? The technology for the cannon is about maxed out with the 120mm hyper velocity rounds. The choice is to either increase the mass of the penetrator or the velocity. The big push since the 90s have been to design an energy based weapon system, ie a railgun using electro magnetic pulses, laser or a plasma based system. The power requirments and weight is still prohibitive. It is similar to problems that the Air Force has had over the years in their weapon programs. The Armour School is working on drone tanks and vehicles with a two man crew. The Cmdr and driver will sit inside of the hull. This will reduce the target size greatly in a hull down position. The current battle computer allows the tank commnder the select the targets on a touch screen and put then in order of engagement. The computer will line up the shots and the gunner does his thing. Once the target has been destroied, the computer will set up the next shot. I do not think that it will much longer that the gunner will be needed. The biggest draw back will be that there will no longer be 4 men to do the maintainance. The current line of Armoured Gun System would be worse than a Sherman. In order the save weight, the 105 mm guns are installed on light armour platforms. Yes, they are mobile and cheaper than a tank. Reminds me of the 1/4 tons armed with tow launchers. As soon as the losses start, the press will be crying that they have no armor. They will work well against Inf and the older armoured vehicles but no match against the latest MBTs.
 
The stipped down M1 without all of the extra armor was rumored to have hit 100 mph back in the 80's. I do not know if it is true or what all was removed. My guess would be that the turret was not on the hull. The old M1 would a have no trouble keeping up with the posted highways speeds.

DBII
 

I believe you are correct about the turret not being on the chassis, I had heard something to the same effect a while back; however, as Philge pointed out, at those speeds the M-1 was in serious danger of throwing a track, even on a smooth, paved road. I'm guessing that, due to the high centrifugal forces at that speed, the track was probably hitting the bottom of the hull sponsons.
 
It always sounded like a good story for the O' Club to me. I can see the tracks shooting off like a rubber bands now...

dbII
 

Sounds a bit like a Swedish S Tank with a few more electronic toys
 
I always liked the S Tank. The S tank had limted traversing ablity, The next generation MBTs will rotate 360. I read where another country was working on a hydrolic system similar to the S tank. I am thinking Korea but that was years ago. I could bring a S-Tank to the local car show and have the hydrolics bounce it up and down. They home boyz would love that.

DBII
 
Its hard to find, but there is considerable disatisfaction in Australia with the leopard Is that we have. I have heard from some ex RAAC men, that the so called superhardened face armour on the leopards has gone crystalline, making them unsuitable now even for training. Basically, hit em with a hammer, and you end up with a pile of rubble in front of you.

Australia has purchased Abrams as a replacement for the leopards. Crews as of last year were in the states doing the conversion training. I cant remember if these are the old 105 equipped units, or the newer 120 mm equipped types. Would seem a waste of time to acquire a weapon system that is already obsolete in my opinion
 
The Leopard I is one OLD tank by now, and I can for the love of god not understand why it took Australia that long to shift them out, and why they didn't opt for the Leopard 2 which came on the scene in the late 70's. At the time it carried the best main gun of any MBT in the world, the 120mm L/44 gun made by Rheinmetall, and in 1985 the US bought the gun and put it on their Abrams instead of the old 105mm gun. It wasn't until the Leopard 2A6 arrived with its new 120mm L/55 gun also by Rheinmetall that the 120mm L/44 was no longer the best in the world.

The Abrams is also soon to have the Leopard 2's 1,500 HP Diesel MTU 870 engine: http://www.mtu-online.com/en/produ/proddies/proddiesspec/proddies870/
 
Really, Soren? The US is going to dump the turbine? Haven't heard of this. What is the rationale. Can't be maintenance. Fuel prices? Compatibility with other vehicles?
 
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