Tanks post-2022: what now?

[Greg Boeser]

Yeah. It's a tough one.

 

[WARSPITER]

Given the need for 'connectivity' amongst the current younger generation they may need to build a 'safe space' into
AFV's in the future.

 

[Admiral Beez]

Some good chatter…

"All of Vlad's forces and all of Vlad's men, are out to put Humpty together again."

The fire in the Russian aerospace/whatever lab that went up was, in my opinion faulty wiring, like they said. It just seems to go along with the rest of their now exposed competence. However, if anyone could have pulled that caper off.....

ww2aircraft.net

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

Two basic questions:
- are the tanks still a must for a modern army?(I's say 'yes')
- what the modern post-2022 tank should look like? (I'd say 'not like a T-72/-80/-90')

The Israeli 'trophy' type system and equivalents seem to be increasingly important. For sure there will be more "drone tanks", I would imagine an MBT with a small army of drone vehicles (flying and crawling) all around it for recon, to help find those pesky ATGMs

 

[SaparotRob]

That would be really cool!

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

Not so cool if you are the infantry guy with the ATGM. But they will be using drones too (already are).

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

What I'm actually really interested to see is drone vs drone systems. I have a theory about large scale RC aircraft in fact...

 

[Admiral Beez]

What I'm actually really interested to see is drone vs drone systems.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

That is A W E S O M E

but i was thinking something more like this ...



...except probably with Jets more like this ...



.... or this



... or this....



.... or one of these



The question is could you make an RC aircraft about that size and be able to carry a payload of say, a couple of stinger missiles or a light machine gun? Looks like they can carry flares....

I have seen them using airsoft successfully with these, but of course that is much lighter.

 

[wlewisiii]

A brief glance shows "heavy lift drones" with a payload of 20 lbs.

A stinger is 30 lbs.

Not impossible to scale up but by the time you're done how different is the Bayraktar TB2 where you have a payload of 330 lbs? Or just go all the way up to an MQ-9 Reaper sitting way way up in the sky with 3000 lbs of Hellfires?

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

A brief glance shows "heavy lift drones" with a payload of 20 lbs.

A stinger is 30 lbs.

Not impossible to scale up but by the time you're done how different is the Bayraktar TB2 where you have a payload of 330 lbs? Or just go all the way up to an MQ-9 Reaper sitting way way up in the sky with 3000 lbs of Hellfires?

Well it's like the difference between a bomber and a fighter. The Bayraktar and the Reaper are 'bombers' and recon. They are very, very dangerous if you are on the ground in a vehicle or an artillery position or something. Drones can be shot down from the ground, but only if you can see them. So to protect the ground forces, it might be helpful to have another type of drone which can shoot down other drones. A 'drone fighter' in other words.

So something like one of those RC aircraft could be fitted with a small caliber machine gun or maybe a scaled down version of something like a stinger, and could find and eliminate drones that destroy tanks and APCs. I think that could be very useful. Even if it just had something like a laser designator which could help a ground based missile find a target that might be useful. Or a high powered laser (just a little more powerful than commercially available ones) which could disable the optics on one perhaps.

A lot of these 1/6 scale jets which are widely available now as toys are already up around 50-60 lbs in weight. I bet something like this could be fitted with say, a couple of .22 caliber guns. Maybe even .223.

Large F-4C / E Phantom. 1 : 6 Scale – Jet North – RC Jet Community!

 

[Admiral Beez]

Not impossible to scale up but by the time you're done how different is the Bayraktar TB2 where you have a payload of 330 lbs?

If Ukraine could get two hundred or more Bayraktar TB2 along with a thousand or more missiles they would have sufficient air power to rain death from above across Russia's front.

Interestingly, the Bayraktar's engine is made by the Canadian-owned Rotax company. I think it's time for Canada to enter the game.

Ottawa launches long-awaited competition for armed military drones

The federal government has officially launched a competition for the purchase of armed drones after nearly two decades of delays and discussion.

www.ctvnews.ca

Let's put some missiles onto the Heron done and offer them to Ukraine for live testing.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

In a nutshell, i see drones as following a similar path to military airplanes in WW2. Right now we have 'scouts' and 'bombers'. I think 'fighters' are next.

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

I think you could put something like this on one of those 1/6 scale RC planes (jet or ww2 type) and it could shoot down other drones

 

[GrauGeist]

There are already drones out there that can hunt other drones.

One such drone, is the U.S.'s Coyote.

United Arab Emirates and Turkey also have something similar.

Watch Jet-Powered Coyote Take Down Enemy Drones With Ease

A drone that can capture intelligence information and data about hurricanes is now being used to blow itself up to counter enemy drones.

interestingengineering.com

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

Gun based tracked Air Defence systems are outranged by the missiles of the aircraft they are supposed to be defending against

You can put missiles on tracked chassis as well. Or, if they're shooting at Frogfoots dropping dumb bombs, even guns could conceivably have a chance.

 

[wlewisiii]

I'm thinking that dual radar & thermal ranging M2 machine guns's on top of a hummer class vehicle or even an old 113 chassis would be an excellent anti-drone defense system

 

[Wild_Bill_Kelso]

There are already drones out there that can hunt other drones.

One such drone, is the U.S.'s Coyote.

United Arab Emirates and Turkey also have something similar.

Watch Jet-Powered Coyote Take Down Enemy Drones With Ease

A drone that can capture intelligence information and data about hurricanes is now being used to blow itself up to counter enemy drones.

interestingengineering.com

Am I interpreting that right that it's a 'kamikaze' drone that rams other drones?

 

[wlewisiii]

Rams its target, whatever that may be.

 

[GrauGeist]

The Coyote has a shape-charged warhead that detonates in a circular (ring-shaped) blast when it gets in proximity of it's target.