Question Thread: Russian Army

I have a question regarding front mounted tanks fo instance Merkava. Among the many problems associated with this technique one particularly trouble me is heat-shimmering. Back in 80s the thermal imaging equipment got busted by heat shimmers but are the modern ones too inherit this flaw. I mean will there be any sighting problems for the crew at night when their front-engine is fully thermally active...

I have had long arguments over front mounted engines in tanks on the internet... some think that if you don't do this then you don't care about the crew.

My arguments against is that an engine is not armour and is a poor substitute for armour. Engines in front greatly increase frontal IR signature and can effect IR optics under some circumstances.
And thirdly the advantage of the engine in front is that it allows either more ammo to be carried in the hull or passengers can be carried like a super APC.

Israeli experience has shown using it like an APC is not a good idea, and I would suggest that putting lots of ammo in the rear hull is asking for trouble.

That is actually a factor I didn't really consider.

An external gun mount could be used to raise the gun and allow better weapon depression, but shifting the gun rearward will limit its depression capabilities.

If you are considering buying a second hand BTR-80 and you want to make sure you can get parts for it can I suggest you contact Rosoboronexport, their webpage is http://www.roe.ru/

They will likely have lots of BTR-60s, BTR-70s, and BTR-80s available for sale, or know who to contact with a serious interest.

It is pretty unlikely you will get a super cheap bargain one, but also less chance you will end up double crossed.

If you don't buy you vehicle from them then it is unlikely they will feel obliged to help you with support.

Keep in mind the BTR-60s and BTR-70s had two engines and had a complicated drive train, but with the right manuals and training they should be relatively simple to maintain.

The BTR-80 will have just one larger single diesel engine.

AFAIK they might have options like custom civilian modifications on new or old vehicles.

Obviously there are also other issues like getting it road legal and even just getting it into your country.

I have seen some interesting civilian modifications of the BRDM-2 with enlarged windows and side doors, but retaining the belly wheels and central tire regulation system and amphibious capability.

Looked fun, but were not cheap.

Of course as Vlad pointed out the makers of the BTR-80 would be the best people to contact for spare parts.

http://www.amz.ru/

Of course because you are in Bangladesh, perhaps contacting your local Army base to enquire who they have their spares supplied by might be worth a crack... the worst result is they don't reply...

If you are after a cheap vehicle, then Rosoboronexport might be a good place to start... Russia is moving from a mish mash of BTR-60s, BTR-70s, and BTR-80s, to BTR-82 and later Boomerang ( a 25 ton wheeled vehicle), so they will likely be thinking about what they are going to do with their older vehicles.

Yes.

The Kurganets-25 will be a tracked 25 ton amphibious vehicle family similar to the current BMP-3 in role but likely with newer firepower options (talk of 45mm and 57mm guns) and a rear ramp door.

In medium tracked brigades the tank, the APC, the artillery, the Air defence, and all the other vehicles in the unit will be based on the Kurganets-25.

In medium wheeled brigades the Boomerang wheeled 25 ton amphibious vehicle family similar to the BTR-90 but 5 tons heavier and with a rear ramp and side doors will be used as the tank, the APC, the artillery, the air defence etc etc vehicles.

The Navy is also getting a developed version of the Kurganets-25 with better rough sea keeping capabilities and propeller drive in water.

Amphibious and air dropable and with excellent firepower.

There was a video somewhere where the makers of the new medium vehicles were interviewed and they talked about Kurganets-25 and Boomerang, and they mentioned that these "light" vehicles were made of expensive materials that gave them added protection above the level current vehicles enjoy.

First off the BMP-3 is 18 tons so the 25 ton Kurganets-25 is 7 tons heavier... and I really don't see how the armament of the Kurg can be heavier than the BMP-3 as it is already rather heavy, so the vast majority of the extra weight will be a bigger engine and extra armour.

The BMD-4M is probably in the 18 ton weight range too.

The Kurganets-25 will be designed to operate in rivers and lakes without modification, but to operate in heavy sea states the Navy is ordering their own version of the tracked vehicle with propeller drive for use in the water and the ability to operate in rough water.

It would not be beyond imagination that the VDV do something similar and order a Kurganets-25 that is perhaps slightly redesigned to suit airborne operations.

I suspect with Slat armour and NERA fitted they will actually be very capable vehicles.

In the mean time the last report I read said the vast majority of VDV vehicles were BMD-2s, so I think a purchase of BMD-4Ms is overdue... and when any new vehicle based on the Kurganets-25 is ready then the BMD-4Ms in service could be transferred to other duties... with excellent firepower and communications and vision devices and excellent mobility I am sure they will find another use for them... even as a border patrol vehicle in arctic regions...

Of course they could always go the other way and look at the Typhoon light vehicle and go for a combination of speed and firepower

The 2S14 is a BTR-60 with an 85mm gun fitted.

As far as I am aware there were a few planned vehicles that had tank guns mounted on wheeled vehicle chassis like the Stryker in the US army with a 105mm gun.

None of them have been enormous successes AFAIK and their mobility on roads is not usually matched across country.

The tank gun and turret plus a decent amount of ammo generally makes these vehicles very poor cross country vehicles and they are pretty much limited to hard flat surfaces, which in most places means roads... which is very limiting.

Having said that the Russians have the Sprut, which is based on the tracked BMD-3 chassis for use as light amphibious tank and before that they had the PT-76 series of amphibious light tank, which both have excellent mobility and are fully amphibious. It is certain that with their plans for new armoured vehicle families that in the medium brigade role they will have a wheeled and a tracked vehicle family.

The concept is that every vehicle in the unit shares the same chassis base so there will likely be wheeled medium brigades and tracked medium brigades, which means therefore there will be 25 ton class amphibious tracked vehicles with a tank gun on a Kurganets-25 chassis and there will be a 25 ton class amphibious wheeled vehicle with a tank gun on a Boomerang chassis. The deployment of the different types will likely depend on terrain with wheeled vehicles in western europe and tracked in the bogs of siberia and deep snow in winter.

The ability to absorb force is a ratio of ring size/area.

A smaller turret ring will limit the amount of recoil that can be absorbed by any turret fitted.

A turret ring is generally optimised to handle the recoil power of the gun fitted... if you put the 100mm rifled gun of the T-54/55 in a T-34 you would find you had problems with cracking or even serious damage during firing.

A good example was the BMP-3 which was designed to use an off centre 100mm rifled gun of low pressure.

The gun could fire a heavy HE shell 4km, but with improved optics and systems they decided to increase propellent and make the gun a bit more powerful and reach out to 7km, but because the turret ring wasn't designed for the extra recoil in addition to the fact that the recoil was off centre they had serious problems with the turret ring cracking.

A modern 155mm gun generates a lot of recoil and the T-54/55s turret ring was not designed for that sort of energy.

The ability to take a powerful gun has more to do with turret ring size and design than the weight of the vehicle.

The 125mm gun used in the Sprut is a standard 125mm gun with normal velocities and can use the full range of ammo types any other modern 125mm gun can use, the only difference is that it can recoil back further than standard guns and this spreads the recoil force over a longer period, which makes it able to be used in lighter vehicles.

On the 155mm gun you can also have a huge muzzle brake to help with recoil.

A T-54/55 could be modified to carry an artillery calibre weapon, the MSTA uses a T-80 chassis as a base, though of course the T-80 is a 125mm calibre gun carrying vehicle which is a few steps up in power over the 100mm rifled gun of the older T models.

I would add that in the late 1970s and early 1980s the preferred anti armour round for the Russians was the HEAT shell rather than the APFSDS.

The whole concept of a smoothbore gun for the T-62 and later tanks was that HEAT shells are less efficient if they are spinning rapidly and long narrow penetrators like the APFADS rounds fired by modern tanks... being long and narrow can't actually be spun fast enough by rifling to stabilise them in flight.

The solution was to not stabilise them with spin, to use small fins to stabilise them in flight, so you don't need rifing in modern tank guns.

The lack of rifling reduces internal friction and makes the gun barrel lighter and easier to clean. You can either get better performance from the same length of barrel or you can shorten the barrel and make the gun lighter still.

The fears of gross inaccuracy in the west when they first heard the 115mm gun of the T-62 was a smooth bore were found to be largely irrational and of course the next western gun copied the Soviets and was also a smoothbore.

The Soviets and Russians are much more practical in regard to tank use and don't expect their tanks to spend all their time killing other tanks. Fully half the ammo carried by a Soviet/Russian tank is HE Frag ammo to deal with soft targets, and of the remaining half, half of that (a quarter of the full load) is HEAT which is fully dual use against bunkers and other hard targets. The APFSDS rounds are kept for those rare cases where the target is very hard because against many targets the APFSDS is largely ineffectual.

Have seen a few photos of them in service in South Ossetia I think.

They seem to use them as replacements for BRDM-2s.

Actually I found a few of the photos I remembered from South Ossetia and they were BPM-97s and not Vodniks.

I do however remember photos with quite a few Vodniks lined up for training I think, but can't remember where it was...

Now I think I remember... I think I last saw Vodniks being used to escort TOPOL-Ms and were being used by the FSB...