PLA Next Generation Main Battle Tank

[alanch90]

That is solved through unmanned turrets which everybody seems to be heading towards regardless of caliber. At the end of the day, autoloader are more easily armored without increasing the turret volume to account for a crew.

No, it doesn´t. An unmanned turret tank will always be lighter than a traditional one for the same level of crew protection. However a tank with unmanned turret and a larger gun will always be heavier than another tank with unmanned turret but designd around a smaller gun.

 

[plawolf]

I'm quite doubtful, that the PLA would adopt a 105mm, that would not at least be able to actually penetrate and destroy most if not all current active service 3th gen tanks.

As for future 4th gen (including heavier weights), the best tactic might be to just use some airbust or HE shot to disable aps, sensors etc. Afterwards a kill could be done with say atgm.

The PLA has never had an ego problem like some western militaries. If you present them with an immovable object, they don’t see it as a matter of pride to need to move it.

You present to them a literally massively thick wall, their immediate reaction isn’t necessarily, how can I punch through it? But is far more likely to be, how do I get around it?

With the massive, and I do mean massive, scale the PLA is envisaging the use of loitering munitions, missiles and drones, not to mention is frankly ridiculously artillery and rocket arsenals, I think it’s safe to say that they won’t exactly be short on ways of killing even the most heavily armoured current and future tanks without needing to punch through its toughest armour head on with a bigger tank gun.

To be frank, I think the PLA sees APS as the far more pressing concern over traditional armour thickness, and moving to 105mm is a way of better addressing that primary concern if the rumoured 2s reload speed is true, as they will basically overwhelm APS with volume of fire, even more so if coupled with missiles/loitering munitions/drones doing top attack.

But I think tank killing is probably fairly low on the mission priority list of future PLA tanks, again due to the embarrassment of riches it has in terms of ways of killing armour en mass and at range. The meat and potatoes role of the new medium tank is going to be fire support for friendly infantry, probably in an urban or self urban setting. Again the rate of fire will be a massive benefit in that mission as well as the bigger shell load as these things can basically use rapid fire to clear entire floors, window by window if needed. But that’s the most crude use of such capabilities. The much more likely use would be that these tanks will have pretty sophisticated combat management software that combines all the sensor data from the large number of sensors all around the tank to automatically flag possible threats and prioritise them. With the crew acting as shot callers to provide oversight and give engagement authority.

So a typically engagement might look something like this:

Tank Commander (TC) gets flags of possible targets all around the tank, with automatic prioritisation based on threat level that he can confirm or overrule. Once TC clears targets and priority, the tank automatically swings the turret around to aim at the targets in sequence. Gunner does secondary checks to make sure target is legitimate and is still in crosshairs before pulling the trigger. As soon as the shot is made, the turret automatically swings to the next target on the engagement list, with BDA feeds also fed back into the TC’s workflow to confirm destruction of targets or work it back into the engagement sequence if a follow up shot is needed.

In this kind of fight, speed is king, and the smaller 105 shells might prove beneficial in that regard since they should generate less smoke and dust, making BDA easier and quicker.

 

[Michaelsinodef]

The PLA has never had an ego problem like some western militaries. If you present them with an immovable object, they don’t see it as a matter of pride to need to move it.

No, I actually do believe the generals in PLA would be pretty hesistant to take a new tank if the 105mm wasn't about as good as the current old 125mm, and i don't think the engineers will disappoint either.

You present to them a literally massively thick wall, their immediate reaction isn’t necessarily, how can I punch through it? But is far more likely to be, how do I get around it?

They would do both, that is looking to see if iit was possible to punch through but also if it can be circumvented.

With the massive, and I do mean massive, scale the PLA is envisaging the use of loitering munitions, missiles and drones, not to mention is frankly ridiculously artillery and rocket arsenals, I think it’s safe to say that they won’t exactly be short on ways of killing even the most heavily armoured current and future tanks without needing to punch through its toughest armour head on with a bigger tank gun.

Oh i know, but that's not gonna stop them from have plans around how their future tanks would potentially handle future tank opponents, even if it might no longer be a primary concern.

To be frank, I think the PLA sees APS as the far more pressing concern over traditional armour thickness, and moving to 105mm is a way of better addressing that primary concern if the rumoured 2s reload speed is true, as they will basically overwhelm APS with volume of fire, even more so if coupled with missiles/loitering munitions/drones doing top attack.

Yea, that is what i think to, HE or some burst round to disable sensors and APS, and then the enemy tank (even if 4th gen) will be easier to kill.

But I think tank killing is probably fairly low on the mission priority list of future PLA tanks, again due to the embarrassment of riches it has in terms of ways of killing armour en mass and at range. The meat and potatoes role of the new medium tank is going to be fire support for friendly infantry, probably in an urban or self urban setting. Again the rate of fire will be a massive benefit in that mission as well as the bigger shell load as these things can basically use rapid fire to clear entire floors, window by window if needed. But that’s the most crude use of such capabilities. The much more likely use would be that these tanks will have pretty sophisticated combat management software that combines all the sensor data from the large number of sensors all around the tank to automatically flag possible threats and prioritise them. With the crew acting as shot callers to provide oversight and give engagement authority.

So a typically engagement might look something like this:

Tank Commander (TC) gets flags of possible targets all around the tank, with automatic prioritisation based on threat level that he can confirm or overrule. Once TC clears targets and priority, the tank automatically swings the turret around to aim at the targets in sequence. Gunner does secondary checks to make sure target is legitimate and is still in crosshairs before pulling the trigger. As soon as the shot is made, the turret automatically swings to the next target on the engagement list, with BDA feeds also fed back into the TC’s workflow to confirm destruction of targets or work it back into the engagement sequence if a follow up shot is needed.

In this kind of fight, speed is king, and the smaller 105 shells might prove beneficial in that regard since they should generate less smoke and dust, making BDA easier and quicker.

Sure, i have 0 problems with this.

 

[gongolongo]

The point I observed was: The new tank pays too much attention to armor-APFSDS countermeasures.
More appropriate firepower for future tanks is something like 155/30 or 125/40 which pays more attention to the power of HEs and gun-shoot missiles, and It is worth sacrificing the power of APFSDS for this

This isn't Europe. The terrain China will be fighting on well be very restrictive for anyone. No one will be able to field vehicles with 155mm guns even 125mm is already stretching it.

 

[pakje]

Is it confirmed the plagf is working on a type 99 successor? The only use case for such a vehicle would be a conflict with Russia and I think everyone agrees that's extremely unlikely.

 

[gongolongo]

My cope is that it is only expensive due to extensive use of novel technology. Novel tech is expensive only because of lack of scale of production, once production scale up it will "cabbage-ilize" eventually. So small scale production at first, large scale adoption a few years later

But what's so novel? APS and sensors I guess? APS isn't too expensive, it is best used on vehicles that are purpose built for it. Sensors sort of but even then it's not too crazy. I think it's really just that most militaries already have tanks from the Cold War and are mostly happy with them as is and including newer tech might need a lot of redesign which they might not find worthy. I definitely think China has the means to produce all of this efficiently.

 

[Gloire_bb]

This isn't Europe. The terrain China will be fighting on well be very restrictive for anyone. No one will be able to field vehicles with 155mm guns even 125mm is already stretching it.

Fielding won't be a problem, you can get a fully balanced 6" tank from same 55-60t onwards (and if you don't care about ideal balance, all the way down to our today's hero; gun itself doesn't exactly weigh that much).

Problem isn't fitting big gun. You can't put in enough ammo for exploitation role safely.
I.e. it you can indeed do it, but at the cost of autonomy(i.e. you're increasingly getting assault gun for positional/breaching/siege warfare, and this is a rather narrow niche due to availability of support fires).

 

[Derpy]

This isn't Europe. The terrain China will be fighting on well be very restrictive for anyone. No one will be able to field vehicles with 155mm guns even 125mm is already stretching it.

120mm gun from the Leopard 2 fitted on a CV90 IFV chassi, it was developed during the late 90s when every millitary was downsizing so never got any traction but have recently got some attention again after the Ukraine war.
A big gun on a light tank is certainly possible but you will have to sacrifice in armor if you want to keep the weight down.

 

[Tomboy]

120mm gun from the Leopard 2 fitted on a CV90 IFV chassi, it was developed during the late 90s when every millitary was downsizing so never got any traction but have recently got some attention again after the Ukraine war.
A big gun on a light tank is certainly possible but you will have to sacrifice in armor if you want to keep the weight down.

Everyone seems to forget the tank this thing is probably going to replace, the Type 96A weights only 40 tons and still have a 125mm. It's even better than the CV90120 because atleast it was even decently armored for the 1990s.

 

[alanch90]

120mm gun from the Leopard 2 fitted on a CV90 IFV chassi, it was developed during the late 90s when every millitary was downsizing so never got any traction but have recently got some attention again after the Ukraine war.
A big gun on a light tank is certainly possible but you will have to sacrifice in armor if you want to keep the weight down.

Theres a price for this: little to no armor