New Type98/99 MBT thread

[Deleted member 13312]

Another reason why the Type 99's turret is lower is that the PLA adopts part of the Soviet doctrine. In that doctrine a lower silhouette means that it would be harder for the enemy to detect the tank, this is in line with the Soviet's offensive mind set. While NATO tanks have greater gun depression because they are designed with a defensive mind set in place.
A bustle mounted autoloader can remove some of the dangers associated with a carousel system but at the cost of reduced ready to fire ammunition.
Personally I think that it is possible to improve the safety of the carousel system, one way might be to include blast off planes on the underside of the tank. Until then, I hate to think what an ammo cookoff will do inside a Type 99.

 

[FichtL]

Another reason why the Type 99's turret is lower is that the PLA adopts part of the Soviet doctrine. In that doctrine a lower silhouette means that it would be harder for the enemy to detect the tank, this is in line with the Soviet's offensive mind set. While NATO tanks have greater gun depression because they are designed with a defensive mind set in place.
A bustle mounted autoloader can remove some of the dangers associated with a carousel system but at the cost of reduced ready to fire ammunition.
Personally I think that it is possible to improve the safety of the carousel system, one way might be to include blast off planes on the underside of the tank. Until then, I hate to think what an ammo cookoff will do inside a Type 99.

I mean an ammo cookoff is probably rather unlikely, since its rather hard to even hit the ammo in the autoloader in a “conventional conflict“, ofcourse hot shrapnell is a danger, though i guess the chinese probably shield their newer tanks autoloaders just like the russians do.

Also we should not forget that bustle loaders are pretty vunerable, and to shield them properly like the one on the Abrams, you need alot of armour, you can probably estimate that a properly shielded Bustle loader probably weighs double that of an equivilant Carusell loader, and all that armour you use on the bustle lacks somewhere else.
Though ofcourse every design has its pro and cons, like for example its rather easy to make blow out pannels on a bustle loader, while on a carusell it gets a bit more complicated, though either way, if you want to go light, a buslte loader is a no go IMO

 

[TerraN_EmpirE]

Another reason why the Type 99's turret is lower is that the PLA adopts part of the Soviet doctrine. In that doctrine a lower silhouette means that it would be harder for the enemy to detect the tank, this is in line with the Soviet's offensive mind set. While NATO tanks have greater gun depression because they are designed with a defensive mind set in place.

Another reason is that they want a smaller and therefor lighter tank. Tanks like the T72 and Type 99 have a reduced crew size for this as well.

Personally I think that it is possible to improve the safety of the carousel system, one way might be to include blast off planes on the underside of the tank.

Blow out panels are weak points in the tank. Under side mounted panels would make the tank vulnerable to mines.

Until then, I hate to think what an ammo cookoff will do inside a Type 99.

Best case the crew bail out. generally though the Turret would pop.

Also we should not forget that bustle loaders are pretty vunerable, and to shield them properly like the one on the Abrams, you need alot of armour, you can probably estimate that a properly shielded Bustle loader probably weighs double that of an equivilant Carusell loader, and all that armour you use on the bustle lacks somewhere else.

Actually the Bustle rack on Abrams is pretty thinly armored. The reason the Abrams went with a Bustle loader was to isolate the destructive potential of the Ammo outside the living part of the Tank. Like all MBT Abrams follows the Classic armor plan of a Tank. The Front of the Turret is better protected then the front of the Hull, The Front of the Hull is better protected then the sides of the Tank and the sides of the Tank are better protected then the back of the tank. What happens is that the Inside of the Abrams fighting compartment there is a very heavy set of Doors that separate the Inhabited fighting compartment with the Commander, Gunner and Loader from the Magazine. These doors are to prevent an incident in the Ammo racks from getting into the fighting compartment.

Though ofcourse every design has its pro and cons, like for example its rather easy to make blow out pannels on a bustle loader, while on a carusell it gets a bit more complicated, though either way, if you want to go light, a buslte loader is a no go IMO

This is false. The South Korean K2 MBT, the Japanese Type 90 and Especially the Type 10 as well as the French Leclerc MBTs all have Bustle mounted autoloaders and come in at weight ranges close to those of Tanks with Carousels. the reason for the reduced weight is not the Autoloader. The Autoloader is far heavier than a manual loader no matter what. What makes the Tank lighter is the size of the Tank. The Abrams has a Crew of 4 Commander, gunner, driver, loader. You look at a these other tanks with a Bustle autoloader and a crew of 3 Commander, Gunner and loader you look at the T64, T72, T80, T84, T90, Armata, Type 96, Type 99 and other Carousel auto-loader tanks and a crew of 3 that's your weight savings. the Manual loader tanks need a crew space for 4 people and that space needs to be protected. The interior of the Abrams is not huge by civil standards but for a tank it's roomy. In operations Tankers have spent almost 100 continuous hours inside an Abrams. one member of the crew is always moving as part of his job that means picking up rounds moving about the fighting compartment and slamming rounds home. As such the interior needs space for the loader to move. When you look at 3 man tanks with a Bustle loader The crew space gets smaller as the crew doesn't need as much room. mind you it's still cramped. They have a little room to move but not much. you go to a Carousel loader and the Crew is supposed to be sitting, almost no considerations for any other position in the tank. farther more the Russians ever went and placed height restrictions on the crew.

 

[Deleted member 13312]

Blow out panels are weak points in the tank. Under side mounted panels would make the tank vulnerable to mines.

Yeah I know that, but nothing is perfect in life. And in general, armed forces would rather lose a tank or ammo than a trained tank crew.

Best case the crew bail out. generally though the Turret would pop.

I was meaning it in a more " I hate to imagine the carnage" scenario though.

 

[TerraN_EmpirE]

You look at a these other tanks with a Bustle auto loader and a crew of 3 Commander, Gunner and loader

This shouls read Commander, Gunner and Driver
Correcting myself as I was typing that, I was falling asleep.

Yeah I know that, but nothing is perfect in life. And in general, armed forces would rather lose a tank or ammo than a trained tank crew.

Which is why they wouldn't add such. If you look at the Armata T14 Tank you see where the Russians are moving to try and evolve there tanks. the move to the unmanned turret over the Carousel means that even if the Autoloader goes and the Turret pops there is no one in the turret the turret. Armata's weight also shows again why Autoloader tanks tend to be lighter in weight by a smaller crew space they can focus the armor more around the crew and less around the rest of the tank.

 

[Gloire_bb]

Another reason why the Type 99's turret is lower is that the PLA adopts part of the Soviet doctrine. In that doctrine a lower silhouette means that it would be harder for the enemy to detect the tank, this is in line with the Soviet's offensive mind set.

All tanks place height at premium. If anything, because it directly affects weight.

While NATO tanks have greater gun depression because they are designed with a defensive mind set in place.

Maybe it had somewhat higher priority. But tank is an offensive weapon.
Even in defense, tank is invaluable not just because it's a glorified mobile pillbox, but because it can counterattack.

A bustle mounted autoloader

Soviet(and post-soviet) designs considered it too.
Namely, Omsk likes them(t-80UM2/Object 640/Burlak),
Kharkov doesn't mind too(t-84-120 and various dual-feed modernisation proposals).

Problem with such a mechanism is what it's either too heavy from a design point of view(turret sides need heavy armor), or you sacrifice these turret sides and your tank becomes quite easy to put out of action.

For other ways to protect ammo inside the tank(though, still with flying turrets) - look at 477A.

With type 96 and 99, IMHO, they just followed design lineage what worked.
Both have their roots in 1980-1990s, not a very rich time for Chinese army.

 

[TerraN_EmpirE]

Problem with such a mechanism is what it's either too heavy from a design point of view(turret sides need heavy armor), or you sacrifice these turret sides and your tank becomes quite easy to put out of action.

Very very few tanks have a lot of armor on the sides or rear. Generally you try and face your threats and for that all MBT have there main armor on the front of the Tank. so this is at best a Very weak argument because there are a number of Tanks that have such systems implemented. the Japanese Type 90, and Type 10. The South Korean K2, the French Leclarc. Yes you sacrifice protection of ammo for protection of crew.

Soviet(and post-soviet) designs considered it too.
Namely, Omsk likes them(t-80UM2/Object 640/Burlak),
Kharkov doesn't mind too(t-84-120 and various dual-feed modernisation proposals).

There is a reason why the T84-120 and the Black Eagle used a bustle mounted Autoloaders and Why Nato Tanks with Autoloaders tend to Bustle mounted models as opposed to the Carousel with only one Exception.
First Note that modern Nato spec Tanks that have Autoloaders are all 120mm main guns based on the German 120mm.
second that The Chinese, Russian and Warsaw pact as well as Successor tanks with the Carousel all have either a 125mm or a 115mm ( T64).
The Reason is the Ammo.
Russian Spec ammo is binary meaning in 2 parts the projectile and the Propellant casing. These are loaded by the Autoloader shell then casing in a single action. This choice was made to keep the size of the ammo down and there for allowing for a shorter loader and shorter tank.
The German designed ammo for the 120mm L44 gun is unitary, and became the standard for NATO tanks save for the British who use Binary or Trinary ammo... I think it's binary for the Challanger 2 L30 but the old L11 was Trinary the difference being a separate primer casing about the size of a .50 cal bullet. Even nations who didn't adopt either the L44 or L55 like France who developed there own generally generally designed there 120mm guns to be compatible with the German ammo including The US, Israel, France, Swiss and Japan.
Unitary is longer and demanded more room for storage this means that if placed in a Carousel loader the loader would need to be bigger. This leads us to the One Time when a Nato tank was built with a carousel loader. The M1 Abrams TTB, of course since the Nato 120mm ammo is unitary the TTB autoloader was deeper then that of a Russian tank. So the Turret was unmanned.
Now the other odd exceptions.
T84-120 used a Bustle loader because of that 120 in the name as in 120mm Nato gun. There have been other former Soviet Tanks to walk this road to the T72-120, the PT16 and PT17 as well bustle loaders with 120mm ammo.
The bigger odd all is the Black eagle Object 640, which had a 125mm and Bustle loader, but the Ammo used was not regular 125mm instead the Object 640 was trailing a new 125 Unitary round. As such the round is longer and a Carousel wouldn't fit.

For other ways to protect ammo inside the tank(though, still with flying turrets) - look at 477A.

Which fall into unmanned turrets again moving the crew away from the ammo. Much like the Abrams TTB, or the Armata which the 477 series would be the forerunner of.

With type 96 and 99, IMHO, they just followed design lineage what worked.
Both have their roots in 1980-1990s, not a very rich time for Chinese army.

Basically they started by looking at there Type 80 And study of the T72. This lead to the Type 90 II and Al Khalid tanks but those were flawed to they then set to improve them. This lead to the Type 96 which they started evolving and splintered off the Type 98 which also evolved into the Type 99 and then the Type 99A and now Type 99A2.

 

[Gloire_bb]

Very very few tanks have a lot of armor on the sides or rear.

There is a requirement calling for s.c. Free angles of maneuver. Basically it's about glancing hits to your expised sides from the front, as well as(and more importantly) to your turret sides when your tank engages target not directly in front.
Two possible ways of achieving it are:
1.hiding as much as possible behind turret front, "cutting" sides in a triangular shape. It's ligh and it's more effective(allows for the greater angles in the end), but turret size becomes limited, and sides have no "hard" protection. Ultimate form of this armor is a late form of Soviet turret(t-90A, t-84)
2.Providing reasonably thick turret sides. It's very heavy and angles will be limited(you just won't make sides very heavy), but it gives reasonable degree of protection not just from the front.
3.the notable exception here are far eastern tanks, which sacrifice this armor for weight and internal volume considerations. I don't really understand why, but all 3 nations (South Korean K2, Japanese type 90 and type 10, Chinese type 96 and 99) do, and they're quite unique in this aspect.Applies both to the hull and to the turret.

Bustle autoloders in Soviet tanks had whole 4 separate designs with different design goals.
1.t-84-120 you're mentioning. Yes, the main factor is unitary ammo. Interesting fact, though, is what it has a secondary loader below a turret ring, also a "flat" one.

2.dual-feed auto-loaders(so called "dual stream"). Idea is (1)remove all non-mechanized ammo from the tank (2)allow for longer rods. Carousel is still kept!

So in the end it's essentially 2 autoloaders in one tank.
3.Object 640. This is the weird one: this autoloader is huge, it stores all ammo of the tank. Basic idea was to make it outright replaceable: put tank out of combat, replace used /damaged one with a new one, go. No ammo inside the tank.
4.Object 292. (it's that cute t-80 with a huge 152mm gun). Basically, to store new ammo(6") in an old carousel, carousel only retained shells. Charges were kepy behind the turret. Quite an elegant solution, honestly speaking.

Which fall into unmanned turrets again moving the crew away from the ammo. Much like the Abrams TTB, or the Armata which the 477 series would be the forerunner of.

490A/477/477A have no crewless turrets in full sense! It's a low profile turret with crew below turret ring. Kind of Merkava to the extreme.
And technically, crew continued to seat on projectiles. Just shells were kept in a new way(2 armored drums kept the main drum fed; main one was used to feed the gun)
Basically, this line continued ideology of "as compact as possible inside, as advanced as possible, as killy as possible", retained from t-64. Just streched every part of this equation to a new, almost unreasonable, levels.
Obj.195 and Armata family are very different even ideologically.

Basically they started by looking at there Type 80 And study of the T72. This lead to the Type 90 II and Al Khalid tanks but those were flawed to they then set to improve them. This lead to the Type 96 which they started evolving and splintered off the Type 98 which also evolved into the Type 99 and then the Type 99A and now Type 99A2.

Yes, exactly.

 

[TerraN_EmpirE]

Bustle autoloders in Soviet tanks had whole 4 separate designs with different design goals.
1.t-84-120 you're mentioning. Yes, the main factor is unitary ammo. Interesting fact, though, is what it has a secondary loader below a turret ring, also a "flat" one.

Depending upon the size of the turret the size of the auto
lautoloader magazine will have a limitation. The larger the size of the bustle the larger the magazine. But as the T84 120 was based on T84 which is derived from T80U, it doesn't have a large bustle. Because again a T80 being a Warsaw pact tank design for small size, so they installed a secondary rack for additional ammo. It's not that unique though the mechanism of a Autoloader generally takes up some space even on Tanks like the K2 so there is often spare ammo storage in the Tank. The Lecarc for example has 22rounds in the loader another 18 in reserve storage.

 

[FichtL]

Actually the Bustle rack on Abrams is pretty thinly armored. The reason the Abrams went with a Bustle loader was to isolate the destructive potential of the Ammo outside the living part of the Tank. Like all MBT Abrams follows the Classic armor plan of a Tank. The Front of the Turret is better protected then the front of the Hull, The Front of the Hull is better protected then the sides of the Tank and the sides of the Tank are better protected then the back of the tank. What happens is that the Inside of the Abrams fighting compartment there is a very heavy set of Doors that separate the Inhabited fighting compartment with the Commander, Gunner and Loader from the Magazine. These doors are to prevent an incident in the Ammo racks from getting into the fighting compartment.



This is false. The South Korean K2 MBT, the Japanese Type 90 and Especially the Type 10 as well as the French Leclerc MBTs all have Bustle mounted autoloaders and come in at weight ranges close to those of Tanks with Carousels. the reason for the reduced weight is not the Autoloader. The Autoloader is far heavier than a manual loader no matter what. What makes the Tank lighter is the size of the Tank. The Abrams has a Crew of 4 Commander, gunner, driver, loader. You look at a these other tanks with a Bustle autoloader and a crew of 3 Commander, Gunner and loader you look at the T64, T72, T80, T84, T90, Armata, Type 96, Type 99 and other Carousel auto-loader tanks and a crew of 3 that's your weight savings. the Manual loader tanks need a crew space for 4 people and that space needs to be protected. The interior of the Abrams is not huge by civil standards but for a tank it's roomy. In operations Tankers have spent almost 100 continuous hours inside an Abrams. one member of the crew is always moving as part of his job that means picking up rounds moving about the fighting compartment and slamming rounds home. As such the interior needs space for the loader to move. When you look at 3 man tanks with a Bustle loader The crew space gets smaller as the crew doesn't need as much room. mind you it's still cramped. They have a little room to move but not much. you go to a Carousel loader and the Crew is supposed to be sitting, almost no considerations for any other position in the tank. farther more the Russians ever went and placed height restrictions on the crew.

To be more exact, the general side turret base armour profile is substantually better armoured than the ones of its contemporaries like the Leo2s or the Type-90.
Ofcourse an APFSDS Round hitting an Abrams from the side will pen that, but when you hit the turret side from a very shallow angle your chances of penetrating are slimmer than those of a Leo2A4 or Type-90.

You are right with the fact that the less volume that needs to be protected on these tanks the less weight they will have, i have to agree 100%,
Though let me elaborate further, the bustle of those tanks do add Volume to the tank, ofcourse its just used for Ammo and maybe other “minor“ stuff, but nonetheless are that needs protection, and that protection even if minimal like on many of those tanks still add weight, which is sort of counterproductive when you want to go light, though still there are many reasons why they choose such a design (blow off panel, Unitary ammo being big...)
Shit explanation, but i guess it will do.. hopefully