PLA Next Generation Main Battle Tank

qwerty3173 said:

Whatever it is using, its not a bustle autoloader. Problems with the upright carousel autoloader hypothesis is that type 100 unlike the Armata doesn't seem to have the vehicle height required for rotating rounds by 90 degrees easily.

Click to expand...

I don´t think thats the case here. The current longest known 105mm projectile in use by the PLA is 1100mm long, I think theres plenty of volume inside the combat compartment to handle such a piece. BTW I´m expecting an autoloader more reminiscent to the XM1202. If it has some sort of double row carrousel, not only the ammo capacity will be unparalleled but since that autoloader is compatible with two piece ammunition, there is a chance to upgun again to 125mm if theres a need for that.

alanch90 said:

I don´t think thats the case here. The current longest known 105mm projectile in use by the PLA is 1100mm long, I think theres plenty of volume inside the combat compartment to handle such a piece. BTW I´m expecting an autoloader more reminiscent to the XM1202. If it has some sort of double row carrousel, not only the ammo capacity will be unparalleled but since that autoloader is compatible with two piece ammunition, there is a chance to upgun again to 125mm if theres a need for that.

View attachment 160329

Click to expand...

The full round has the propellant charge and the case besides the projectile itself, and longer ammunition is inherently harder to rotate, requiring a lot of turret height that does not exist on this vehicle. What I am inagining is a revolver type autoloader that places rounds horizontally on a vertically spinning rack similar to the soviet obj477A design. This design provides unparalleled firing rate that could be why they chose 105mm as the caliber, more like an autocannon.

qwerty3173 said:

The full round

Click to expand...

Thats my bad because I chose the words wrongly. I meant the full round length being 1100mm, not just the projectile.

tamsen_ikard said:

What is the overall big picture assessment of the new tank design? Is it a good design? Will it be effective?

Click to expand...

I would say there is too much we don't know about it to make a proper evaluation.
The fact it uses hybrid drive is interesting and the separate crew seems like a good idea. The big question is how good it is in practice.
FWIW they tried using electric drive in WW2, the Germans (Porsche Tiger), the US (T23), and the Soviets (IS-6). But all gave up on it. But then again they did not have permanent magnet motors.

This Type 100 seems to have a serial dating all the way back to 2023-6-17.

Why exactly is bustle ammo storage not an option for type100? Not necessarily all ammo/propellant, but at least part of it?
Dimensions wise, Type100 is as tall as type99, if not a few cm taller. it's almost as tall as m1's. Turret length is approximately the same as type99 and just a bit shorter than m1's.
Armored part of the turret, the core turret is narrower, true. But again, type 100 has smaller caliber rounds and not necessarily all of them in the bustle - so why couldn't those fit?

Let us remember, there are two crewmembers in type 99's turret. There are 3 in leopard2 or abrams.
But in type 100 pretty much all the internal turret space can go towards the gun, the autoloader and at least some of the ammo/propellant. When i overlay m1a1 internal schematic over type100, i get almost the same internal turret length.

Basically, if type 100 doesn't store anything in the back third of its turret - then what is that room for? There's a whole bunch of space back there. There are actually two hinges on top of the turret, that seem to hold the back of the turret, as if it was a lid, opening the back side up. If so, that might be a logical position to take out empty ammo mags and insert new ammo mags.

Tomboy said:

View attachment 160335
This Type 100 seems to have a serial dating all the way back to 2023-6-17.

Click to expand...

And still some online who are too academic about the whole process or too eager to downplay China's MIC achievements will not even entertain the idea that everything being shown is following the rule that nothing that is truly leading edge that China's working on is ever shown hence everything we see is from many, many years ago.

PL-15E used to shoot down French Rafales had retrieved missile wreckage showing they were made in 2012 iirc, many years before people were comfortable admitting PL-15 was in mass production.

PL-15 production apparently has already stopped because it's now 2 generations old for China. The USAF hasn't even yet fielded an equivalent AAM that is as advanced as PL-15 according to the US itself. That would be the AIM-260. China has already stopped producing this level of missile. Let that sink in for a moment and then apply your thoughts to the hypersonic gliders and cruise missiles we are being shown. It is still the same old China, play your fourth best, show your third best and have two higher tiers at the ready. The US used to operate similarly back when it was fit during the Cold War. It's since become an India, bragging about stuff they only started working on. At least they're not like India, bragging about PPT drafts.

ougoah said:

PL-15E used to shoot down French Rafales had retrieved missile wreckage showing they were made in 2012 iirc

Click to expand...

Source?

sequ said:

Source?

Click to expand...

This forum makes it bloody hard to share images. Everything is "not an image" or "too large" to share. Anyway it's a pita. I can't load the full images thanks to the stupidly low limits for this site.

These PL-15E wrecks retrieved by Indians were mostly rocket sections and frames but they managed to find a few burnt out seeker heads from the missile warhead detonating behind the seeker section. One of those seekers they shared an image of the manufacturing plate. Instead of 2012, it is 2015. My mistake, I didn't bother checking but PL-15 was thought to have went into mass production after J-20 reached service in 2017/2018 and only known about after photos of J-20 prototypes showing internal bay and four dummy PL-15 training missiles (the blue ones) were shown.






2015 july is the marked date of manufacture for this particular PL-15E Pakistan used. We didn't see PL-15 until around that period in time. This just shows the missile was in active service in some form well before we estimated.