Self Propelled Gun/Rocket Launcher

dankris said:

More stuff from the same blog.

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Some mistakes about the gun. It's not actually a ZPT-94, rather a redesigned/largely improved version, easily differentiated by a different air extraction device and numerous other details. The gun is also slightly longer than the ZPT-94, and is used also on the Type 15 and VT-5.
Here's a render of the whole gun.

I don't think this is useful for anything, but I decided to post this anyway.
Structure of PCL-181's chassis.

Images from recent exercises...

A short video on PCL-181.

by78 said:

A short video on PCL-181.

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Damn it! Beat me by a minute.

Fastening the hydraulic spades. Finally stopped digging the holes manually. I reckon the scenes before were simply retarded military propaganda lol.

Артиллерия готова! Выстрел!!!
World's best 155mm Wheel mounted canon-howitzer, one of its kind. Just admire that firing stability. Only shame is it still can't use the congruent charges introduced in 2016, or even full-auto reload is possible. Export version SH-15 is able to use it tho lol. A traditional Norinco feat of selling better stuff out.

RichardGao said:

View attachment 61280
Fastening the hydraulic spades. Finally stopped digging the holes manually. I reckon the scenes before were simply retarded military propaganda lol.
View attachment 61281
Артиллерия готова! Выстрел!!!
World's best 155mm Wheel mounted canon-howitzer, one of its kind. Just admire that firing stability. Only shame is it still can't use the congruent charges introduced in 2016, or even full-auto reload is possible. Export version SH-15 is able to use it tho lol. A traditional Norinco feat of selling better stuff out.

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(Edit expired sorry)
PS Real SH15 photos are really rare. The ones showed in Zhuhai were actually 181s instead of SH15. The main difference should be 181 having a vertical-sliding wedge breech block and SH15 having a horizontal one with obturator rings. If somebody has images (preferably with the breech visible) of the SH15 I hope you could share it.

RichardGao said:

A traditional Norinco feat of selling better stuff out.

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I'm sure Norinco would love to sell the better (and more expensive) stuff in, but the PLAGF looks at the price tag and goes "lol nope."

ZeEa5KPul said:

I'm sure Norinco would love to sell the better (and more expensive) stuff in, but the PLAGF looks at the price tag and goes "lol nope."

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That's part of the case lol, (Central Committee plz give ol'Ground Force some money haha) but a majority of new tech vehicles are tested and commented by foreign clients, so that Norinco can further improve the product (and turn export into domestic), a nice example being the 85-IIAP turned into the 88C (old 96) and A portion of 90-II's design conclusions into the 99, other examples of better export products include 69-II vs 59/69, and CTAG CS/AA5 vs no similar products for domestic use. But eventually these better products and tech will also be use for PLA itself. Other reasons include influence of current gear inventory, such as the 99A vs VT-4 and SH15 vs 181, the inventory is all good enough so that we don't really need to upgrade them right now, and complete production lines of the congruent charge is still under construction and improvement, and we don't need to worry about that. For now, cased charges are good enough.

ZeEa5KPul said:

I'm sure Norinco would love to sell the better (and more expensive) stuff in, but the PLAGF looks at the price tag and goes "lol nope."

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In my humble opinion, strict price control is the main beauty of this vehicle. Selling point of those vehicles is maximum bang for the buck, and not a single rmb over that.
Just two examples:

1, wheeled koalitsiya. Extremely expensive turret(Russia intends to keep Msta in production!) on a (censored) chassis.
Unarmoured, overloaded and outright unstable. Pantsirs on same base overturned multiple times on wet highways. Now imagine escaping return fire on this.

2, Malva. Right kind of gun mount, and a good, special, armoured base. Really good base. The only problem, is this base alone drives cost to near-SPH levels for something that was intended to be a gun bolted to its tractor unit.

Small armies may buy whatever they want, but for larger forces -best is an enemy of the good enough.