Re: Tank Sizes

On Mon, 31 Jan 2000, Thomas.Barclay wrote:

> Someone commented about tanks getting smaller. Silhoutte wise, I'd
agree.
> I'm not sure this is totally true though in mass. Or crew. You might
drop 1
> crew. But a tank with fewer crew had better be mechanically more
reliable
> and easier to maintain. Part of the reason for a big crew complement
is
> maintenance. 
> 
> You realize there is a trend towards heavier ordinance? Some new
designs
> (not counting the ones loosely based around lasers or railguns) are
talking
> about 130-140mm main ordinance? Heck, they've got 105mm mounted on an
8x8
> and I understand someone is working on (may be done) a 120mm turret
for an
> 8x8 wheeled chassis. If these upgunned FSVs can carry that kind of
> ordinance, a tank probably should be going bigger or nastier. 

Ordinance size has increased to 125mm on the T90. The US and its allies 
which prefer not to go the route of autoloaders (technical and manning 
reasons) are stuck at 120mm, because that is about the limit of the size

round your average loader can heft around in the turret. Some ammo has 
become two piece (the brit 120mm I think) so as to alliviate this to a 
degree, however, that slows the loading time down quite a bit reducing 
the speed for follow up shots. 

One area this has pushed things is the development of liquid propellants

for the main gun. Thus you'd have a projectile that was inserted, close 
the breech, squirt a given volume or weight of propellant into the 
chamber and *BOOM*. This would make resupply a bit odd in that you'd 
transfer half of your ammo load via hose rather than by hand through the

turret hatch. The big issue is the volatile nature of such a propellant. 

------------------------------------------------------------------
- Ryan Montieth Gill	  NRA / DoD# 0780 (Smug #1) / AMA / SOHC -
- ryan.gill@turner.com	    I speak not for CNN, nor they for me -
- rmgill@mindspring.com 	     www.mindspring.com/~rmgill/ -
- '85 Honda CB700S  -  '72 Honda CB750K  - '76 Chevy MonteCarlo  -
------------------------------------------------------------------