MBT Arjun - News and Discussions

[SaiK]

@DRDO_India
1h1 hour ago
Desert Ferrari MBT Arjun Mk II at live demo dry run at DefExpo-2018 @DefExpoIndia @DefenceMinIndia

[Pratyush]

What's the afv in the background to the Arjun.

[Philip]

The showing off of Arjun at Defexpo is very welcome, good PR,but if the GOI truly want to sell the beast,not exhibit a "technology demonstrator",then it must place meaningful orders of the same with the IA first! Secondly,at what price can it sell the same and offer what support for the MBT with so few in existence? There are few if any nations that would want to buy it,as cheaper Ru T-series MBTs are available and they can have their pick of the best of the West ,battle tested and for which support is not a question at all. These would also be competitively priced. No Western ally would want A-2,and the only other nations with hard cash for such an order are the Gulfies,who have already made their choices.
An order for A-2 at the Defexpo for the IA would give the tank a big boost.NS are you listening?

[kvraghav]

What's the afv in the background to the Arjun.

Think it is tata Kestrel

[kit]

It is very depressing to read these reports. Looks like entire OFB complex should be shut down ASAP.

OFB will soldier on regardless of orders. It's an employment scheme.

all employment schemes should be privatised .. atleast it would have efficiency.. GOI can give assured orders

[Manish_P]

Thanks a lot!

Sir, Thank you. Good luck and God speed.

[srai]

What's the afv in the background to the Arjun.

Think it is tata Kestrel

It's a FICV JV between DRDO VRDE and Tata Motors and is called Wheeled Armored Platform (WhAP).

[tsarkar]

Thanks a lot!

Sir, Thank you. Good luck and God speed.

I needed that report for my homework. I asked our Defence Minister on Saturday on inducting Tejas and Arjun in more numbers, and she gave a very positive response. The video is there in the Tejas thread.

[Thakur_B]

Think it is tata Kestrel

It's a FICV JV between DRDO VRDE and Tata Motors and is called Wheeled Armored Platform (WhAP).

WhAP and Kestrel are one and the same.

[ramana]

Sir

Page 297 - annexure XIX

Link - https://www.cag.gov.in/sites/default/fi ... 5_2014.pdf

It is very depressing to read these reports. Looks like entire OFB complex should be shut down ASAP.

This whine was already served when the report came out.

Keep some for later.
And BTW OFB is being reshaped as we speak. Look at Union leaders complaints. We can discuss in the OFB thread....

[SaiK]

Arjun based ARV




https://twitter.com/strategic_front/sta ... 7227788288

[Surya]

first thought it was an APC

seems like a heavy duty APC version can be derived out of it which will have real protection

[Bishwa]

Why I"ve been stressing the need for a few
hundred light tanks.If the Sprut's armour can be i.proved with better armour or ERA tiles it will still be in thd 20t+ range.

I think that the IA still want an overwhelming superiority in armour iver the PA, to blunt any offensive by them or race deep into southern Pak and use territory as a bargaining chip.

Philip. Look at the number of armored divisions in IA.

Eg:
https://www.globalsecurity.org/military ... /corps.htm


Total three divisions with three strike corps.
1st, 31st, and 33rd.

Each has three armd brigades: 90 tanks each.

So total armd divs inventory objective is 90*3*3 = 810. So say 90 more for reserves etc. It comes to 900 tanks.

Then add the 1 armd brigade per infantry division. Don't know how many are those.
Its possible a clever corps commander will ensure his armd brigades can work together and form a reserve armd division in a pinch. So he has two armd divsions in his corps.
But knowing doctrine he will be court martialed.

Mtn divisions could probably use the BMP with Konkurs as Nag is still a distant dream.

Conventional Inf Divs have an armd regt. The RAPIDs have an armd brigade with 2 armd regt and 2 mech inf regts i believe. Additionally there are indep armd brigades. Some attached to the strike corps and some with other corps.

X Corp in Bhatinda has 2 RAPIDs and 1 Indep armd brigade apart from an Inf Div as per wikipedia. The total number of armd regt this Corp has would be very high. Equal to a armd division perhaps.

[ramana]

How many Independent Armored brigades?
May be these Arjuns can be attached to couple of them of them?

[ParGha]

How many Independent Armored brigades?

Six known (2, 3, 6, 14, 16, 23), plus one more reported: https://www.bharat-rakshak.com/ARMY/tod ... oured.html

[Manish_P]

Cross posting from the Strategic thread (Original post by Bart S in the India-Russia Thread)

Fascinating video from Defexpo, watch from around 2:00 to hear directly from a guy who really knows what he is talking about, how our 'strategic partner' and 'only trustworthy friend' screws us over on spares:

[hnair]

Never seen the gun stabilizer doing its job in past demos! Hoping to see a good demo of auto-tracker in action too

[suryag]

wow that gun is stable like a rock

[Philip]

No news of A-2 orders? The GOI/MOD should use such opportunities as is done at all Def. expos,to announce orders for desi wares in particular.
At least the re-affirmation of orders for Tejas,etc.,which would give a boost to desi firms which want to enter and invest in the industry.Was discussing last night with a pal who was supplying the DRDO with a few items for years when he was ED of a co. Babudom and red tape will exasperate you until you say "enough",and start to export items shutting the door on the DRDO. Unless the small and medium industries are roped in with regular orders,based upon straightforward tendering and awarding contracts,nothing will percolate down and only the huge corporate groups with the right govt. contacts will grab orders through their chummy relationships with their establishment.They swiftly sign up collaboration with firang OEMs,and then use screwdriver tech yet again and cream off the profits.The continued success of ISRO must be applauded. If only the same culture was there in the MOD/DPSU establishments.

[ramana]

Philip relax. I think this show off is to build support for orders.

BTW you made this point many times in different threads.

[jaysimha]

I doubt after S-400 there is room in budget for purchase of another ABM and will eat into even domestic program (AAD).

Lets look at it from another POV.

We have to pay some way or the other to Russia for all the support we get.
And that we do by paying for the hardware we import from them.
All along we might be paying through (or buying) T-90.
May be, that will stop and this whole exercise is ground laying work to buy ARJUN TANKS in laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarge numbers. Just wait for the announcement

If not, no use in making TN UP a def. corridor. we have to connect some dots here and there..

[ArjunPandit]

^^jingo's wet dreams, nothing more, in the end not you me, putin but philip will have the last laugh

[Philip]

Article in a def. mag that the IA is going to follow the Ru roadmap with the Armata concept of a family of AVs. However, if a 50t FMBT is the main aim with an auto -turret, then A-2 may be built in limited qtys. only as it isn't a 3-crew MBT.

[uddu]

[Arun.prabhu]

This is necroed, so apologies in advance. There isn't any spaced armor that is effective against a hundred pounds of plastic explosive slapped against the armour and detonated. Certainly, if not spalling, the shock from the explosion will kill or seriously wound the crew.

^^ Two questions:
- What's the effectiveness of HESH round on spaced armour ?
- How does the muzzle velocity of 105mm howitzer compare to that of a tank ?

Plus, most tanks now have spall liners, and HESH can at best mission kill a tank by stripping its sights etc. But not reliably penetrate modern armor arrays. There is s big reason FSAPDS remains part of the Arjun loadout.

[Trikaal]

http://idrw.org/arjun-mk-2-set-to-lose- ... of-weight/

Arjun Mk-2 after incorporating 84 improvements gained over six tons over the MK1 and now weighs at 68.6 tons. but this is about to change and on instances of the Indian Army, DRDO has again started working on to carry out structural improvements and also develop a reconfigured Hull with new improved advanced armor material which will allow it to lose 3 tons in total weight.

Indian Army had asked for weight optimized Mk-2 in 2016 and work begin soon after by DRDO put results will not be quick since reconfiguration of an accepted design will mean more painstaking and also slow developmental work which will keep the Mk-2 out of production before it is revalidated again by Indian Army in fresh trials.

Experts are already questioning what advantage a 65.5 tons Mk-2 will bring over 68.6 tons Mk-2 in its area of operations. In past, even 62 tons MK1 was criticised for being overweight and hardly 80 of the tanks were inducted or operational within Indian Army at this given point.

46 ton Russian developed and locally manufactured T-90A Main Battle Tank is still quite popular with the Indian Army and over 1200 already are in service with Indian Army even though T-90A was outgunned and outmaneuvered by Arjun MBT in direct field trials years ago.

Source- IDRW

[nash]

http://idrw.org/arjun-mk-2-set-to-lose-3-tons-of-weight/

Arjun Mk-2 after incorporating 84 improvements gained over six tons over the MK1 and now weighs at 68.6 tons. but this is about to change and on instances of the Indian Army, DRDO has again started working on to carry out structural improvements and also develop a reconfigured Hull with new improved advanced armor material which will allow it to lose 3 tons in total weight.

Indian Army had asked for weight optimized Mk-2 in 2016 and work begin soon after by DRDO put results will not be quick since reconfiguration of an accepted design will mean more painstaking and also slow developmental work which will keep the Mk-2 out of production before it is revalidated again by Indian Army in fresh trials.

Experts are already questioning what advantage a 65.5 tons Mk-2 will bring over 68.6 tons Mk-2 in its area of operations. In past, even 62 tons MK1 was criticised for being overweight and hardly 80 of the tanks were inducted or operational within Indian Army at this given point.

46 ton Russian developed and locally manufactured T-90A Main Battle Tank is still quite popular with the Indian Army and over 1200 already are in service with Indian Army even though T-90A was outgunned and outmaneuvered by Arjun MBT in direct field trials years ago.

Source- IDRW

Great, just great, job well done and Arjun-MkII successfully delayed further. Not sure who i should congratulate of this great job.

[Trikaal]

What difference will a 65 ton tank make compared to a 68 ton tank? Just another tactic to delay Arjun.
I believe it is time DRDO just give up on Arjun and start working on a light tank(40 tons) because it doesn't look like army will ever accept it. I am sorry for the pessimism but I have lost all hope.

[Pratyush]

news of this nature makes me feel like executing all armour designers in India and buy whatever junk the Russians come up with. Regardless of how good or bad that is.

While we are at it. Shut down Avadi and buy everything that comes from Russia. Why even have the pretense of domestic production. When we don't get any meaningful tot and all we do is turn screwdriver.

[Pratyush]

What difference will a 65 ton tank make compared to a 68 ton tank? Just another tactic to delay Arjun.
I believe it is time DRDO just give up on Arjun and start working on a light tank(40 tons) because it doesn't look like army will ever accept it. I am sorry for the pessimism but I have lost all hope.

What makes you feel that IA will accept a 40 ton tank designed by DRDO. In the absence of the GSQR.

I am reading about the fmbt since at least the 2012. But no progress on the requirements.

I will not be surprised if the Indian army just makes a demand for the Armata.

[Philip]

I've stated sev. times that a difference of 20t+ in shher weight of the tank with its 4 man crew requiring larger turrets along with their sophisticated armour, more powerful engines, etc. has a huge bearing in the cost of the MBT.Moreover, there is a foreign content in Arjun which for A-1 obtaining spares now has become a serious support problem..So when the IA draw up their reqduirements and budgets, for tank requirements Arjun comes out as a much more expensive proposition than buying more T-90s.I've produced before comparative costs from open sources, the costs of our T-90 procurements in batches official statements. Regardless of comparative performance between the two , and the IA in general are satisfied with T-90 variants,in the Indo-Pak equation predominantly, for the IA, outnumbering the Pakis on armour by a wide margin is a fundamental.

As we've often discussed, the DRDO/ CVRDE should've developed our own 3 crewed MBT to supplant T-72s being made under licence of which we havd somewhere between 1500 to 2000 tanks.Some of the T72/90 series components could've been utilised like the auto- loader, etc, but armour could've been Kanchan and our hydro-pneumatic hull developed for Arjun.This way our improved T-72 could've fitted in with the IA's AW doctrine.

This appears to be now understood with the FMBT or whatever its changing nomenclature is, with the requirement for a 45 to 50t MBT for the future.However, trying to fit in every kind of bell and whistle will again send the weight soaring and we need to remember the philosophy behind the mass production of the T-34 that won the war for Russia on the ground in WW2 despite supposedly superior German tanks built however in smaller numbers.

[vasu raya]

Would a diesel electric drive in Arjun reduce its weight? as transmission weight is reduced.

Even if army is going to put hurdles, if they can offload technology to private sector, the goal of serving the nation is acheived as ISRO did with its Lithium Ion battery technology. The private sector on its own wouldn't make that investment in applied research.

[Karan M]

This is necroed, so apologies in advance. There isn't any spaced armor that is effective against a hundred pounds of plastic explosive slapped against the armour and detonated. Certainly, if not spalling, the shock from the explosion will kill or seriously wound the crew.

Plus, most tanks now have spall liners, and HESH can at best mission kill a tank by stripping its sights etc. But not reliably penetrate modern armor arrays. There is s big reason FSAPDS remains part of the Arjun loadout.

Who says its 100 pounds? Around half that.
http://ofbindia.gov.in/products/data/am ... /lc/22.htm
Second, most tanks now have ERA tiles mounted at a distance from the main armor. The HESH round will likely strip away the ERA and the actual explosive effect won;t get through the main armor

[barath_s]

I
As we've often discussed, the DRDO/ CVRDE should've developed our own 3 crewed MBT to T-72

Where was the army requirement ?. Is the drdo supposed to provide requirements to the army ? Or are they supposed to keep developing tanks without any requirement and the army is supposed to fit the requirements to the hardware ? What a cluster**** that would be ..

The armed forces should come up with high level requirements based on doctrine, solicit industry /drdo feedback on feasibility and work with them on concept that can qualify. And vice versa.

Not come out with actual hardware, find defects, qualify them and then decide the requirements..

Unfortunately requirements are not thought through with professionalism and accountability either...

[Philip]

As an aside, what were the fundamental requirements of the Arjun programme 3 decades ago? Remember that there was the Tank- X venture by the CVRDE not too long ago.But unless the IA and desi AV designers put their heads together, to formulate the design no satisfactory result will appear.We see something similar happening with the LCA which however thanks to the GOI's armtwisting has forced the IAF to accept it. The same situ has plagued Arjun.

[Arun.prabhu]

But I’m not talking HESH on tank guns. HESH on 155mm short range guns mounted on tracked or wheeled vehicles.

Neither ARMOR PIERCERS or HEAT will work well against ERA armor either. Should we discard those?

This is necroed, so apologies in advance. There isn't any spaced armor that is effective against a hundred pounds of plastic explosive slapped against the armour and detonated. Certainly, if not spalling, the shock from the explosion will kill or seriously wound the crew.

Who says its 100 pounds? Around half that.
http://ofbindia.gov.in/products/data/am ... /lc/22.htm
Second, most tanks now have ERA tiles mounted at a distance from the main armor. The HESH round will likely strip away the ERA and the actual explosive effect won;t get through the main armor

[ramana]

But I’m not talking HESH on tank guns. HESH on 155mm short range guns mounted on tracked or wheeled vehicles.

Neither ARMOR PIERCERS or HEAT will work well against ERA armor either. Should we discard those?

Who says its 100 pounds? Around half that.
http://ofbindia.gov.in/products/data/am ... /lc/22.htm
Second, most tanks now have ERA tiles mounted at a distance from the main armor. The HESH round will likely strip away the ERA and the actual explosive effect won;t get through the main armor

The OFB upgrade to 130mm M-46 is called Sarang. The M-46 carriage has direct fire mode. Sarang due to its carriage elevation limits will be mostly in plains where such a HESH round could be awesome for bunker busting and anti tank role. BTW British Indian Army developed the tactics of using the 5.5 inch medium gun in direct fire mode to destroy Imperial Japanese bunkers which were immune to 1000 lb. 'near miss' bombs from RAF.

[Karan M]

But I’m not talking HESH on tank guns. HESH on 155mm short range guns mounted on tracked or wheeled vehicles.

The discussion you jumped into was about HESH on tank guns. 155mm guns are not in IA service as tank killers nor are there plans to make them fulfill that role.

Neither ARMOR PIERCERS or HEAT will work well against ERA armor either. Should we discard those?

Errr.. KE rounds are tested for use with ERA protected targets considered, and most Gen1/Gen2 ERA packages (as versus advanced ones like Relikt) cannot stop advanced KE rounds, bar introducing a yaw which degrades but cannot entirely stop effectiveness. HEAT remains viable against ERA armor FYI, as tandem HEAT rounds are in fact the IA's primary tank killing weapon in the form of the INVAR, and specifically procured for use against heavy armor (Pak/PRC tanks with heavy composite and ERA package). As India again picks up on FSAPDS development, which had been foolishly stopped and has now been restarted, the need for INVAR type expensive rounds will reduce and we may well revert to FSAPDS. Most western armies continue to rely on advanced FSAPDS to deal with ERA equipped targets.

Who says its 100 pounds? Around half that.
http://ofbindia.gov.in/products/data/am ... /lc/22.htm
Second, most tanks now have ERA tiles mounted at a distance from the main armor. The HESH round will likely strip away the ERA and the actual explosive effect won;t get through the main armor

[Karan M]

For instance,
https://www.rheinmetall-defence.com/med ... etence.pdf

The 120mm KE DM63/DM53A1 is the world’s first temperature-independent high-performance tank round. Its purpose is to destroy the latest generation of main battle tanks; even at long ranges of engagement, it can penetrate double-reactive armour. Fired from L44 and L55 tank barrels, the ammunition is extremely accurate.

Every country tests against what it has available (easiest) and what it can procure (diplomatic work or from conflict sites).

[kit]

http://strategypage.com/htmw/htmurph/articles/20180624.aspx

Russia has quietly put over a third of its 550 newly built T-90s into reserve. While the T-90 was loudly proclaimed to be the next-big-thing the Russian army preferred the refurbished T-72s in the form of the T-72B3. These proved to be cheaper and more reliable than T-90s, something that got little publicity. While all the upgrades (new engine, gun, fire control and protection) made it nearly as expensive as the T-90 it was preferred by the troops and the older officers quietly agreed that it was a better tank than the new T-90/T-72BUs. This apparently has something to do with the design of the T-72BU (trying to merge T-80 elements into the T-72 design) and the decline in manufacturing quality in Russian the defense industry after the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991. Since the T-72B3 was introduced in 2013 it has been produced in far greater numbers than any other tank and that continues. Especially telling was how T-90s began to be taken out of service (and put in reserve) as soon as enough T-72B3s became available. At the same time, the most popular Russian tank for export customers is the T-72B (a B3 with fewer of the upgrades) and these cost nearly two million dollars each but can be delivered in a few months after the contract is signed. The T-72B3 has been so popular with Russian troops that the government is giving it more publicity in the state-controlled mass media