Armoured Vehicles Discussion Thread

manjgu · Post by **manjgu** » 01 Mar 2011 10:29

rahulm..nice conversation.

as i said in one of my previous posts that there remains a large body of officers in the army who are still skeptic of Arjun for variety of reasons ... a concious effort will have to be made to win them over.

As of Arjuns on rails knocking down the signal posts ( it does not surprise me) ..often in India the left hand does not know what the right hand is doing... talk of lack of coordination, planning etc. Dont we know how many times a road is made and then dug up to lay a line and then laid and then dug up.

negi · Post by **negi** » 01 Mar 2011 10:30

When mounted on railcars, the thing just chops signal posts down. Its impossible to move it by rail.

That's one lousy excuse it's akin to a 7 year old who wets the bed in the night because he is afraid to get up from the bed in the dark and go to the toilet.

negi · Post by **negi** » 01 Mar 2011 10:39

You see this only shows how hollow the claims of logistics are now that wagons are available signal posts have become an issue, is word 'chootiya' written all over our foreheads, that these guys bring up the issue of chopping of signal posts ? How difficult it is to place the tanks on wagons in a staggered fashion or have their turrets turned at 45 deg ?

My father and bro are right onlee 'fauj mein dimaag nahin lagane ka'.

This was posted here some time back, but to re-iterate the IA does transport their MBTs aligned lengthwise on the wagons when needed.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 01 Mar 2011 10:52

abrams tank tracks also stick out of wagon when transporting...web has photos of that.

some people do whats need to kick some ass,
some people look for ways to make life peacetime life easy.

negi · Post by **negi** » 01 Mar 2011 10:56

Btw T-90's width is 3.78 meter as against 3.86 for Arjun.

rahulm · Post by **rahulm** » 01 Mar 2011 11:04

I would expect the IR standards (signal post spacing from rails etc) to be the same as those in England. The Challenger 2 has a width of 3.5 metres.

Assuming logistics is a real issue, is it such a bad idea to locate the Arjun BRD's in Punjab, Gujarat and Rajasthan? It would kill the logistcs issue once the Arjun's are transported from the south to the Western front.

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 01 Mar 2011 11:09

Sanku wrote: Actually Karan M's link only shows that DRDO developed HESH in 2002, I had posted a link in 2007 in this forum that the HESH shells were developed but not produced in any numbers. (Yes IAs fault onleee) the reason I did not say this is because I wanted to repost that with the exact link, <snip>

so OFB was supposed to produce HESH 'in numbers' for a tank for which there was no guarantee IA would ever accept 'in numbers' ?

Sanku wrote:
Rahul M wrote:which didn't work either ! must be the magic touch of T-90 !
Rahul dont you think as a forum mod you should leave the task of making one line flame baits based on massively outdated information to some others?

The Catherine TI has been working fine for over 6 years now.

huh ?
from a couple of pages back in this very thread.

November 17, 2010

The Indian Army has detected flaws with the thermal imaging system of the Russian-built T-90 main battle tanks (MBTs), inducted in its fleet three years ago, causing an estimated loss of Rs 620 crore.

Rechristened as ‘Bhishma,’ T-90s’ flaw came to light during its comparative trials with the indigenous MBT Arjun during peak summers in the Thar Desert of Rajasthan.

According to the report submitted by the Indian Army, the French Catherine thermal imaging (TI) camera giving T-90s its night vision capability and higher precision is not “adequately tropicalised.” It simply cannot function in the extreme condition for which it was supposed to function. Because of this the thermal imaging camera is prone to malfunction in extreme temperature conditions of Rajasthan, where it is deployed.

“During the trials it was observed that the temperatures inside the tank goes up to 55-60 degree Celsius resulting in the blurring of images taken by the camera,” a senior Indian Army officer told Financial World on condition of anonymity as he was not authorised to speak to media.
<snip>

The report describes the thermal imaging cameras as the ‘eyes’ of the tank. While the tank costs around Rs 12 crore, each of these systems cost (including) Rs 2 crore. Prolonged use of the tank in extreme weather conditions has already rendered 80-90 of such systems “unserviceable.”
imagine if this happened with the arjun, the skies would have been pierced with the wailing from the tin-can fan-club.

The Indian Army is deliberating to get a locally effective air conditioning system for the thermal imaging camera. However, nothing concrete has happened on this front.

http://www.tehelka.com/story_main47.asp ... efence.asp

this kind of deliberately ignoring facts contrary to your opinion and consequent circular discussions is precisely what's creating problems in this thread.

merlin · Post by **merlin** » 01 Mar 2011 11:12

negi wrote: My father and bro are right onlee 'fauj mein dimaag nahin lagane ka'.

I have heard that so many times now, its not funny any longer

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 01 Mar 2011 11:14

sum wrote:Sorry but if IA was really so concerned about transporting the tank, W(hy)TF did they issue a GSQR for a tank of such dimensions and then whine that it cannot be carried on existing rails?

Thats why I posted tsarkar's post. IA/IAF etc, do not normally specify height weight etc down to last millimeter. So it is not right to say that it is per GSQR, GSQR would specifiy overall ability not details to last min.

I would expect the IR standards (signal post spacing from rails etc) to be the same as those in England. The Challenger 2 has a width of 3.5 metres.

Do they have a requirement for moving tanks by trains in England? That is such a tiny country, does it really make impact there.

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 01 Mar 2011 11:16

rahulm wrote: Assuming logistics is a real issue, is it such a bad idea to locate the Arjun BRD's in Punjab, Gujarat and Rajasthan? It would kill the logistcs issue once the Arjun's are transported from the south to the Western front.

This is what I said as well, this would need that sort of action.

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 01 Mar 2011 11:27

Rahul M wrote: so OFB was supposed to produce HESH 'in numbers' for a tank for which there was no guarantee IA would ever accept 'in numbers' ?

Well this is not funny any longer, everything is "we cant make things on time unless we have a 10000 order" This is not IA's fault right? MoD should not make sure that such situation does not come up.

In any case, I merely said that the HESH ammo for Arjun had been a issue sometime back (in reality from a user perspective) it may be that OFB was not making enough. But hey an issue is a issue end of the day.

The Indian Army is deliberating to get a locally effective air conditioning system for the thermal imaging camera. However, nothing concrete has happened on this front.

http://www.tehelka.com/story_main47.asp ... efence.asp

this kind of deliberately ignoring facts contrary to your opinion and consequent circular discussions is precisely what's creating problems in this thread.

Oh please a teleheka regurgitating old articles. Telehaka for gods sake.

There are no shortage of articles talking about how T 90 has done well in exercise in Thar in all weathers.

One here:
http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes ... -90-armour

negi · Post by **negi** » 01 Mar 2011 11:36

Sanku ji OFB has been making HESH rounds albeit in 105mm cal for ages now , Centurion used to fire that round so making a 120mm version of the same was solely depended on demand. Finally firing HESH is a bonus i.e. something over and above the primary round i.e. the APFSDS otherwise T-90 shouldn't be even in contention.

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 01 Mar 2011 11:42

negi wrote:Sanku ji OFB has been making HESH rounds albeit in 105mm cal for ages now , Centurion used to fire that round so making a 120mm version of the same was solely depended on demand. Finally firing HESH is a bonus i.e. something over and above the primary round i.e. the APFSDS otherwise T-90 shouldn't be even in contention.

Sir, I am not even making a big deal, all I said is that OFB had issues with making 120 rounds and not enough were made till at least 2007. People took that as a reason to jump on me, I dunno why.

There are a lot of mil-ind issues which are on the face of it simple to solve, but for some god forsaken reason does not happen in reality. Just the usual "chalta hai" by MoD.

pragnya · Post by **pragnya** » 01 Mar 2011 11:45

negi wrote:
When mounted on railcars, the thing just chops signal posts down. Its impossible to move it by rail.
That's one lousy excuse it's akin to a 7 year old who wets the bed in the night because he is afraid to get up from the bed in the dark and go to the toilet.

bang on sir. it may have been an issue in 80s when broadgauge network of the IR was not fully in place. should not be an issue now. special wagons were engineered precisely for this -

http://www.bemlindia.com/documents/Prod ... 0Wagon.pdf

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 01 Mar 2011 11:51

So was the officer deliberately lying? Or is rahulm's story wrong? Or was the officer so grossly misinformed?

What is the take?

manjgu · Post by **manjgu** » 01 Mar 2011 11:54

marten..this info does not prove anything. What if there is only 2 inch clearance in case of T 90 ?

a lot can happen even with 3.1 inches

) its important to know how much is the clearance between signal posts and T 90 as of today.

manjgu · Post by **manjgu** » 01 Mar 2011 11:55

sorry..i did not see ur full post.

manjgu · Post by **manjgu** » 01 Mar 2011 11:58

its a possibility that while signal posts are far away , but poles for some other thing are getting chopped down?

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 01 Mar 2011 12:03

it's more likely a typical urban legend like the arjun's 'torsion-bar' breaking down rather than a real story. BEML would be crazy to make a wagon which would end up chopping down poles. they are the ones that do this for a living and I'm certain IR would never have allowed any wagon that would chop down its precious poles. bunkum, to put it mildly.

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 01 Mar 2011 12:04

Marten wrote: Sankuji, my apologies, but there is no logic around this logistics issue. Wouldn't you agree?

Marten I am only trying to understand rahulm's post. What do you think happened there?

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 01 Mar 2011 12:07

There are no shortage of articles talking about how T 90 has done well in exercise in Thar in all weathers.

One here:
http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes ... -90-armour

come on, even if you keep your eyes closed about every contrary article, you can surely do better than this fluff piece on the T-90 running around in the desert watched on a monitor in delhi and little besides. it has nothing about the T-90's capabilities and it is not meant to be that kind of report.

p.s. that article is from 2004 and tehelka's from november last year, 4 months back, amking specific references to the arjun V T-90 trials that happened last year. who is regurgitating old articles here ?

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 01 Mar 2011 12:10

Rahul M wrote:
There are no shortage of articles talking about how T 90 has done well in exercise in Thar in all weathers.

One here:
http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes ... -90-armour
come on, even if you keep your eyes closed about every contrary article, you can surely do better than this fluff piece on the T-90 running around in the desert watched on a monitor in delhi and little besides. it has nothing about the T-90's capabilities and it is not meant to be that kind of report.

Rahul, I do not know who is keeping eyes closed about contrariness reports. There are any number of articles about how T 90 has done well all over the place including in Thar. I just posted one. And I trust telehaka less than the entire BRF combined trusts ChorGupta.

BTW -- No one says there were no integration issues between French TI and Russian T-90 in early first few years, in fact IA was first to try the MKIzation of T-90. The issues were sorted out in time as per all reports.

manjgu · Post by **manjgu** » 01 Mar 2011 12:22

Marten...

a) Can u give me EXACT distance of signal post from the centre of the BG rail track.
b) Its not just question of 1 inch.... u have to take into account the shaking, lateral movement of the thing which is tied on top of the wagon, when the train moves. Does this fit in with tolerance defined by railways??

if the figures/maths look convincing , I am prepared to accept that the officer was talking out of heresay and not out of personal experience.

manjgu · Post by **manjgu** » 01 Mar 2011 12:23

Rahul M ..its not abt BEML made wagons breaking the poles.... its about tanks placed on the wagons that are alleged to be doing the damage !!

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 01 Mar 2011 12:25

Marten wrote: You still haven't stated your opinion or perception -- do you still believe those claims?

Those claims? Thats dangerous to comment on

I will just say that I am trying to understand where the Officer was coming from before I form a opinion, examine the issue so it were, but this was really new, never heard this one before, the other issues are sorted out as per all other reports, no one in the longest time has talked about the rail transport being a issue (last time was 7 years or so back?) -- so this one frankly was a googly, but so far out, that it is tough to "make it up" IMVHO

I confess to being curious about the matter.

Prasad · Post by **Prasad** » 01 Mar 2011 12:29

Well I found this on google cache -

link

The IR manuals are on this page. Someone could check if the details needed are present in one of the manuals

After some searching - " Movement of ODC and Other Bulky Consignment " in http://www.indianrailways.gov.in/upload ... raffic.pdf

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 01 Mar 2011 12:43

manjgu wrote:Rahul M ..its not abt BEML made wagons breaking the poles.... its about tanks placed on the wagons that are alleged to be doing the damage !!

are you telling me IR doesn't know the distance between its poles and would carry cargo that it knows will chop down its electric poles and given the high % of electrification of IR tracks and the fact that goods train use the same track as other trains would end up causing complete power failure and freezing of railway traffic ?

is this a joke ?

rahulm · Post by **rahulm** » 01 Mar 2011 12:47

Does the signal post clearance from the track decrease on curves and near points as against when on a straight track run?

From my personal experience of craning my head out of train doors, sometimes at curves and when approaching points, the signal posts appear to be closer to the coach than on a straight run. One has to withdraw the lemon urgently into the safety of the coach to prevent a decapitation.

All very scientific observation!

I am as curious as the rest. The difference in width between the T-90 and Arjun is 8.4 cms. That's 4.2 cms on either side.That could be a lot or not.

If the Lt. Col. is correct (and I can't say he is or isn't) then the T-90 is probably at the limit of IR's widest carriage dimension margin.

Is the Arjun on a BEML transporter wholly contained within the transporter? If yes, then this issue is bogus as I think we can assume with certainty that IR will never certify a non compliant transporter to use its infrastructure.

schowdhuri · Post by **schowdhuri** » 01 Mar 2011 13:01

With regard to Rahul's discussion with Armd Corps Officer, I have also dicussed it with many Armd Corps Officer's from t-72 & t-90 regiments. Never heard anyone speak well of Arjun.

Reasons have been the same ones discussed here - logistics, very good firing on the move, cannot fire at all when stationary, jsut a hotch-potch assembled thing etc.

How can it be that all Armd Corps Officer's are such idiots, or so brainwashed, that they prefer not to care for their own safety? It does not takelong to see they are fairly intelligint people. It is very difficult to understand or belive.

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 01 Mar 2011 13:03

Sanku wrote:
Rahul M wrote: come on, even if you keep your eyes closed about every contrary article, you can surely do better than this fluff piece on the T-90 running around in the desert watched on a monitor in delhi and little besides. it has nothing about the T-90's capabilities and it is not meant to be that kind of report.
Rahul, I do not know who is keeping eyes closed about contrariness reports. There are any number of articles about how T 90 has done well all over the place including in Thar. I just posted one. And I trust telehaka less than the entire BRF combined trusts ChorGupta.

BTW -- No one says there were no integration issues between French TI and Russian T-90 in early first few years, in fact IA was first to try the MKIzation of T-90. The issues were sorted out in time as per all reports.

it says nothing about whether T-90 did well or not, it's not meant to. all it says was T-90 was running around and may be firing guns.
it's a typical routine report on a military exercise that just reproduces word by word PRO handouts, please don't try to portray it as something substantial, it is anything but.
take any report from another exercise from another year, change the name and you will not know the difference.
I'll hold out for just 3 credible reports by decent journalists on catherine TI working well out of your stash of 'any number of' articles.

so OFB was supposed to produce HESH 'in numbers' for a tank for which there was no guarantee IA would ever accept 'in numbers' ?
Well this is not funny any longer, everything is "we cant make things on time unless we have a 10000 order" This is not IA's fault right? MoD should not make sure that such situation does not come up.

what exactly was the 'need' for production 'in numbers' for HESH in 2007 ? the tank was not even accepted back then. they needed a few hundred rounds for testing arjun to death and then some and they got it.
even for a strawman argument this scratches the bottom.

rohitvats · Post by **rohitvats** » 01 Mar 2011 13:15

No one has ever complained about the "chopping of signals" thing......least of all railways. This is nothing but some nonsense urban legend that has got multiplied manifold to become a 'fact'.....pure nonsense.

Chances are something led to some incident and presto....you had every tom dick and harry shouting "Arjun bad bad".

manjgu · Post by **manjgu** » 01 Mar 2011 13:16

Marten, ... the passage you quote is for the telegraph post ( which is quite far from the track) .. the telegraph pole is NOT the signals pole IMHO.

Rahulm.. the tank always sticks out a bit from the sides.. never 100% within the carriage...

Rahul M... u make good point. However, the possibility could be that the tank was not properly centrered ( which it can never be) on the wagon. So while dimension wise ( maths) it may fit in but in reality it was jutting more on one side and probably damaged something??

rahulm · Post by **rahulm** » 01 Mar 2011 13:17

I have clearly stated in a prior post that I do not know if the offer is right or not. I have no view of him.

However, it would be useful to formulate an objective response to counter any such future comments when I and presumably others interact with such officers.

rohitvats · Post by **rohitvats** » 01 Mar 2011 13:19

schowdhuri wrote:With regard to Rahul's discussion with Armd Corps Officer, I have also dicussed it with many Armd Corps Officer's from t-72 & t-90 regiments. Never heard anyone speak well of Arjun.

Reasons have been the same ones discussed here - logistics, very good firing on the move, cannot fire at all when stationary, jsut a hotch-potch assembled thing etc.

How can it be that all Armd Corps Officer's are such idiots, or so brainwashed, that they prefer not to care for their own safety? It does not takelong to see they are fairly intelligint people. It is very difficult to understand or belive.

It is called organizational inertia and no less that General SR Chowdhary had commented on it in his biography.

The same Armoured Corps was forced to go for T-72 when they wanted the Leo....geopolitics and money meant that a generation of officers grew up on tin-cans....and rest, eveything is "he said so"....it is nothing got to do with their intelligence.

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 01 Mar 2011 13:29

Rahul M... u make good point. However, the possibility could be that the tank was not properly centrered ( which it can never be) on the wagon. So while dimension wise ( maths) it may fit in but in reality it was jutting more on one side and probably damaged something??

good point, however, in this day and age this doesn't sound like an insurmountable problem. things like guide rails are there on the BFAT AFAIK. and as you rightly observed, even the T-90 hangs out of the wagon. so the loading shouldn't be that much more difficult for arjun. considering everything, any other army would be embarrassed to even mention this little thing as a supposed problem.

rahulm · Post by **rahulm** » 01 Mar 2011 13:30

Ergo: no one gets into trouble in the army for being anti Arjun. The converse, however, is probably not true. A bit like "no one got fired for buying Microsoft"

Also, group think in the works. Watch all fauji's goggles. Almost without exception they wear Ray Ban aviators! Show them warp around goggles and they don't want to know anything about them.

Sri · Post by **Sri** » 01 Mar 2011 13:32

I generally do not post hairsay information on BR. But the problem with the width of the tank was told to me by another EME officer many moons ago. Am not sure whether this is a major issue. But it does seem to be an issue which comes to the minds of the officer. First thing they will tell you is the width problem and how Southern railway expressed inability to move the tanks from Avadi.

manjgu · Post by **manjgu** » 01 Mar 2011 13:53

Rahul M... maybe the extra few inches make the loading of arjun on existing wagons a wee more difficult... not being able to centre them well enough ?? no idea really. I need to check this out...

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 01 Mar 2011 13:58

So despite, reports and reports like the following

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uJSo2eSyKE

in exercise after exercise

we are supposed to believe that all the IA armored corps, down to captains and lt-cols lie merrily on camera and the tank is plagued with issues?

Telehaka is probably still trying to continue its hatchet job against George uncle, forgetting that he has long since retired.

Sanku · Post by **Sanku** » 01 Mar 2011 14:15

schowdhuri wrote: How can it be that all Armd Corps Officer's are such idiots, or so brainwashed, that they prefer not to care for their own safety? It does not takelong to see they are fairly intelligint people. It is very difficult to understand or belive.

My theory is that BRF in its quest to show how the stupid DRDO Indian product bashing was wrong has went way too far and is completely closed to the idea of discussion of any issues that come up. That get promptly into a "its all IA/IAF fault" with any info that can remotely support it.

Not healthy IMVHO.