Armata soon to be in service.

[VladimirTarasov]

Logistics is probably the main reason on continuing with the new 2A82M1 cannon, They can fire the older rounds still. Once NATO heavy armor gets more stronger then the upgrade to 152mm will come to reality. 

[panzersaurkrautwerfer]

But it seems to me that they might think the current new 125 mm is up to the challenge of facing the current generation on western armour but not whatever the next generation is going to be, and they think they are at or at least nearing the the limit with what they can do with 125 mm.  So they want to be ready to move to 152mm for MBTs when it becomes necessary, but since it is still a system that hasn't been field tested it would be an unnecessary risk to make that the initial MBT configuration.  And it would also mean that whatever armour the west came out with next would be an attempt at being 152mm proof.  By releasing it first with the new 125mm for MBT and 152mm as unimportant accessory, it makes it o the west is more likely to respond to the 125mm threat than the 152mm threat with their next generation of armour.  This allows the Ruskies to still have a western armour beating weapon at their disposal after the next generation of western armour is released.  And if they cant get the next new generation of 125mm to penetrate the next generation of western armour then they can modular-ly switch out the turrets of the 125mm armatas with the 152 turret and make it the new MBT.

The size and bulk of an autoloader for a 152 MM gun will nearly certainly be well outside of a readily swapped out module.  This is almost doubtlessly going to have to be a new Armata based tank rather than anything simple or easy (case in point see what happened with the CATTB, and that's without needing the autoloader).  The fact the Russians have gone with an in-hull autoloader too doubtlessly places constraints on the size of whatever comes next.

The "HAH YOU BUILD ARMOR TO FEND OFF 125 MM NOW I HAVE A 152!!!!" sounds like a thing...except now you've incurred the cost of two separate tank programs.  Having some manner of 152 MM gun program with an eye towards the future isn't dumb, but much for the same reason the 140 MM guns of the west are still sometimes researched, but never employed, there's still a wide variety of issues to be overcome before it's ready for primetime.  

Which is why announcing that there's now going to be this armata wunderpanzer is so silly.  It's like if I showed up to a car trade show and promised my car's in vehicle AI would literally drive you everywhere without so much of a hiccup, precisely calculating the exact maximum speed required by 2019.  This is much more advanced than what much better funded with more experienced engineering teams would even dream of promising in terms of automated cars.  I say my car will also be cheaper, come with a self feeding self cleaning hooker, and outperform all other cars on the race track.  What I have to show for it is a Ford Focus made from off brand parts that broadly accomplishes the task of going forward when you press the gas pedal.

Russian promises and claims for the Armata so far have been so outside of what the state of the art is capable of on a bloated Western defense budget, let alone a sad violin Russian budget.  To now claim there's a super-heavy massive gun tank that'll exist concurrently with the already shaping up to be technically complex and likely highly expensive T-14 just stretches credibility to the degree where I feel comfortable mocking it until someone finally puts their rubles where their mouths are.

And frankly looking at the never ending array of new Russian equipment, from BMD-4s, to PAK-FAs, new ships, the whole Rainbow of Armatas claimed, new infantry kits, revamping the way the Russian army is trained, established and paid while at the same time keeping the old way it's always done thing because conscripts! and then I look and see oil has bounced back to 31 dollars a barrel, I have to wonder just where the certainty that what exists as a real prototype enters production, let alone the napkin drawing follow on ultra vehicles based on that prototype will come from.

It's just funny.  If there's ever an operational T-14 battalion, then I think I'll take suggestions of a newer even bigger version of it almost seriously.  But as the case is, I'm dropping this one firmly in the MIG-31 Firefox bin, and going back to Xcom 2 for the day.  

[cool breeze]

The size and bulk of an autoloader for a 152 MM gun will nearly certainly be well outside of a readily swapped out module.  This is almost doubtlessly going to have to be a new Armata based tank rather than anything simple or easy (case in point see what happened with the CATTB, and that's without needing the autoloader).  The fact the Russians have gone with an in-hull autoloader too doubtlessly places constraints on the size of whatever comes next.

Thanks for the reply .  All that feasibility and economic stuff is way above my pay grade so I'm not trying to be drawn into an argument about any of that stuff, I was just giving my take on why I thought they might WANT to do what they say they are doing, not commenting on if they CAN do it, or anything like that.  And while putting some of the autoloader in the basket in the hull does constrain the potential size of it, I was under the ill-informed impression that the armata tank was designed to work with either the 125 or the 152. 

[Battlefront.com]

Once NATO heavy armor gets more stronger then the upgrade to 152mm will come to reality. 

It's great how Russians can go from the idea stage to the implementation stage without doing any of the hard work in between!  You guys must have Underpants Gnomes working for you:

Man, I wish my country could do that.  It would save so much money to just come up with stuff without having to bother with successful engineering.

The 152mm has been around for decades, as has been stated.  The current 125mm hasn't been effective against NATO armor for 30+ years.  Yet the 152mm is not in service.  Either Russians are "stupid" and keep producing an inferior gun when a superior one is available *or* stepping up to a 152mm is a lot more difficult than snapping fingers to make it happen.

Steve

Edited February 24, 2016 by Battlefront.com

[panzersaurkrautwerfer]

Thanks for the reply .  All that feasibility and economic stuff is way above my pay grade so I'm not trying to be drawn into an argument about any of that stuff, I was just giving my take on why I thought they might WANT to do what they say they are doing, not commenting on if they CAN do it, or anything like that.  And while putting some of the autoloader in the basket in the hull does constrain the potential size of it, I was under the ill-informed impression that the armata tank was designed to work with either the 125 or the 152. 

Armata watching is difficult. For the longest time there simply were no details at all, so a lot got filled in by:

1. Fantasists.  Think of it almost like conceptional fiction, what would you as a semi-educated person want on a tank?  Why wouldn't the Russians build a tribarrel 45 mm railgun?  

2. Russian nationalists.  Whatever the M1 Abrams has, the Armata's will be bigger and cheaper, and cooler, and RUSSIA STRONK ALL HAIL THE UBERPUTIN.

3. Professionals throwing things at a dart board.  What historically have the Russians tried to do?  Would they pursue a 152 MM main gun tank?  They tried that before.  How about an austerity light tank?  Less likely but Russia is going towards hybrid warfare, something more deployable might go with that!  

This put a lot in the air, some things more believed than others, there's a lot of computer model tanks that all got floated with mutually exclusive features that were all taken as real (and honestly all of them were equally based in reality).

Then with the actual unveiling of the Armata platforms a lot of really confusing information was published, some of it likely wrong on purpose purporting a whole host of features, that then got fed through the Russian nationalist press which resulted in 100% true facts about the Armata's ability to engage spacecraft.  This is then complicated by a mentality displayed on this forum that takes any of these claims, and then turns them around into "we need to shoot down spacecraft so it will happen!" without asking if the capability is reasonable, feasible or economically possible.  So what information we have includes nuggets about how the Armata will be able to drive itself (which is something the rest of the world struggles to get small cars to do under fairly controlled circumstances) and an APS that can swat western Sabot rounds out of the sky (which is something western APS won't even claim to be in the same area code of being capable of).

This is not to imply Russians are stupid, or incapable of building something advanced, but there's a lot of factors working against the Armata delivering on it's capabilities list.  Unhelpfully as evidenced by a few posters here, the Russian answer hasn't been "well wait how will we shoot down an object that is traveling fast enough to go from muzzle to impact 2 miles downrange in about 2 seconds?" it has been "we need the Armata to do this so it will happen."

This is frankly not an answer.  The US needs a cheap reusable space platform and yet it has not appeared.  We need totally clean nuclear power without the inherent risks and that hasn't happened yet either.   If there was a track record of "this will happen" resulting in product from the Russian defense industry, then well yes there's reason to be confident, but the Russians have needed a new tank since about 1993 (a real new tank) and yet, all the various Black Eagle, T-95 stuff drowned in economic troubles and technological immaturity.  The PAK-FA sets itself on fire and is disappointing the Indians of all people in it's ability to do much of anything.  Which is not to imply this is a Russian and only Russian problem (lord knows the critical tomes you can write about the F-35!) but there's this belief that engineering, political, and economic friction does not impact the Armata.

Which getting back to the original statement, totally modular super turrets were likely something claimed by someone at some point.  It's likely as real as a lot of the things the Armata is supposed to do.  But given Russian history, and extraordinary claims, the jury is pretty far out on the basic short term goals, let alone the follow on. 

[Wicky]

Artists impression

Less cumbersome barrel for urban demoltion as demonstrated in Syrian cities by T-72 and more accurate than barrel bombing.  Assad would buy a limited run.

[cool breeze]

I thought we heard, around the time of the parade, after we started seeing pictures of it, that there was a 152mm turret for it too.  I thought the Kremlin had said they had it but weren't saying if they would put it in the parade?  Anyway, while there was a lot of fantastic speculation and ridiculous claims making around the time of it's unveiling, it seems like if the Russians thought they were running out of room for improvement with their 125mm, they would make fitting the new 152mm tank gun they had been working on as a replacement to the 125mm fit into the new tank that's supposed to stay relevant for a long time. By fitting the gun into the tank I mean making the tank big enough to fit the gun, because they say they already had the gun. If the tank is big enough to mount the 152mm turret, it's definately big enough to mount the 125mm turret.  But if you make the tank only big enough to fit the 125mm then you need to make a whole new tank to fit the 152mm, and if you expect the 125mm to stop cutting it later on you'd be building a bunch of obsolete tanks if you did that.  So triple barreled rail guns aside, I don't think its unreasonable to think they might have just made the tank big enough in the first place.  And while i don't think it would be easy to change out the turrets and such, I think the fact that the turrets are separate from the crew compartment does mean the turret is kind of a bolt on modular kind of a thing.  I meant its not like integral to it, its like stuck to the top of it (and down into it a bit) and connected up with the rest of the tank with a bunch of wires/plugs.

[BTR]

Logistics is probably the main reason on continuing with the new 2A82M1 cannon, They can fire the older rounds still. Once NATO heavy armor gets more stronger then the upgrade to 152mm will come to reality. 

There is also the matter of re-balancing the armor equation. If someone puts a larger gun on an MBT, everyone will follow suit nullifying last 30 years of armor developments. 

[Battlefront.com]

Less cumbersome barrel for urban demoltion as demonstrated in Syrian cities by T-72 and more accurate than barrel bombing.  Assad would buy a limited run.

Why would Assad want something that is more accurate than barrel bombing when the whole point is to not hit anything specific?

Sorry, grim humor.

More seriously, if Russia wants an effective FSV which is also practical to build and field in large numbers, I'd take another look at things like the M50 Ontos and the M274 MULE with 106mm recoilless.  Obviously I'm not advocating these specific vehicles, but if the concept is to give infantry a mobile support platform I see there being far more merit to going light than going heavy:

Steve

[panzersaurkrautwerfer]

I thought we heard, around the time of the parade, after we started seeing pictures of it, that there was a 152mm turret for it too.  I thought the Kremlin had said they had it but weren't saying if they would put it in the parade?  Anyway, while there was a lot of fantastic speculation and ridiculous claims making around the time of it's unveiling, it seems like if the Russians thought they were running out of room for improvement with their 125mm, they would make fitting the new 152mm tank gun they had been working on as a replacement to the 125mm fit into the new tank that's supposed to stay relevant for a long time. By fitting the gun into the tank I mean making the tank big enough to fit the gun, because they say they already had the gun. If the tank is big enough to mount the 152mm turret, it's definately big enough to mount the 125mm turret.  But if you make the tank only big enough to fit the 125mm then you need to make a whole new tank to fit the 152mm, and if you expect the 125mm to stop cutting it later on you'd be building a bunch of obsolete tanks if you did that.  So triple barreled rail guns aside, I don't think its unreasonable to think they might have just made the tank big enough in the first place.  And while i don't think it would be easy to change out the turrets and such, I think the fact that the turrets are separate from the crew compartment does mean the turret is kind of a bolt on modular kind of a thing.  I meant its not like integral to it, its like stuck to the top of it (and down into it a bit) and connected up with the rest of the tank with a bunch of wires/plugs.

That would be valid with a western style turret in which everything is stuffed into the turret itself, or with a bustle style autoloader.  As the case is, the unmanned turret and Russian style autoloaders actually take up a lot of hull space.  Also the more open space you have on the interior of the tank the more armor it takes to effectively protect the tank.  Adding a lot of interior volume for a hypothetical 152 MM cannon that might or might not be fielded is a lot of design penalty to add.  

There is something to be said for futureproofing a tank by adding in the ability to upgrade the main gun.  The Leo 2 and Abrams both have the capacity to include a longer 120 MM gun (the Leo has exercised this in newer models, the Abrams just has the engineered ability to do so should a longer gun be selected.  This however is a pretty small leap with hand loaded guns.  As I've already mentioned the Russian style autoloaders have placed their own burdens on gun and ammunition upgrades, and it's no small feat to install a new loader system.

Basically summarizing:

A. It's not just plug and play.  A new larger gun will come with a much larger autoloader.

B. having the requisite volume to fit a larger gun, AND have loose enough tolerances to accommodate unexpected size issues would impose not insignificant design penalties.  

C. All of this costs money.  Vehicle design is rarely "check all" for options.  Would a 152 MM friendly tank be helpful?  Likely!  Is it economical?  Not really.
 

Why would Assad want something that is more accurate than barrel bombing when the whole point is to not hit anything specific?

Sorry, grim humor.

More seriously, if Russia wants an effective FSV which is also practical to build and field in large numbers, I'd take another look at things like the M50 Ontos and the M274 MULE with 106mm recoilless.  Obviously I'm not advocating these specific vehicles, but if the concept is to give infantry a mobile support platform I see there being far more merit to going light than going heavy:

Steve

This is the logical Fire Support Vehicle.  If you can bring a tank to a fight, then why not bring a tank?  If you cannot bring a tank, how do you build something to do what you wanted a tank for?  The Ontos in its ultimate use (rather than design) was a good sample of that.  If offered the sort of firepower reserved for tanks, in a package that was easily transported.  Not as good, no, but you could get an Ontos a lot of places that either did not require, or could not accommodate tanks.  

Which is why FSVs for armor formations are silly.  No one will claim an Ontos is superior to a tank on a battlefield that will accommodate a tank.  So why build something worse than a tank in some ways to do things tanks already do just fine to follow tanks into battle?  

[Battlefront.com]

That would be valid with a western style turret in which everything is stuffed into the turret itself, or with a bustle style autoloader.  As the case is, the unmanned turret and Russian style autoloaders actually take up a lot of hull space.  Also the more open space you have on the interior of the tank the more armor it takes to effectively protect the tank.  Adding a lot of interior volume for a hypothetical 152 MM cannon that might or might not be fielded is a lot of design penalty to add. 

There's also the evidence of weight.  From what I remember of the early speculations the weight of the Armata is about right for its dimensions and armor protection.  This means it is not right for a massive increase in weight that goes along with a larger turret with a bigger gun.  Which means it is probable the hull was NOT designed for the 152 and therefore it can not take one.  Which makes sense... if you're going to design the hull for a larger gun then you put a larger gun on it.  Tanks are far too expensive to overrengineer purely for the possibility of something 10-15 years down the road.  If Russian did do this then I would say "Russians are stupid".  But since I don't think they are stupid I don't think they did this.

And then there is the still nagging problem of ammo...

This is the logical Fire Support Vehicle.  If you can bring a tank to a fight, then why not bring a tank?  If you cannot bring a tank, how do you build something to do what you wanted a tank for?  The Ontos in its ultimate use (rather than design) was a good sample of that.  If offered the sort of firepower reserved for tanks, in a package that was easily transported.  Not as good, no, but you could get an Ontos a lot of places that either did not require, or could not accommodate tanks.  

That and the practicalities of large scale production.  I'd rather have something cheap and effective available pretty much full time to anybody rather than something that is expensive and requires three signs offs for it just to show up for a few hours.

A FSV doesn't need to be able to reach out and touch an enemy at thousands of meters because at thousands of meters you won't even know there's a target in the first place.  It's not like a big hunk of moving, heat spewing, noise making metal.  We're talking about guys dug into treelines, buildings in dense urban areas, etc.  Infantry will already be engaged almost by definition and that means ranges measured in hundreds of meters at best.  If there is a target further out than that most armies have something called artillery and even sometimes air support.  Let those things deal with the distant threats.

Trying to make one thing please everybody winds up with either nothing (i.e. it never gets deployed) or something that pleases nobody.

When Strykers were first announced I remember all the whining about how a Strkyer couldn't kill a tank.  Well, neither can a rifle, so should we not have dismounted infantry?  Such silly arguments

Steve

[Kinophile]

If I were Russia, I would be developing a tandem system of UAVs with laser designators and a fleet of cheap, highly mobile vehicles armed with top attack missiles.  Fly a bunch of quad copters over a NATO tank formation and pop a couple dozen fire and forget missiles, then run away to fight another day.  This is far more viable way to beat NATO's quantitative and qualitative battlefield superiority

This is pretty close to how my tactics have instinctively evolved as RUS v US. 

I don't buy full/stripped down MRBs - I go for a (old) recon battalion, bump it's BMPs to 2or 3M, strip out the assault platoon and add AT 14s, Breach teams (to facilitate hidden movement), Snipers and crucially,  one FO &  Drone Op per platoon. GLs also if I can afford. 

The critical part is that each FO has a dedicated battery each, and a priority sector with 3 TRPs in a triangular arrangement,  

I back this up with a platoon+ of T90-AMs.

Essentially my goal is to create a forward  deep,  loose front,  using the FOs and ambush AT-14s to attrit, with the recon squads to protect if infantry get too close, and everybody has 2 different fall back positions. I use the small recon  squads for quicker squad movement (less men going through doors,, so quicker in/out),  smaller target and good firepower.  Except for no RPGs, they're pretty good. If I can  I add a RPO team. Basically, they protect the spotters from infantry/bradleys. 

So I attrit, Dodge,  attrit, fall back, outflank attrit ATTACK. 

(I keep the BMP-3s because they can nail Bradley's easily,  and suppress the **** out of infantry in houses. Also they can kill an Abrams if they get around them. Technicals are just too flimsy).

The standard  RUS formations are both too cumbersome and brittle v US. 

v UKR though,  they do juuuuuuust fine. 

Note: The above is urban centric. I'm a FISH guy. 

Edited February 24, 2016 by kinophile

[Sublime]

Gah Steve so dense. Obviously everyone was upset that we had to engineer vehicles that couldnt kill a tank when EVERYONE knows from any Soviet history there are numerous examples of glorious Soviet workers destroying fascist hordes with their workers hammers! How can we every aggressively invade Russia in a 2017 Barbarossa II with Strykers???

[Sublime]

My goto is a bttn tac grp with 2Ms and deleting a lot of the BMPs. Then a couple plts of AMs on attack. An FO keep the 152mm 2S1, trps. The 120mms are always on map.

As on defense. On defense i go for the BTR tactical group because my BMPs refuse to use ATGMS so I use the BTR grps bigger ATGM arsenal.

[panzersaurkrautwerfer]

Re: Armata

Weight is a pretty serious issue, but it's a bit of the lesser problem to conquer.  Looking at the size creep of various western MBTs and IFVs, they're often 10-20% heavier than they were designed to be, but that's a problem to be overcome vs a hard barrier.  Interior volume though, that's pretty much a killer/show stopper.  If it's not there, it's not going to be there short of some pretty drastic modifications/honestly just buy a new hull.

Also with regards to ammo.  20 Sabot type rounds sounds like enough to get the job done, but what it'd actually look like is closer to 6-8 sabot, then 6-8 HEAT, and then however much room you have left for HE FRAG.  So in that regard, 20 sabot rounds is more than enough to get it done....but that's assuming you've got another 20 or so rounds of AMP/MPAT/HEAT/split of HEAT and HE to do the rest in.

Re: FSVs

Being a tanky-tanker I tend to view everything as evolving away from the tank at its root.  An FSV is a tank that's lost some of it's tank-characteristics in order to thrive in habitats a tank cannot handle.  Some of these are literal habitats (poor terrain, mountains, etc), some of these are metaphorical habitats (budget, strategic mobility) but by trading away variously the cross-terrain mobility, firepower, and protection of a tank, the FSV can operate where a tank cannot.  The Stryker MGS trades cross-terrain mobility and protection in order to make a vehicle that's highly strategically mobile while retaining a lot of the firepower of a tank.  The M113 FSV trades the armor, and some of the firepower of a tank in order to make something that can follow infantry into battle and flatten bunkers at close range that does not cost an arm and a leg.  And so forth.

Which goes back to the original point.  Building an FSV on a modern MBT hull doesn't make much sense because if you can get away with building an MBT scaled vehicle, your better bet is just to use the MBT, as all things considered the cost, strategic mobility, local mobility etc is all pretty much the same as a tank, in exchange for effects that will be doubtful sufficiently potent to justify the expense.  I mean 152 MM is a big gun regardless of it it's a NLOS friendly lower velocity weapon or a high velocity anti-tank thing, but in the strategic sense is it so lethal as to justify its existence?

And I'd contend no.  A 120 MM range round will still ruin a building in short order, maybe not as fast as a 152 MM but not so much slower as to be deficent.  Longer 125 MM rounds might just be okay enough at anti-tank.  If they weren't okay enough then they shouldn't be used at all because why make a brand new MBT that literally cannot complete against peer armor*?

 

[cool breeze]

All points very much appreciated.  Totally agree that a 152mm FSV on a tank chassis is not a particularly helpful thing.  But my money (like ten dollars or so )  is still on us seeing a surprisingly long-backed and tall turret fit onto the armata tank some time coming up.  To me the current turret looks small, like they might have a bigger one that can fit there too.  While it doesn't seem helpful as a FSV it does seem very helpful as a MBTfield trial, and also marginally helpful playing the roll firefly's played for the US.

 

And about the ammo, if it carried 20 rounds it could have 10 sabot and 10 HEAT.  10 152mm heat is a lot more HE firepower than is carried by the MGS....  not that you really want to compare a tanks HE firepower to MGS, but it's no wet noodle.  I'd take it in CM for sure even if it only had the 10 sabot and 10 HEAT.

P.S. oh and when I was talking about making the tank big enough to fit the 152mm gun, I very much meant to include the autoloader and such as part of that.   Of course this takes nothing away from the very correct points that there are big trade-offs in making that design criteria.  But I think that having the tank be somewhat bigger was deemed not too big of a drawback.

Edited February 24, 2016 by cool breeze
Whats an MTB? jk

[Battlefront.com]

Building an FSV on a modern MBT hull doesn't make much sense because if you can get away with building an MBT scaled vehicle, your better bet is just to use the MBT, as all things considered the cost, strategic mobility, local mobility etc is all pretty much the same as a tank, in exchange for effects that will be doubtful sufficiently potent to justify the expense.

This is the most important point to focus on.  Back in WW2 the Germans and the Soviets realized this. Their FSVs were all turretless vehicles based on existing tank chassis.  This made sense because they were in a mad race of mass production, therefore whatever negatives there were for reusing hulls that sometimes weren't up for the task was offset by the ability to crank out more today instead of something different next year when the war would likely already be decided.

After the war it became clear that the hull reuse concept wasn't the best way to go.  Which is why all nations, including Russia, dropped the idea of an FSV that is based on the same hull as a MBT.  It was the right thing to do so talk of returning to that mode of production is definitely a step backwards.

And I'd contend no.  A 120 MM range round will still ruin a building in short order, maybe not as fast as a 152 MM but not so much slower as to be deficent.

Yup.  Back in WW2 there were good reasons to make FSVs because the standard tank gun calibers didn't have a lot of room for HE.  The ISU-152 could do with one shot more effectively than a T-35/85 could do with probably 5 shots.  So if you need to bring something into a dense urban environment to clean out a floor in one shot, something like the 150mm Brummbär made a lot of sense.  But is the Brummbär so much better at taking out bunkers than a modern MBT?  I'd argue not.  It has similar mobility restrictions and likely doesn't offer a different offensive capability attacking non-armored targets, while at the same time having none of the pros that a MBT has when doing anything other than hardpoint reduction.

Steve

[panzersaurkrautwerfer]

All points very much appreciated.  Totally agree that a 152mm FSV on a tank chassis is not a particularly helpful thing.  But my money (like ten dollars or so )  is still on us seeing a surprisingly long-backed and tall turret fit onto the armata tank some time coming up.  To me the current turret looks small, like they might have a bigger one that can fit there too.  While it doesn't seem helpful as a FSV it does seem very helpful as a MBTfield trial, and also marginally helpful playing the roll firefly's played for the US.

 

And about the ammo, if it carried 20 rounds it could have 10 sabot and 10 HEAT.  10 152mm heat is a lot more HE firepower than is carried by the MGS....  not that you really want to compare a tanks HE firepower to MGS, but it's no wet noodle.  I'd take it in CM for sure even if it only had the 10 sabot and 10 HEAT.

Few more points:

1. It is a small turret, but that's because outside of optics and accessories, the only thing in it is the gun and breach assembly.  The rest of everything the turret needs has been crammed into the hull.  Which gets into the putting a bigger gun either means:

  a. Somehow cramming more into a space that's already full up with less
  b. Building a massive external turret (as it'll have to hold the ammo and autoloader) that doesn't exceed the limitations of the existing turret ring.

Both of these are technically possible given enough money and time, but the question will remain does it make economical sense to build a really bad 152 MM tank, or does it make more sense to design a tank from the tracks up to work with the gun you need to accomplish tank type missions?

2. The US "never*" used Fireflies.  The later 76 MM armed Shermans were simply the recognition the 75 MM was not up to snuff against armor and something bigger was needed.  The end state was never "76 MM augments continued use of 75 MM tanks" it was "we use the 75 MM models until they're all broken then replace them with 76 MMs as they become available."

You can see this occurring with late arriving US Armor divisions that simply did not have any 75 MM gun Shermans, and were all 76 MM model equipped.  The transition is also noteworthy because none of the later model guns the Sherman would mount were available or even conceived of when the tank was produced, which is rather unlike the 152 MM which "exists" as an option now.  The Sherman was armed with a gun that was totally adequate for armored combat circa 1942-early 1944, and when the gun got long in the tooth there were plans to out and out replace it entirely**.

 

This is the most important point to focus on.  Back in WW2 the Germans and the Soviets realized this. Their FSVs were all turretless vehicles based on existing tank chassis.  This made sense because they were in a mad race of mass production, therefore whatever negatives there were for reusing hulls that sometimes weren't up for the task was offset by the ability to crank out more today instead of something different next year when the war would likely already be decided.

After the war it became clear that the hull reuse concept wasn't the best way to go.  Which is why all nations, including Russia, dropped the idea of an FSV that is based on the same hull as a MBT.  It was the right thing to do so talk of returning to that mode of production is definitely a step backwards.

Yup.  Back in WW2 there were good reasons to make FSVs because the standard tank gun calibers didn't have a lot of room for HE.  The ISU-152 could do with one shot more effectively than a T-35/85 could do with probably 5 shots.  So if you need to bring something into a dense urban environment to clean out a floor in one shot, something like the 150mm Brummbär made a lot of sense.  But is the Brummbär so much better at taking out bunkers than a modern MBT?  I'd argue not.  It has similar mobility restrictions and likely doesn't offer a different offensive capability attacking non-armored targets, while at the same time having none of the pros that a MBT has when doing anything other than hardpoint reduction.

Steve

Yep.  In terms of industrial planning it makes sense to find "something" for all those factories geared to pump out Panzer IIIs to do.  It does not make sense however to gear up to build an entirely obsolete tank right out of the gate that cannot be made "modern" without significant changes.  Which again is what the Armata appears to be on path for if we believe press releases.

I wonder if that's just the plan.  The Armata will never actually be fielded, it'll just constantly be going back to the drawing board to become the ultimate tank, with a newer model slapped together for each victory parade until infinity.  Armata 2076 will hover and include an APS that protects the crew from excessive homosexual radiation!  IT WILL BE BEAUTIFUL.

*Some US Fireflies were completed before the end of the war, but they were completed much too late and there's no record of them leaving the depot, although there's sufficient ambiguity to their fate that some might have been issued or even made it to the frontline in time to be turned in at the end of the war.  No one really cared to document it very well because hey global war is ending and we don't really care what happens to these oddball tanks because they're just as scrap metal as the rest of them.

**There was resistance to this simply because the 75 MM was a much better gun for anti-infantry work which is most of the Sherman's missions, and the early run 76 MM had some pretty big faults.  However again looking at production once the 76 MM was adopted it became "the" Sherman variant used rather than both being operated side by side until the end of time.
 

[cool breeze]

Few more points:
1. It is a small turret, but that's because outside of optics and accessories, the only thing in it is the gun and breach assembly.  The rest of everything the turret needs has been crammed into the hull.  Which gets into the putting a bigger gun either means:

  a. Somehow cramming more into a space that's already full up with less
  b. Building a massive external turret (as it'll have to hold the ammo and autoloader) that doesn't exceed the limitations of the existing turret ring.

Both of these are technically possible given enough money and time, but the question will remain does it make economical sense to build a really bad 152 MM tank, or does it make more sense to design a tank from the tracks up to work with the gun you need to accomplish tank type missions?

2. The US "never*" used Fireflies.  The later 76 MM armed Shermans were simply the recognition the 75 MM was not up to snuff against armor and something bigger was needed.  The end state was never "76 MM augments continued use of 75 MM tanks" it was "we use the 75 MM models until they're all broken then replace them with 76 MMs as they become available."

 

Oh no I knew something felt off when I wrote fireflies, thanks for to reminder.  I was really meaning and thinking about the 76mm Shermans although I guess the Brits with the fireflies were a good example too.  But wrong names aside it still seems like a good analogy to what I'm talking about.  The Sherman 75mm was released in mass  because they knew the gun was reliable, but it was built big enough to handle the experimental super gun too in case it was needed (even though it sacrificed ammo and especially HE) , and they started sending the 76mm model along with the 75mm ASAP.  Yet it' kind of old fashioned and WW2 style to plan on the first batch just getting destroyed and replaced, much more modern to plan on an upgrade.

Edited February 24, 2016 by cool breeze

[panzersaurkrautwerfer]

You foolish fool!  As a huge Sherman nerd I now have something else to ramble about.

The US 76 MMs used and entirely different turret that was originally built for an abandoned Sherman replacement that was going to use an early model 76 MM gun.  It had been designed however with the exact same size as the Sherman's turret ring for industrial/parts reasons, so when it came time to equip the Shermans with bigger guns, through sheer happenstance there already was the engineering solution sitting on a shelf.  The base model turret could not accommodate the larger gun without significant modifications and the installation of a counter-weight to keep the turret traversing evenly on the turret ring.   As such virtually all US 76 MM armed Shermans used the "T23" turret (so named after the abandoned prototype it was originally installed on) rather than the original model.

The Firefly required welding a massive counterweight to the turret, rotating the gun itself onto its side so the breach was accessible (as the Sherman turret was too small to operate the breach from the rear and top, the loader had to come in from the side), cutting a hatch into the turret because the loader could no longer get around the gun (as opposed to the strictly ease of escape reasons the US added loader's hatches), dropping a crewman to make room for the new ammo, etc etc.

Then with both of these, the Sherman moved from "bad ground pressure for it's weight class" to "terrible ground pressure for its weight class" which required track extenders, and eventually an entirely new suspension system.  It's worth noting there's almost no parts commonality between the M4/M4A1 series and the later model M4A3E8 that represented the 76 MM armed version with all if it's kinks worked out.

And that's just for a gun, not including an autoloader and such.  

[Kinophile]

Oh God,  cool breeze,  what have done,  man,  WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!!?? 

He's free, loose out of his appropriate forum! THE HUMANITY, OH THE HUMANITY. 

Your new nick is Pandora.  Or butter fingers. Something appropriate. 

You're always a fount of fascinating detail,  Panzer, and very often hilarious....  but Let's at least stay with the current decade...

[gnarly]

Great info Panzer! Maybe I should frequent your WW2 CM2 forum postings more..  ;D

[sburke]

Great info Panzer! Maybe I should frequent your WW2 CM2 forum postings more..  ;D

why?  Wait long enough and he'll find an opportunity right here.    kidding aside panzeralphabetsoupname it is really good info and helps make the point quite succinctly.  And thanks for feeding him the lead in cool breeze...you two didn't conspire to turn the thread in that direction by any chance did ya?

[panzersaurkrautwerfer]

I am the harbinger of Sherman.  I will post on the M4 until I have reached Atlanta, and then I will burn it for His power runs through me and metes out retribution.

Joking aside, the Sherman is just a really good example of how hard a "simple" upgrade in armament is.  If you look at most new tank designs, they nearly inevitably have their roots in the moment in which someone has finally built a bigger gun that absolutely must now go on a tank.  And rarely does this go easily.

For that matter the one up-gunning I know of that wasn't too crazy was the M48 models that recieved 105 MMs, but I would believe that has a lot to do with the guns being fairly similar in proportions, and the M48 being designed around being crewed by wookies so the turret had some room.  Even the Abrams that was designed to receive a 120 MM still required an interim model (the M1IP) because the 120 MM gun (which was an existing weapons system mind you, nothing prototype about it) just couldn't be made ready fast enough to keep up with other pressing needs.

When you talk about tank upgrades, I'm hard pressed to think of one that's less challenging than the weapons system.  And given that it makes it doubtful the Russians would stride into the Armata literally planning on adding a gun that historically has been beyond reasonable engineering capabilities to install.  

[Battlefront.com]

I wonder if that's just the plan.  The Armata will never actually be fielded, it'll just constantly be going back to the drawing board to become the ultimate tank, with a newer model slapped together for each victory parade until infinity. 

It is possible.  However, I do think that Armata is intended to be fielded, though without many of the touted features and at a much slower rate over a longer period of tome than announced.  Note I said "intended".  I think the economic crisis Russia is facing now has left all of this in doubt because the Kremlin doesn't want to compromise on anything despite major revenue declines.  Something will have to be sacrificed for the next 5 years and I doubt it will be short term capabilities.

This, of course, gets us back to my initial objections to Armata waaaaay back at the start of this thread.  Even if Armata were production ready in 2 years I see it as a waste of Russia's resources.  Practically speaking it buys them nothing more than what the T-90 already provides.  And it will be that way well into the future because it will always be behind NATO and always ahead of a non-NATO supported country with the exception of China.  If it goes to war with NATO it will lose no matter what.  If it goes to war against China it will lose no matter what.  So why develop a tank that can't change that equation and yet doesn't squash an annoying former Soviet Republic any better than what it currently has?

Steve