BIG BOYS GUNS

[Gil Boyd]

As an ex Paratrooper we spent thousands of hours recognising tanks from every nation and learning every aspect of them, especially the Soviet ones obviously.
227 tanks remain out of the original 376. The British Army require the conversions to be finished by 2025. It is assumed that Challenger 2 will remain in service until 2035. However it will be a big task for BAE or it's competitor Rheinmetall Defence.

The tank shape seems to being going back to WW2 with more and more reliance on Chafe to deter missile strikes from the air, or have I a skewed view of tanks.
Being half German half Irish, I have always rated the LEOPARD German tank as one of the best, what does your country have U.S and Canada that compares on upgrades?

Below images left to right: CHALLENGER 2 - LEOPARD - M1 ABRAMS

Information

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[Peter Laidler]

The problem is that, as I see it, tanks are a status symbol of the past. If you thought that MILAN spelled the end of the road for tanks, then JAVELIN certainly has put paid to them. Look at it this way....... An old chieftain, towed out on the ranges as a hard target would last a couple of months on a range until it was destroyed to a semi recognisable mass of steel. The same tanks used as hard targets against the Javelin last for weeks.

When they were live firing Javelin against the targets you might see the missile turn over and look down as it searched out the target you aimed at. In that millisecond it took to hook on, a synthesized voice in the missile radioed back to the control point '........it's not their lucky day'. Valhalla was about to come..........

[Gil Boyd]

Very true Peter, but what's all this I heard from a serving Tank Regiment RSM at the Airborne Soldier unveiling on Saturday at Aldershot, that MOD have bought the Isreali Chaffe launchers fitted to the outside of the Challenger 2 upgrade.

Is everybody doing that, surely its only useful against Air attack not Javelin type weapons, and presumably only useful just before the missile strikes anyway, and how would a tank crew know they were on the radar so to speak??
Must be some experienced ex tankies on here!!

JAVELIN VIDEO MOD

[Sunray]

Canada wouldn't have any tanks if the rat offspring of unmarried parents Liberals got their way. The CPC isn't any better either.
Our Leopards are Leopard 1's bought in the 1970's and we have no way of moving them anywhere anyway. (At one time our NATO tasking was to reinforce Norway. We couldn't get there with any heavy kit. Trudeau the Elder used it as his excuse to pull us out of Europe.)
When our guys went to Afghanistan in 2007, we had to rent some Leopard A6M's because our's were out if date and we have no way of transporting pretty much anything bigger than a case of beer.
Rumour has it The CF bought some used Leopard 2's from the Dutch. Lt.-Gen. Hillier, the former Chief of the Defence Staff, thought he could replace a tank with an LAV Dinky Toy. Idiot.
"...An old Chieftain..." The old Chieftain in question was a W. W. II designed tank with W.W. II vintage armour. The Challenger 2, upgraded or not, is a typical Brit PBI tank design. Very slow in comparison to other tanks. 40 km/h (25 mph) off road vs the Leopard 1's 65 KPH. Still has a Point blank range of 1,000 meters though. See the Javelin/Milan crew. Kill the Javelin/Milan crew. From away over there.

[stencollector]

Our Leopards are Leopard 1's bought in the 1970's and we have no way of moving them anywhere anyway. (At one time our NATO tasking was to reinforce Norway. We couldn't get there with any heavy kit. Trudeau the Elder used it as his excuse to pull us out of Europe.)
When our guys went to Afghanistan in 2007, we had to rent some Leopard A6M's because our's were out if date and we have no way of transporting pretty much anything bigger than a case of beer.
Rumour has it The CF bought some used Leopard 2's from the Dutch. Lt.-Gen. Hillier, the former Chief of the Defence Staff, thought he could replace a tank with an LAV Dinky Toy. Idiot.

A little convoluted there Sunray. Yes, tanks were about to leave the CF inventory back around 2006. At that time, Crown Assets was selling good running Leo hulls (turret and gun removed) for between $11,500 and $16,000. They were referred to by the then CDS as relics of the cold war. But Afghanistan really started to turn sour, and a quick decision was made to send in the tanks. At that time, there was a large excersize scheduled for here in Shilo, and pretty much all the units participating were already here, including the armoured. The ex was cancelled just two days before it was to begin....my guess was that the armour was going to Afghanistan and sure enough, within a month the LDSH was there. Our C1s were past their prime, so tanks were leased while another fleet of newer ones were run through Germany to be upgraded and things like air conditioning added. I made it over as contractor in time for the changeover, and was there when we shipped the rentals, along with the dutch tank transporters back to Europe in whatever condition they ended up in. Those C2s now remain as Canada's main battle tank. Any C1s have been relegated to monument, target, or just plain scrapped.

Previous to the Afghanistan use, the only other operational use I saw of the leos were as a show of force when we were peacekeeping in Kosovo.I believe a whopping 2 of them were there as part of our contingent. I was in Bosnia around 2000 and suddenly heard the unmistakeable rumble of a Leo as it passed our position heading back to the North. Aside from that, of course the Leos were part of the cold war in Germany.

The Leos are here to stay for the time being. Their opportunity to serve may be limited to use against the insurgent type militaries like the Taliban or the Kosovo mafia, but in that role they still have a place taking the heat off the infantry and providing good fire power against fortified defenses.

[Peter Laidler]

Mmmmmm....., Re your last para, I'm not quite sure that you are on the same page as me regarding our tanks Sunray. I'm sure that they both use the same main L7 Ordnance

[Brian Dick]

What about the M1A2 Abrams? How does it compare? I was never a tread head so I'm admittedly ignorant about the performance. I did work as a contractor for GDLS who build them in Lima, Ohio but never heard much about the goings on in that world they're so diverse. I do remember something that was mentioned a lot when I was in the Airborne Infantry, "When you're in a tank, EVERYONE knows where you're at!" When I was in a line platoon, I was also qualified on the old Dragon wire guided AT missile and was quite proficient with it but knew sure as God made little green apples that if i missed, my arse was going to be toast in a real world scenario which fortunately never came to pass.

[Gil Boyd]

Would love to know from somebody what this Chaffe idea is all about?? I could understand a little if they used jamming technology, but Chaffe!!!

This is interesting, not sure what happened to the LEOPARD on this list, The ABRAMS is apparently more maouverable than the CHALLENGER and can fire more accurate rounds!!:

Currently top 10 best tanks in the world are these:

M1A2 SEP (USA) ...
Challenger 2 (United Kingdom) ...
Armata (Russia) ...
Merkava Mk.4 (Israel) ...
Type 90 (Japan) ...
Leclerc (France) ...
Oplot-M (Ukraine) ...
T-90 (Russia) The T-90 is currently the only tank produced in quantity in Russia.

Here's the Israeli Chafe system fitted to CHALLENGER 2 now called the "BLACK KNIGHT" on the rear of the turret where the smoke used to be

[Flying10uk]

Would love to know from somebody what this Chaffe idea is all about?? I could understand a little if they used jamming technology, but Chaffe!!!

Surely "Chaff" is a form of "Jamming Technology" for radar? It may be old technology but if it still works why not use it if there is nothing better available?

[Bob Womack]

Surely "Chaff" is a form of "Jamming Technology" for radar? It may be old technology but if it still works why not use it if there is nothing better available?

Hey! Didn't you guess from the Islands used to call that "window?"


Bob