The new Bundeswehr tank should have a combat weight of no more than 50 tons: this figure was announced by the inspector of the German army, Lieutenant General Alphonse Mays, and this can actually be a serious problem for the designers of the main battle tank, as Defense24 reports.
For comparison, the mass of the Leopard 2A7 tank is 64.5 tons (Leopard 2A7+ is more than 70 tons), the American M1A2SEP v.3 Abrams is 66.8 tons, and the British Challenger 2 is 62.5 tons. The Germans want their tank to "lose weight" by 15-20 tons, and under such conditions the vehicle armor must undergo radical changes.
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With such difficult requirements for a tank to reduce the and preserve the ability to resist modern threats the German Rheinmetall Protection Systems is currently developing a new concept of the "hybrid armor", which will be a combination of composite armor and active protection system built into it.
This system was named StrikeShield and it is built on the basis of the ADS (Active Defense System). Its principle of operation is as follows: the sensors of the system detect an enemy projectile flying towards the tank and select the module that will neutralize it, while the task of the composite armor in this case is to "detain" the fragments of the destroyed ammunition. At the same time, modules are replaceable.
Such a solution should help reduce the armor of the tank, but so far a number of questions remains. Thus, the number of modules that can intercept enemy projectiles is limited. So, in combination with thinner composite armor, it can create situations with lack of adequate protection of the vehicle.
After all, speaking of active defense systems, the issue of interception of APFSDS armor-piercing projectiles is currently relevant, although work in this direction has been carrying out for years, the effectiveness of such systems against them is currently only satisfactory.
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