There are reports in russia about the production acceleration of infantry fighting vehicles at the Kurganmashzavod and announced that in the first quarter of 2023 they produced more BMP-3 than in the whole of 2019. But there is one catch.
In 2018-2019, the plant fulfilled orders for the production of 200 units, of which 106 were to be delivered in 2019. Also, in 2019-2020, the it was supposed to carry out major repairs of 97 BMP-3 within the scope of the contract for 6 billion rubles with the obligation to hand over 60 units by October 2019.
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Thus, if the statements are to be believed, the enterprise produced up to 106 new and overhauled 60 BMP-3’s in the first quarter of 2023. At the same time this does not mean that the annual output will be equal to 424 new BMP-3 and less than 200 repaired ones, as this all depends on the production cycles. But in any case, the pace of delivery is quite strong.
There are also extracts from contract No. 1921187312042412241006930 dated April 29, 2019 regarding the order of russia’s Ministry of Defense from "Kurganmashzavod" for 168 units of BMP-3 with delivery in 2020-2021.
In particular, it was planned to hand over only 53 units in 2020, and 115 in the following year. That is, there is a certain distribution of technological cycles within the limits of two-year contracts. And although data on subsequent contracts were not published due to the introduction of complete secrecy of arms purchases, most likely the contract for 2022-2023 was planned to be similar: fewer vehicles in the first year and more in the second.
Even more interesting may be a clarification from russian publication Novosti VPK, which noted that the BMP-3 will be produced with additional dynamic protection in the future. Also last year, russians published footage of the BMP-3 with additional elements welded onto the turret spaced armor.
Apparetntly, they serve precisely to place ERA containers. At the same time, it would be done according to some new project, which is different from the previous ones. In particular, the works under the name OKR Karkas-2, which were carried out in the 2010s, were known. One of the options provided for the installation of dynamic protection 4S24 specially designed taking into account the armor of light vehicles:
Other projects did not provide for the installation of dynamic protection on the turret, being limited only to the sides. And in 2018, a set of additional armor from sides and grilles without any ERA protection was demonstrated. In the end, with certain modifications, it got into the army, and the destroyed BMP-3's with such kits have already been seen.
And in general, all these efforts with extra armor are explained very simply: despite the declaration that the BMP-3 holds a 30-mm automatic cannon, the reality is different.
At the same time, even the BMP-3 with such protection demonstrated such effectiveness that russia’s Ministry of Defense tried to abandon the order of this vehicle and renew the production of the BMP-2. But "Kurganmashzavod" started the production of the BMP-3, promising to strengthen its armor and announced the production of the 2S25 Sprut.
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