Re: (ARMOR) Modern Tank Question...

The gas turbine engine in the Abrams is a true multifuel design, and
can run on most anything, including diesel, though it has more pep with
hotter fuel mixes. The other NATO countries favored the low fuel
consumption and low risk of fire associated with traditional diesel
engines in the 1200 horsepower range, while the US favored the high
speed and acceleration offered by the 1500 hp turbine. Compared to a
diesel, the turbine is also much quieter, so tank columns don't
announce their coming quite so early.
In service, very few Abrams have ever been penetrated, so the fire
risk of jet fuel has rarely been an issue, and the fire supression
systems are pretty effective, allowing the crew time to get out if a
fire cannot be extinguished. The downside of turbines is that they are
very sensitive to particulate contamination. Dust is very unkind to
them if it gets past the filters, and their reliability suffers
accordingly. After the first Gulf War, the British press was full of
articles snubbing the Abrams' supposed lack of reliability, though much
of this was political spin. Their own Challenger 1 Mk 3 was a
compromise design that jammed a highly advanced fire control system
into a turret that just wasn't designed for it. British tankers had
suffered much embarrassment at NATO firing competitions over the years,
so they saw the Gulf War as something of a vindication (the UK finally
bit the bullet and introduced a redesigned turret in the Challenger 2).

Ultimately, both the US and British tanks have done what they were
designed to do when they confronted Russian bloc tanks in the two Gulf
wars. In more limited service in the Balkans, the German Leopard 2 has
also performed admirably, so there doesn't seem to be much point in
belaboring the decision over powerplants.

Gerald Owens

Francis X. Kranick, Jr. wrote:
> I've been wondering...
>
> The Abrams designers came under a lot of heat for using a gas turbine
> for propulsion but most modern-designed, latest-generation tanks
> (Abrams, Challenger, LeClerc, Leopard II and the Russian and Chinese
> offerings) bear a resemblance to each other. They share the angular
> armor, the lower, more angular forward hull and the raised rear hull
> around the engine compartment and in most cases, side skirts.
> What are these other tanks using for engines? It would appear some
> similarities are carrying through and I wondered about propulsion as well...
> There was a website I came across some time ago whose author posed
> facts and figues on why diesels should have been used but the folks
> 'inside the Beltway' conspired to use the gas turbine. It would seem
> that the turbine has vindicated itself and JP-4/5 is more plentiful than
> any fuel in the US Armed Forces...
>
>
> Frank Kranick

.

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