The Chinese government refers to the Type 15 light tank as a light tank.
It is not entirely different from TAM or CV90105, it’s the same exact weight class and similar underlying hull armor arrangement though CV90105 has the weakest turret of the 3 in part cause it weighs 5 tons less.
TAM “replaced” Leopard 1s and M60s as well.
I suspect that the 36 ton version is the armor protection being claimed, cause 3 tons is equal to how much composite armor the TAM-2IP has attached to it vs base steel of the base model, and protects against 100mm APCBC frontally and light auto-cannons on the side.
I’m all for an 11.0 - 11.3 36 ton VT5 with composite add-on armor, but that should go in the tech tree.
I think the 10.7 squadron one can be the base model, and so far people have tried to say things that pages themselves don’t say to me when I can plug the image of pages into 6+ translators and they’ll all spit out statements that ultimately say the same things.
Also only the front lower plate can be penned by autocannon fire in-game, not the rest of the front.
You can’t beat physics of rolled steel density.
Tracks + base armor alone is an estimated over 15,000kg for the hull alone. That’s not counting the 1600kg of fuel, 760kg of main gun ammo, equipment to fill the hull, wiring and other lines…
Devs assumpt it would be OK to put power system to a 5mm armour box, get hit and cault fire, Devs assumpt it would be OK to have a MBT pen by a 7.62mm rifle, can’t even stop infantry from side and from back, Devs assumpt it would be OK to make a crap Chinese vechicle, make Chinese player to pay for it and call it a day.
And face the problem that Chinese player always facing the biased opinion like that.
VT-5 is a brand new vechicle and we had a hard time to prove it, just as we had hard time to prove ZTZ-99A or VT-4 is not as bad as the performace in game.
Welcome to American waste in prototyping, the SPAA weighs like 15+ tons more as well.
But yeah, VT5 we’re getting is in its base 33 ton package, most equal to TAM but the VT5 has a bit more turret armor, which partially makes up for why VT5 weighs 3 tons more.
I expect the 36 ton VT5 with add-on armor to be tech tree, the opposite situation of TAM-2IP.
Made of steel, which has a known density. The hull of VT5 weighs an estimated 19 - 22 tons with its in-game levels of protection.
Which is in-line with the turret weighing ~11 - ~13 tons, especially since the turret is more well armored than the TAM’s turret and the TAM’s turret weighs 10.5 tons.
You’re more than welcome to go look for sources of VT5 turret weight, and I’m going to say it’s rather close to my estimate.
Players only need to collect information to correct Gaijin’s erroneous data. But for Gaijin, arbitrarily fabricating data based on mere imagination is inherently far more difficult.Gaijin has never taken the data provided by players seriously and has always relied on imagination to develop the game. In reality, even when Gaijin acknowledges player-submitted data, they refuse to make changes. For example, documentation regarding the 99A’s spall liner was submitted to Gaijin over a year ago, and they still haven’t addressed it to this day. If they genuinely valued player-provided data, their efficiency as a major gaming company would be unacceptably slow.
ZTZ59 is also a significantly smaller and cramped vehicle.
And ceramic composite would be on the add-on armor for the 36 ton variant.
Either way, people will realize that the 15mm of steel on the VT5 is closer to correct in time, and that the add-on armor for the 36 ton version would give it some side protection.
Whether this is the exact kit or not, looks like it’ll protect from auto-cannon rounds to me.
Edit: Adding this portion since it’s just repeating what I’ve already said.
The LFP’s steel thickness is incorrect as of last dev.
What you showed on picture, the turrent is never in mass product, this is just in show case back in 2022 and obsolete, they kept the current one for any config.
And side addon armour changed dramatically compare to this show case vechicle.
I hope now you can see, devs don’t even know what is the current status of VT-5.
Since there are no specific parameters available, we can only make rough estimates.
The density of armored steel is given as 7.87 g/cm³.
Hull: The internal clear height is 810 mm. Excluding the structural elements on both sides, the estimated weight of the hull is 3.9 tons. Adding the weight of the 5 mm armor on both sides, the total weight is approximately 4.5 to 5 tons. However, the hull weight should not exceed 8 tons.
Gun: Taking the 105L7A1 as an example, which weighs 1.282 tons, the Chinese 105 mm gun is estimated to weigh around 1.7 tons.
Turret: Using the 90-type autoloader as a reference, which weighs 1.5 tons, the VT5 autoloader is estimated to weigh around 1 ton. The estimated weight of the turret is around 5 tons.
Road wheels and idler wheels: Assuming each weighs 100 kg, the total weight would be around 1.6 tons. Adding the tracks, suspension, and other miscellaneous components, the total weight is estimated to be between 2.5 to 3 tons.
Engine and transmission system: Estimated to weigh between 3 to 4 tons.
Total estimated weight: 18.7 tons.
This seems completely unreasonable.
If this were the actual VT5, the development team should all be sent to jail.
This translation is provided by DeepSeek. If there are any unreasonable parts, please bear with us.
VT5 and Type 15 are not the same vehicle, the two projects are independent, and it does not mean that VT5 is the export model of Type 15. Although the VT5 was labeled as 15E when it first appeared at the Zhuhai Air Show, it is just a means to attract customers, because when the customers know that the wide tank has orders from their own military, they will be more assured to buy it. The VT4 (MBT3000) was also called the 99E when it first appeared at the Air show, but the VT5 is no longer called the 15E. The VT5 was originally positioned as a lightweight MBT (although not much different from the light tank), its design indicators were to be able to face off against earlier tanks such as the T54/T55, and if some third-generation MBT were encountered, its firepower should be able to support and penetrate the front of enemy tanks. So the frontal protection indicator is to be able to withstand 100mm tank guns, and if you choose to increase the price, you can get better armor (Bangladesh bought no explosive reactive armor). Although Bangladesh purchased a low-fit version, but the merchant generally will not be reduced on the base armor, but the low-fit version will not be equipped with additional composite armor. The Type 15 is a serious light tank, because China already has the 99A and 96A tanks, so the Type 15 is mainly used in parts of the region where the infrastructure is not good and the main battle tank is difficult to pass. The Type 15 tank follows a design philosophy that is more of a high-low match, as China already has a large number of 99As. The VT5’s main customers are facing some countries with weak armor and weak military strength in the surrounding countries, buying the Leopard 2 is very wasteful and economically unaffordable for them, they need a device that can withstand the attack of the first generation of tanks, and the firepower can threaten the third generation of main battle tanks.
Secondly, I think you misinterpreted what I meant by the new design of the VT5 tank, which is much more protective than the CV90. It is true that the VT5 and Type 15 look similar to the CV90 in weight and positioning, but the CV90 is modified from the chassis of the infantry fighting vehicle, and it is not much consideration of the armor at the beginning of the design, the designer can not pile the armor of the CV90 to the level of Merkava. CV90 chassis at the beginning of the design may be part of the weight for the rear of the body of the infantry compartment space, as well as some infantry fighting vehicles related facilities, while the VT5 does not need to consider these, he needs to consider only armor, firepower, engine, and the space required by the three-member team. The VT5 is able to use all the space and weight saved in the armor stack. And after so many years, the technology of tank composite armor has been greatly developed, and the VT5 must be able to use better composite armor than the CV90.
More critically, unlike previous practices where Gaijin implemented vehicle nerfs in ambiguous areas - such as reload speeds, spall liners, and subsystem performance - Their latest modifications to the VT5 tank constitute a flagrant violation of fundamental physics principles.
This 30+ metric ton tank now demonstrates inferior protective capabilities compared to other tank weighing under 20 tons.
While developers might argue that mass doesn’t directly correlate with armor effectiveness, such claims ring hollow and demonstrate institutional bad faith.
Previous balancing adjustments represented a silent fight between the development team and the players. This latest action, however, constitutes an overt attack - punch the player’s face while taunting “What recourse do you have now?”
@HIDwhite-live
There is no tank in War Thunder or reality that weighs 20 tons at the same size, engine power, and gun as VT5 with the same protection.
2S25 has less than 25% the protection of VT5 and weighs 55% of a VT5.
VT5 only adds 83% mass for ~400% protection.
CV90105: 76% the mass of VT5, its turret is 8% the protection of VT5’s turret.
TAM-2 weighs 30.5 tons, this tank has the same protection on the hull, and 60% protection on turret.
92.4% the mass of VT5, with 60% the protection of turret to VT5.
The VT-5 tank has issues with its armor protection. It is missing a critical armor plate on its front, which is essential for the lower hull to withstand 30mm cannon fire. Additionally, the sides of the VT-5 should be capable of resisting 12.7mm machine gun fire even without additional armor modules.At last,the attitude of the bug reporter whose name is TrickZZter is very bad.He denied many issues about VT-5 and VT-4 without any reasons.
