- Yes
- No
- Benelux
- France
- USA
- Other / Don’t know
- I said no
The M41 LCTS 90 is a heavy Belgian modification of the M41 Walker Bulldog with a Cockerill LCTS 90 turret.
The M41 hull was chosen for demonstration purposes, to show that the turret could be fitted to a wide variety of hulls, especially those of widely-used but now obsolete tanks.
This way, armies with a smaller budget could still equip themselves with a cheap but potent anti-tank capability.
Unfortunately, this turret didn’t recieve much attention at all, but its successor, the LCTS 90MP proved to be much more popular, even being used by the US Army!
Only 1 M41 was modified with the turret.
The LCTS 90 turret housed two crew members, a commander and a gunner which also had to load the 90 mm gun. 12 rounds could fit in the turret, and more (around 30) could be stored in the hull.
It couldn’t offer much protection for the crew, only being immune to small-arms fire, however additional armor layers could be bolted on, but would only provide protection from 12.7 or 14.5 mm machine guns.
The gun could fire APFSDS and HESH among others, and all of those are made in Belgium by MECAR.
While the turret is completely different and a lot more powerful, no changes have been made to the hull, it retains the same powerpack and the same top speed.
The M41 LCTS 90:
Now that we know more about what exactly we’re dealing with, let’s move on to the specifications:
Armament:
90 mm Cockerill Mk. 7 cannon (ammo: ~40-45)
- M690A1 APFSDS: >300 mm RHA at 2 km (similar to DM23)
- M691A2 HESH: similar to DM502
Reloading rate: ~7 s
2 x 7.62 mm machine guns (probably FN MAG) (ammo: 750, 250 for roof-mounted and 500 for coaxial)
Turret rotation speed: 30°/s
Vertical guidance: -9 / 20°
8 x smoke grenade launcher (ammo: 16)
Stabiliser: maybe
Laser rangefinder: yes
Thermal sights: yes
Armor:
M41 armor on the hull, turret protected from small arms fire and more armor could be bolted on.
Mobility:
Continental 6 cylinder engine (500 hp)
Max. speed: 72 km/h
Power to weight ratio: 21.2 hp per ton
Crew:
3 (Driver, Commander, Gunner-Loader)
Dimensions:
Mass: 23 t
Length: 5.81 m
Width: 3.19 m
Height: 2.72 m
With access to APFSDS, a stabiliser (probably), thermal sights and a laser rangefinder, this would not play like a normal M41 at all!
It’s closer to the Chinese M41D, only with a way better cannon than the 76 mm, weak for 8.0 standards. The M690A1 shell should penetrate around 340 mm of armor at 0° and 0 m, while the HESH shell about 100 mm. It still has good mobility, but the armor, already weak for 6.0, can be considered almost worthless at the BR where this tank is going to find itself in
This little tank could go to a BeNeLux tech tree if it sees the light of day, however if it isn’t the case, it could be a US premium/event since the M41 is obviously american or be added to France, since they are close to Belgium culturally and geopolitically.
Sources
http://www.mecar.be/content.php?langue=english&cle_menus=1156856615
Army Guide for info on LCTS 90 turret
