- Yes
- No
- Israel
- USA
- Other
- I said no
M41 Repotenciado
History:
The first M41 Walker Bulldogs arrived in Chile in 1964 in the A1 variant and being a total of 10, through the PAM (Military Aid Pact), these new tanks came to complement the already old M24 Chaffee and M4A1E9 Sherman received years ago so it meant a technological and quality leap for the Chilean crews. Later, in 1970, new units of this tank were received, being a total of 40 units between A1 and A3 versions, deploying throughout Chile, so they served in climates as different as desert and snow.
During the 70s Chile was very close to coming into conflict with its neighboring countries Peru and Argentina, especially Peru posed a great threat since it had the Soviet T-55 in large quantities, at that time Chile only had the old and obsolete M24 Chaffee and M4A1E9 Sherman being its most capable tank the M41 Walker Bulldog, for this reason Chile sought to buy new armored vehicles in the international market but due to the blockade imposed by the United States this was almost impossible, so in 1983 Chile turned to Israel which was willing to sell a large amount of weapons including M-50 and M-51 Super Sherman tanks which reduced the large gap that existed in armored material between Chile and its neighbors, Israeli IMI HVMS 60 mm guns were also acquired and were later installed on the M-50 and M24 Chaffee in Chile.
This new rapprochement between Chile and Israel made it possible to carry out more joint projects, so in 1984 the Israeli company Nimda was hired to re-engine the M-50, M-51 and M41 Walker Bulldog tanks of Chile, the engine chosen was the Detroit Diesel 8V-71T that was installed in the aforementioned tanks.
The decision to replace the engines of these 3 tanks was made because the previous engines had already been used for many years and were very worn so their performance was already very poor, another possible reason is that in this way the engines were standardized so the logistics were much simpler. Due to the change of the tank engine the performance was much better than with the original ones.
The engine change required some modifications to the engine compartment area at the rear of the tank so aesthetically the tank looked different compared to a standard M41, by identifying these small differences we can know which tanks were modified. The most noticeable change was in the area of the M41’s engine exhaust outlets, the new modification added visible air filters and eliminated the 2 normal exhaust outlets leaving only 1 engine exhaust outlet on the left side.
Nimda’s modification also included a new electrical system and a new panel for the tank driver that simplified the way to see the different data regarding the engine, the new driver panel came in Spanish which is the language spoken in Chile.
The second part of the modernization which is the most important and the most unknown by everyone (since it is not mentioned in any book or page) is presumed to have been carried out by Elbit Systems and El-Op of Israel since analyzing various photos of the interior of a Chilean M41 Repotenciado (Repowered) in a tank museum you can observe many interesting things, the first of them and the one that attracts the most attention is in the area of the tank gunner, in the photos that I am going to share you can see a laser rangefinder and a joystick for the gunner as well as a Ballistic Computer Unit and various other systems that make up the new FCS.
Analyzing all the photos I have shared we can see that there were several improvements that the M41 Repotenciado (Repowered) from Chile received, reading various books on Israeli fire control systems and comparing some of the photographs that appeared in those books (in addition to the help of people from Israel) I came to the conclusion that the system implemented in the Chilean tanks was the LAN-SADOT of Elbit and EL-OP since that system could be installed in the M41 Walker Bulldog and the images of the systems are identical to those of the photos of the Chilean M41.
On some occasions some of these M41 Repotenciado (Repowered) from Chile could be seen carrying 4 smoke launchers in the tank turret although this was not a standard for all tanks, it is unknown why only in some tanks it was decided to install this important modification.
These tanks were finally decommissioned in 2005 and were replaced by the French AMX-30B1 and German Leopard 1V. Before being decommissioned in previous years they could be seen in various military parades in Chile where the modification of the engine could be seen and therefore they also had the modifications of the fire control system of Elbit and El-OP.
Great military parade of Chile, year 1996
Specifications:
- Crew:
- 4 (Commander, Gunner, Loader, Driver)
- Armament:
- Primary: 76 mm M32 cannon
- Secondary: .50 Browning HB on top, coaxial .30 Browning M1919A4
- Dimensions:
- Length: 8.21 m (5.81m without gun)
- Width: 3.2 m
- Height: 3.07 m
- Weight: 23.1 t
- Maneuverability:
- Engine: Detroit Diesel 8V-71T, 470 hp at 2300 rpm
- Max. speed: 70 km/h
- Accesories:
- Laser rangefinder
- Ballistic computer
- Night vision
Photos:
Sources:
- https://www.memoriachilena.gob.cl/archivos2/pdfs/MC0067618.pdf
- M41A1 - War Thunder Wiki
- https://www.nimda.co.il/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/M41_Repowering_Program-NXPowerLite-Copy.pdf
- https://web.archive.org/web/20040710044234/http://www.elbitsystems.com:80/data/LanSadot.pdf
- https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP04T00990R000100390001-8.pdf (page 3)
- Jane’s Armoured Fighting Vehicle Retrofit Systems 1993-94
- Jane’s A&A Upgrades 2006-07 (page 273)