What’s your source that gaijin’s estimates are wrong???
List em. Let’s break it down and do the math…
Not false, T-72s notoriously have access to heat. If you’re being hit with 3bm9 KE protection doesn’t matter much anyway.
Doesn’t matter. For example: If you intend ln fighting Sherman’s why add unnecessary weight in order to combat something else you’ll never face. It’s a waste of money especially if you don’t export them…
Ahh yes … China… The nation famous for having Merkava’s in their inventory. But considering they have a F-35 canopy I don’t be shocked. Gaijin agreeing that certain aspects of the tank are too weak doesn’t mean the numbers people throw around are substantiated or logically sound. 800mm KE and even 900mm KE is just not likely. Who are they facing where that would make financial and logistical sense?
I shouldn’t need to explain how weight savings are done. Components are made of lighter alloys, light roadwheels, sprockets, idlers, return rollers, suspension components, and such. The Merkava Siman 4 is a heavy weight, sitting around 82 tons when combat-loaded, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t save weight where they could.
HEAT is not the primary shell fired at enemy armor, nor do angles protect much against it. The interior turret was given spaced armor for the heat, and the external slope was for kinetics.
Anti-Tank rounds and Stugs, primarily. Stugs are not a “tank” by doctrine. Sturmgeschütz translates to Assault Gun. Furthermore, the Shermans were designed to fight other tanks, but they were not designed to hunt them.
Did you just ignore the document from when they tested the Merkava Siman 3…? They didn’t steal the tank. General Tal of Israel met with Chinese Chief Designer Mr.Zhang to discuss armor protection.
General Tal can be found on the right in this image, meeting with a Chinese individual related to the discussions.
Exactly. Size and geometry matter a lot. A bigger tank has more surface area to protect, so weight alone doesn’t tell us how strong its armour is. That’s basically the point I was trying to make earlier.
Bro misses the entire point. Explain what the weight savings were in detail since you brought it up > eXplAiN HoW WeIghT SaVIngZ WeRk… I swear some people intentionally misunderstood what others say and it’s annoying.
Completely missed the point. If you’re developing a Merkava for example. And your enemy only has Sherman’s in this hypothetical and nothing else. Why prioritize and add on all these requirements for fighting a T-14 Armata. It doesn’t make sense. It’s a hyperbolic example. But gets the point across.
If your neighbors don’t have substantially strong KE what’s the point? Especially if your focus isn’t even against armored combats but guys running round with rocks and rockets lmao. It’s a waste of cash.
If you manage to poke too many hornet nests and infuriate someone who not only has LOADS of tanks, the ability to get them within your borders untouched, and somehow managed to field loads of top end KE rounds for them. You still have Air Superiority in your own borders, and out. If you don’t, you’ll always have most of the world’s most powerful leaders coming to help you ANYWAY 7/10 at the least…
point is… The Merkava MK 4 IRL doesn’t need loads of KE protection. That’s just not substantiated. A handful of tanks that are capable of firing a handful of 3bm60 wouldn’t justify this. You’d need to be outnumbered 1/2 by equipment capable of 600mm penetration, plus no air superiority, no Allies to help you . But that isn’t the case.
Never said you did. It’s common on Merkava Threads (like Abrams threads) to have some people claim KE protection upwards of 800mm with 0 sources and even say that having sources is “bad” and act as if they are victims being targeted upon asking them for even a reference.
I can’t list every single weight saving; I must be making it up, right? What a joke of an argument. It’s a highly classified Military vehicle. I only know what they tell publicly.
I won’t entertain a false narrative. When the Merkava Mk.1 debuted in 1982, it was expected to face Syrian T-72s, and it did. This “Sherman” statement is completely untrue and clearly shows your bias.
The tanks are 20 years apart. At the time of development, T-72s firing 3BM42 were just as common as they are now. Furthermore, Israel’s neighbors now have Leclerc and M1A1 models. I’m not sure where you get this absurdist view that the T-14 Armata is the only Kinetic threat in the modern age.
“loads” isn’t the point and never has been. It’s to be ready when a threat arrives. The Merkava has always been on maximum crew survivability. It’s no different than saying the Abrams or Leopard are wastes of money because you could ignore the Soviet Union.
Okay, and what if they needed it to go into a Ground War in Syria, for example? What if Egypt became hostile and used American-made Abrams tanks in an invasion again? Would it be useless then?
3BM60 functionally does not exist. Nice going on exposing yourself for how little you actually understand about this topic.
You’re also pulling numbers out of thin air that mean nothing.
The Abrams does have that much on the turret cheeks. As for the Merkava, nothing is proving them right or wrong. The Siman 4’s armor arrays are highly classified and explosive. It’s entirely possible that with the correct angle of attack, an APFSDS like that could be stopped by utilizing the whole cheek package at once.
