Military FAQ thread

Thanks Scratch. What I understand is, passive sonar has longer range but less accuracy, so you have to measure sevral times to get an accurate location of enemy. While active sonar is more accurate but has less range. Moreover, it's possible that the enemy vessel is out of the range of your active sonar but within his range of passive sonar. So when you open your active sonar you will find nothing but the enemy will know your existance.

Am I correct?

ahho said:

well i did heard about the trophy. Does China have anything like this kind of active defence??

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Nothing I know of. Perhaps you ask that question in the type 98 thread in the land warfare forum, since I think it's quiet related to that topic.

on another question, i was wondering about the external fuel tanks on jet fighters. Does it consume all of the external tank first first and drop it one by one or wait all of them to be empty and drop it

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Probably depends on the situation. If there's no need to drop, they will bring them back home. If you drop them anyway, it just makes sense to drop them as early as possible. Since every single tank is a source of additional drag and weight.
If you have i.e. one tank under each wing, I think the jet consumes the fuel from both of them simoultaniously to avoid assymetric weight dispersal. Hence both could be droped at the same time.
Due to the weight, those tanks limit the max G-limit of a jet. If you come into a situation where high maneuverability is needed (A-A fight, avoid missiles) your going to drop all tanks at once (no matter how much fuel is left) and also heavy bombs, if you have those, to safe the jet.

szbd said:

What I understand is, passive sonar has longer range but less accuracy, so you have to measure sevral times to get an accurate location of enemy. While active sonar is more accurate but has less range. Moreover, it's possible that the enemy vessel is out of the range of your active sonar but within his range of passive sonar. So when you open your active sonar you will find nothing but the enemy will know your existance.

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Basicly, you're right. There are a lot of factors to consider wich make the actual task in combat much more difficult of course. But I'm no expert on that.
Regarding range of passive sonar. It's difficult to actually speak of a range here.
I.e. lets say there is a sub 5000ft (random figure) away from your own. It may be that quiet that you cannot "hear" it with your passive sonar. If you'd use your active sonar and would point into the right direction, you might be able to hear the return signal. That would alert your opponent as well. But you have not only bearing, but also the range. (Such a hit would be pure luck)
However, no sane submariner will ever sweep the ocaen with active sonar in the hope to find another sub.
Besides, I think subs can be covered with some kind of rubber material on the outside to (partly) absorb active soner signals.

The exporation of Chinese Shmel

I would like to know if the Chinese version of the rocket launcher Shmel (PF-97) flamer is exported by China.

Well i was wondering, when people were discussing about auto loader of tanks like type-96 to 99 and t-72 to 90 in the land warfare forum. It was said that crew survivability wouldn't be high if it hit the ammo storage which wasn't sealed or protected like in M1, but does this shortcoming occur in other tank with auto loader like japanese type-90 and european tanks that have it

ahho said:

Well i was wondering, when people were discussing about auto loader of tanks like type-96 to 99 and t-72 to 90 in the land warfare forum. It was said that crew survivability wouldn't be high if it hit the ammo storage which wasn't sealed or protected like in M1, but does this shortcoming occur in other tank with auto loader like japanese type-90 and european tanks that have it

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Any round that penetrates into the crew compartment is fatal, so it doesn't matter if the ammo storage is sealed or protected like in M1. In other words, it doesn't matter if the ammo explodes when a shell penetrates into crew compartment, anybody inside would be dead anyways. Otherwise, I imagine they could make the ammo more sophisticated so they won't explode when hit by shells. Looking at it from this perspective, I wonder if anybody could survive when a round penetrates into crew compartment of M1 - the survivability between M1 and tanks without separate ammo storages is probably the same.

Re: Midget subs and submersible craft

Hi

Just need to get some info regarding a news in a local news paper (THE NEWS - one of the two most credible english language news papers in Pakistan) that Pakistani scientists/engineers have acquired the tech / capability to indiginously build nuclear sub engines and eventually SSN's.

Given their recent experience with Agosta and 2.5 decades of experience with Nuclear reactors i don't think the claim to be that far fetched.

If it is indeed the case, how would you think this will affect balance of power in sub-continent?

Sorry for hopping-in in the middle of another topic but could'nt find a way to start a new topic

Ryz05 said:

Any round that penetrates into the crew compartment is fatal, so it doesn't matter if the ammo storage is sealed or protected like in M1. In other words, it doesn't matter if the ammo explodes when a shell penetrates into crew compartment, anybody inside would be dead anyways. Otherwise, I imagine they could make the ammo more sophisticated so they won't explode when hit by shells. Looking at it from this perspective, I wonder if anybody could survive when a round penetrates into crew compartment of M1 - the survivability between M1 and tanks without separate ammo storages is probably the same.

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Hogwash! It depends on the amount of energy the round has left when it enters. During GW1 an M1A1 took a BM-9/12 APFSDS or similiar round through the turret ring from point blank range only wounding the loader. However if the spall, round, plasma or what ever happens to penetrate the compartment had hit a combustable case then the tank would have been catasphrophically destroyed with crew loss like most of the Iraqi T-72 fleet.

Also several Abrams have taken ammo conmpartment hits in GW2 and gone up in a volcano of fire and explosions, only to have the crew emerge after the ammo was done cooking off. Seperating the ammo form the crew via bustle rack storage and blow out panels saves crews, and an epxerianced crew is harder to replace than the tank itself.

In a tank with an exposed ammo storage system every penetrating hit may result in crew loss, in protected ammo tanks only crew compartment hits run the risk of a crew kill.

zraver said:

Hogwash! It depends on the amount of energy the round has left when it enters. During GW1 an M1A1 took a BM-9/12 APFSDS or similiar round through the turret ring from point blank range only wounding the loader. However if the spall, round, plasma or what ever happens to penetrate the compartment had hit a combustable case then the tank would have been catasphrophically destroyed with crew loss like most of the Iraqi T-72 fleet.

Also several Abrams have taken ammo conmpartment hits in GW2 and gone up in a volcano of fire and explosions, only to have the crew emerge after the ammo was done cooking off. Seperating the ammo form the crew via bustle rack storage and blow out panels saves crews, and an epxerianced crew is harder to replace than the tank itself.

In a tank with an exposed ammo storage system every penetrating hit may result in crew loss, in protected ammo tanks only crew compartment hits run the risk of a crew kill.

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They store the ammo in the crew compartment, so only if the ammo penetrates into crew compartment can it result in a member kill, similar to M1 where the ammo is sealed somewhere else - any penetration into crew compartment is fatal and survivability is the same. I guess they can also make ammos that won't "cook" when hit.

Ryz05 said:

They store the ammo in the crew compartment, so only if the ammo penetrates into crew compartment can it result in a member kill, similar to M1 where the ammo is sealed somewhere else - any penetration into crew compartment is fatal and survivability is the same. I guess they can also make ammos that won't "cook" when hit.

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so does european tank and type-90 jap tank suffered the vulnerability of t-72

T-72 and Chinese tanks with carousel autoloader suffer this mentinoned proplem becouse the ammunition surrounds the turret and crew, but Japanese Type90 and Leclerc have the hazarous ammunition in the buzzle seperated by armourplates from the crew.