Chinese Military Exports (Land Systems)

lcloo said:

I wonder if Thai army used Chinese supplied 125mm rounds and Ukrainian ones (for T-84 Oplot) indisriminately for their VT-4. Technically rounds from both country are compatible, but their effect on inner gun barrel wear may be different due to different propellent?

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lcloo said:

I wonder if Thai army used Chinese supplied 125mm rounds and Ukrainian ones (for T-84 Oplot) indisriminately for their VT-4. Technically rounds from both country are compatible, but their effect on inner gun barrel wear may be different due to different propellent?

Click to expand...

RTB74 said:

Chinese 125mm rounds are a little bit longer, they are not compatible.

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ztqfan1999 said:

Not true. DTC-10 and DTW-125/BTA4 for example, (other types of ammo are 1:1 with their soviet counterparts so I won't mention them.) are specifically designed to be compatible with the original AZ (which includes Oplot-T since their MZ has the same length capacity.) because that is all that China got when they obtained their T-72 Ural which they used as a basis for future tanks. This is evidenced by the fact that none of their rounds go over 680mm in length which is exactly the max for AZ-172. View attachment 167791View attachment 167792
Furthermore, what makes Chinese 125mm rounds superior to Russian or Ukrainian ones are not because of length, but because they use better propellants which give them better velocities and by extent slightly better penetration without having to actually increase the length of the projectile itself and upgrade the autoloader like Russians did with AZ-185 to fit 3BM60. So as far as I know, there's nothing actually stopping the Thais from mixing ammunition other than the fact that Oplot-T's FCS wasn't designed to use Chinese sabots, all other types of ammunition should be compatible because they're no different from the ones provided for Oplot-T.

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RTB74 said:

Ah, my mistake. I just heard a rumor here in Thailand that the VT-4's ammunition has higher penetration than the Oplot, so I assumed it would be longer than the BTA4 round.

View attachment 167794

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ztqfan1999 said:

Not true. DTC-10 and DTW-125/BTA4 for example, (other types of ammo are 1:1 with their soviet counterparts so I won't mention them.) are specifically designed to be compatible with the original AZ (which includes Oplot-T since their MZ has the same length capacity.) because that is all that China got when they obtained their T-72 Ural which they used as a basis for future tanks. This is evidenced by the fact that none of their rounds go over 680mm in length which is exactly the max for AZ-172. View attachment 167791View attachment 167792
Furthermore, what makes Chinese 125mm rounds superior to Russian or Ukrainian ones are not because of length, but because they use better propellants which give them better velocities and by extent slightly better penetration without having to actually increase the length of the projectile itself and upgrade the autoloader like Russians did with AZ-185 to fit 3BM60. So as far as I know, there's nothing actually stopping the Thais from mixing ammunition other than the fact that Oplot-T's FCS wasn't designed to use Chinese sabots, all other types of ammunition should be compatible because they're no different from the ones provided for Oplot-T.

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supersnoop said:

Propellant difference can make it incompatible too. There were the allegations that Pakistani 122mm ammo blew out the barrels of the Ukrainian Soviet-era artillery pieces. It was discussed here that it was potentially the fact that Pakistani 122mm artillery is originated from China rather than the USSR and the max range of the Chinese 122mm gun is 15 Km, while the USSR was only 12.

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