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Al-Khalid tank (Type 90-IIM / MBT-2000) Information Pool

A few weeks back, we were discussing the possibility of a Chinese engine replacement for AK.

I suppose Ukraine war will force PA's hand.





Speculation is all you will get because no one knows how long this war will continue.

Safe to say, the turmoil in Ukraine will continue for some time.
Not just a possibility. Already happening, engines already delivered.

In light of recent developments.... How much and how long can the Pakistani inventory of 6TD-2 parts last... As far as I know Pakistan imports the motor oil from them as well...
Implications on Al-Khalid 2 and the acquisition of 1400 bhp engine....
Check above. Al-Khalid-2 is not going to be using a Ukrainian engine. I also talked about wether it was feasible to replace the 6TDs in older Al-Khalids. Will be very cost prohibitive due to the numbers, but is a possibility when the tanks need to be rebuilt or the engines replaced as they reach the end of their life (especially in older Al-Khalids).

What about engines and/or spare parts needed for maintenance/replacement?

BTW any chance ukraine defence industry continues to function after a pause under 'new management' or is it totally history?


surely there's other sources for motor oil?
Good thing we have a good logistics system. We have plenty of spares to last us a while, and if not, we can always make them locally, yes, we have that capability, it’s just always been cheaper to import them, however when their hand has been forced. PA and HIT have localized. When Ukraine was having trouble delivering parts for the T80UD, we localized them, this included the entire FCS. An engine is also doable.
 
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It seems that these oils were engine specific thus Pakistan kept buying from them...


Doesn't seem that simple... Especially if Russia wants de militarization of Ukraine... So they would leave the factories intact ?
So far Russia has been destroying selective infrastructure and keeping other. The armament factories at Ukraine are of good use to Russia if they can hold the area. They will want to keep them intact. Russian industry has been struggling.
 
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So far Russia has been destroying selective infrastructure and keeping other. The armament factories at Ukraine are of good use to Russia if they can hold the area. They will want to keep them intact. Russian industry has been struggling.
I've just made a post wrt that on the Ukraine-Russian conflict thread... I'll attach SS of the location respective industries locations as per Wikipedia. Most are falling into Russian hands... Which raises 2 questions
1:- Will Russians supply to us ?
2:- Will the West let them supply to us i.e sanctions ?

So far Russia has been destroying selective infrastructure and keeping other. The armament factories at Ukraine are of good use to Russia if they can hold the area. They will want to keep them intact. Russian industry has been struggling.
 

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I've just made a post wrt that on the Ukraine-Russian conflict thread... I'll attach SS of the location respective industries locations as per Wikipedia. Most are falling into Russian hands... Which raises 2 questions
1:- Will Russians supply to us ?
2:- Will the West let them supply to us i.e sanctions ?
I made a post regarding this on the same thread that might answer your questions. If it doesn’t, feel free to ask again :)
 
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Share the specific post because I've missed it in the pages somewhere.
 
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Do pakistani chinese origin tanks have same cook off issue as russian tanks ? Cause in many cases m1 abrams and other western tanks are penetrated but does not knock out a tank. but in case of russia once penetrated the stored ammo is causing the actual damage.
 
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Do pakistani chinese origin tanks have same cook off issue as russian tanks ? Cause in many cases m1 abrams and other western tanks are penetrated but does not knock out a tank. but in case of russia once penetrated the stored ammo is causing the actual damage.
Russian origin tanks explode like that because any penetration that impacts the ammo stored in their carousel auto-loaders or elsewhere in the hull and turret of the vehicle blows up the tank, if you’ve seen Russian origin tanks with their turrets blown clean off, it’s because of this, and yes, it’s fairly common.

Although The carousel is not well protected in T72 and T90S models, it is still hard to hit because it sits in the lower center of the tank, however the rest of the ammo that’s scattered around in the hull and turret is very easily damaged and is what often causes the cook-off and resulting explosion (though the carousels have known to explode too at times)

Russians have taken measures to fix this in later T90M models where the carousel has additional armor and the extra ammo (the reloads not carried in the carousel) have been moved to an isolated compartment in the rear of the turret, which has blowout panels, making it less likely for later T90M models to suffer the same fate as their older counterparts.

This does not occur much in western tanks (though they’re definitely not immune to it) because they have manual loaders, they have made their tanks significantly bigger in order to make separate, isolated ammo storage compartments with blowout panels that ensure that even if a tank is penetrated, the ammo is safe, and if the ammo is hit, the blowout panels ensure that the crew does not get injured. Complete Ammo isolation also possible in tanks with auto-loaders, as seen in the T-14 and the Japanese MBTs using a bustle style auto-loaders that store ammo at the rear of the turret and only open it for reloading, instead of a carousel style auto-loader. However that does make the tank significantly more complex and hence wasn’t used in older designs like the T72, T90 etc.

Chinese tanks use the exact same auto-loaders as Russian tanks, namely the ones from T72 and T90S, so they will definitely have this same problem, but it may not be as common as it is in the Russian tanks; because while the best option is to isolate the ammo as I stated above, there are other precautions that can be taken to reduce the risk of ammo cook off, some of these are;

1. Armored carousels as employed in the T90M, may also possibly be employed in VT-4 and ZTZ-99 but is unknown.
2. Armored storage bins for ammo reloads, this is employed in Al-Khalid and VT-4, while the ammo outside the carousel isn’t completely isolated from the Crew, it’s put in armored storage bins in the crew compartment, these storages are also lined with Kevlar to prevent spalling and fragments. Each ammo bin has its own explosion and fire suppression system that can detect a fire and go off in milliseconds in order to reduce the risk of ammo cook off.
In the Al-Khalid there’s two such storages, one at the rear of the turret and one on the side of the turret. These hold half the ammo reloads of the Al-Khalid, the other half is stored in a completely isolated compartment between the engine and crew compartment, it doesn’t have blow off panels, but it also has a similar explosion and fire suppression system. VT-4 employs a similar ammo storage strategy.
The issue with both these tanks is their extremely poor side armor, if any AT munition strikes the sides of these tanks, it will easily go through and poses a high risk of hitting ammo inside the tank and causing a catastrophic explosion. Indian T72 and T90S also have this side armor issue, but it’s not as bad as in the Pakistani tanks (however both of those have absolutely no ammo protection so they’re likely still worst off than the Pakistani tanks in regards to ammo cook-off).
3. Canisterised ammo, this is used in the Indian Arjun tank, however this one is likely not possible to employ with an auto-loader. Each round has its individual container, this way even if one round is hit and explodes, it doesn’t damage the other ones.​


While the Al-Khalid and VT-4 employ some means to prevent ammo explosions, there are no such steps taken in Al-Zarrar, Type 85UG, T80UD and T72, (T90S is not much better off, but it does employ some stuff like fire suppression systems) all of these are highly susceptible to ammo cook off and catastrophic explosions, which almost always result in the entire crew being knocked out.

Bottom line is, the only way to truly prevent these is to use completely isolated ammo with blast doors or to use hard kill active protection systems or a combination of both. Something both india and Pakistan are a fair few years off from deploying.
 
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Russian origin tanks explode like that because any penetration that impacts the ammo stored in their carousel auto-loaders or elsewhere in the hull and turret of the vehicle blows up the tank, if you’ve seen Russian origin tanks with their turrets blown clean off, it’s because of this, and yes, it’s fairly common.

Although The carousel is not well protected in T72 and T90S models, it is still hard to hit because it sits in the lower center of the tank, however the rest of the ammo that’s scattered around in the hull and turret is very easily damaged and is what often causes the cook-off and resulting explosion (though the carousels have known to explode too at times)

Russians have taken measures to fix this in later T90M models where the carousel has additional armor and the extra ammo (the reloads not carried in the carousel) have been moved to an isolated compartment in the rear of the turret, which has blowout panels, making it less likely for later T90M models to suffer the same fate as their older counterparts.

This does not occur much in western tanks (though they’re definitely not immune to it) because they have manual loaders, they have made their tanks significantly bigger in order to make separate, isolated ammo storage compartments with blowout panels that ensure that even if a tank is penetrated, the ammo is safe, and if the ammo is hit, the blowout panels ensure that the crew does not get injured. Complete Ammo isolation also possible in tanks with auto-loaders, as seen in the T-14 and the Japanese MBTs using a bustle style auto-loaders that store ammo at the rear of the turret and only open it for reloading, instead of a carousel style auto-loader. However that does make the tank significantly more complex and hence wasn’t used in older designs like the T72, T90 etc.

Chinese tanks use the exact same auto-loaders as Russian tanks, namely the ones from T72 and T90S, so they will definitely have this same problem, but it may not be as common as it is in the Russian tanks; because while the best option is to isolate the ammo as I stated above, there are other precautions that can be taken to reduce the risk of ammo cook off, some of these are;

1. Armored carousels as employed in the T90M, may also possibly be employed in VT-4 and ZTZ-99 but is unknown.
2. Armored storage bins for ammo reloads, this is employed in Al-Khalid and VT-4, while the ammo outside the carousel isn’t completely isolated from the Crew, it’s put in armored storage bins in the crew compartment, these storages are also lined with Kevlar to prevent spalling and fragments. Each ammo bin has its own explosion and fire suppression system that can detect a fire and go off in milliseconds in order to reduce the risk of ammo cook off.
In the Al-Khalid there’s two such storages, one at the rear of the turret and one on the side of the turret. These hold half the ammo reloads of the Al-Khalid, the other half is stored in a completely isolated compartment between the engine and crew compartment, it doesn’t have blow off panels, but it also has a similar explosion and fire suppression system. VT-4 employs a similar ammo storage strategy.
The issue with both these tanks is their extremely poor side armor, if any AT munition strikes the sides of these tanks, it will easily go through and poses a high risk of hitting ammo inside the tank and causing a catastrophic explosion. Indian T72 and T90S also have this side armor issue, but it’s not as bad as in the Pakistani tanks (however both of those have absolutely no ammo protection so they’re likely still worst off than the Pakistani tanks in regards to ammo cook-off).
3. Canisterised ammo, this is used in the Indian Arjun tank, however this one is likely not possible to employ with an auto-loader. Each round has its individual container, this way even if one round is hit and explodes, it doesn’t damage the other ones.​


While the Al-Khalid and VT-4 employ some means to prevent ammo explosions, there are no such steps taken in Al-Zarrar, Type 85UG, T80UD and T72, (T90S is not much better off, but it does employ some stuff like fire suppression systems) all of these are highly susceptible to ammo cook off and catastrophic explosions, which almost always result in the entire crew being knocked out.

Bottom line is, the only way to truly prevent these is to use completely isolated ammo with blast doors or to use hard kill active protection systems or a combination of both. Something both india and Pakistan are a fair few years off from deploying.
Thanks for detailed info. Much appreciated. One more question you specifically mentioned weak side armor of Pakistani tanks, how weak is it ? compared to t90S ?
 
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Thanks for detailed info. Much appreciated. One more question you specifically mentioned weak side armor of Pakistani tanks, how weak is it ? compared to t90S ?
I’ll have to explain a few things to explain that.

First of all, tanks have the thickest armor at the front, and they have a thing called the frontal armor arc. basically, tanks designers design tank turrets and hulls in such a way that the thickest armor doesn’t just cover the narrow front of the tank but also extends a certain amount to the side of the tank. Notice in this image of a T90S turret how the front of the turret is not flat but angled so the frontal armor arc extends on each side of the tank. This design feature is present in both the T72 and the T90S as well as the T80UD, meanwhile the Al-Khalid and the VT-4 have a nearly flat turret front, meaning it’s armor is only at the front with the entire side of the turret vulnerable to enemy fire, this is somewhat remedied by adding ERA to the turret side as the Al-Khalid and VT-4 do, but Al-Khalid has older ERA so this isn’t going to help it that much, VT-4 at least has much better ERA with better coverage on the side of the turret, but this design flaw is still there. Arjun has these design flaws too.
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9662044C-DC49-4D07-BA49-D8B883297703.jpeg





A similar strategy is applied to tank hulls, where the first 1/3rd or 1/4th of the tanks side may have thicker armor than the rest. Or may have some sort of additional armor like ERA on the side of the tank. While no tank in South Asia has proper side hull armor for the entire tank, The T90S and the T80UD at least employ additional armor or ERA on the first 1/3rd of the tanks side. Al-Khalid and VT-4 have just their normal hull armor on the entire side of the tank, which is not that thick at all and is a massive weak spot. This is also surprising because Al-Khalid was initially deployed with similar 1/3rd armor coverage as T80UD and was even tested with a full side armor kit, but neither was ever put into service.
This image shows why having that 1/3rd side armor can be very useful, although it is an outdated example as it’s using a WW2 tank with no sloping armor, But disregard that for this example.
070672A4-8020-4972-9CFE-95CA3460FA21.jpeg




So what I mean to say is, that while Pakistani/Chinese tanks have armor that may be as effective, if not more, than the Indian/Russian counterparts, their design is very poor, with all of this armor being focused on the front of the tanks and no emphasis given to side armor, this is especially inexcusable in the case of the VT-4 which has the thickest front armor of any tank in the region and should have proper armor covering its entire side like T90MS or other modern tanks but has only thin steel on its side.

In short: from the front, modern Pakistani tanks are generally better protected than modern Indian ones (only talking about 3rd Gen stuff here), but Indian ones have better side armor simply due to their better russian design philosophy, however they’re not ahead not by much because of their age.

Indian tanks employ much poorer ammo when compared to Pakistani tanks, so they’ll have a hard time penetrating Pakistani armor in general, While PA tanks don’t have this issue. However the most prevalent threats to armor these days aren’t other tanks, it’s infantry, and that’s where side armor is important. IA employs a lot of modern ATGMs and AT weapons that will be very deadly to PA tanks if they can get a shot at the side.
 
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Al-Khalid MBT
TypeMain battle tank
Place of origin China
Service historyIn service 2001 – presentUsed by
Production historyDesigner
Norinco
Designed 1993–1999
ManufacturerNorinco (MBT-2000, Type 96-IIM)
Heavy Industries Taxila (Al Khalid
)Unit cost $4.7 million – $5.8 million USD in 2011
Produced 2001 – present
Al-Khalid is better than MBT Arjun as compare to it (in term of cost, speed,repair and many things) , but in some field MBT Arjun is better than Al-Khalid (like 1400 hp engine, etc) My point of view Al-Khalid is better since both are 3rd generation,almost identical,but cheaper.
India and Pakistan are both third world countries that try to harbor military that would match the capabilities of highly developed nations. Third world economy, as well as politics means that neither of the two tanks are completely indigenous from the screws and bolts up to the bullets being used. Initially more than 50% of parts used in Arjun tank were imported from abroad. As time went by, local Indian companies began to provide spares and parts and presently Arjun still runs on an engine that is provided by German company MTU. Similarly its suspension is still supplied by RENK which is also a German company.

It was pitched against Russian T-90s and performed favorably. In 2012 Indian army chose to order T-90 tanks instead of its own Arjun and then it repeated another order of T-90s in 2016. It was finding it hard to secure a place in the country of its own origin. Recent comments from Indian sources reveal that it will be the T-90 tank that will form the backbone and mainstay of Indian armor and not the Arjun.

Similarly, Khalid is powered by a 6TD-2 liquid-cooled diesel engine
, designed by the Kharkiv Morozov Design Bureau (KMDB) of Ukraine. Unlike the Indian tank which is only used by India and that also in limited quantity, Khalid tank is presently in use by Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Morocco. Tests have also been done by other nations. In short, on paper they are both the same and if we were to compare them in singular capacity, matching specs with specs then they may not hold any significant edge over the other. In reality Khalid is presently in use by a greater number of nations. It would be similar to KIA vs HONDA comparison. You can compare specs and on paper they may look the same but even in Honda presently has the greater global market.
 
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Al-Khalid MBT
TypeMain battle tank
Place of origin China
Service historyIn service 2001 – presentUsed by
Production historyDesignerNorinco
Designed 1993–1999
ManufacturerNorinco (MBT-2000, Type 96-IIM)
Heavy Industries Taxila (Al Khalid
)Unit cost $4.7 million – $5.8 million USD in 2011
Produced 2001 – present
Al-Khalid is better than MBT Arjun as compare to it (in term of cost, speed,repair and many things) , but in some field MBT Arjun is better than Al-Khalid (like 1400 hp engine, etc) My point of view Al-Khalid is better since both are 3rd generation,almost identical,but cheaper.
India and Pakistan are both third world countries that try to harbor military that would match the capabilities of highly developed nations. Third world economy, as well as politics means that neither of the two tanks are completely indigenous from the screws and bolts up to the bullets being used. Initially more than 50% of parts used in Arjun tank were imported from abroad. As time went by, local Indian companies began to provide spares and parts and presently Arjun still runs on an engine that is provided by German company MTU. Similarly its suspension is still supplied by RENK which is also a German company.

It was pitched against Russian T-90s and performed favorably. In 2012 Indian army chose to order T-90 tanks instead of its own Arjun and then it repeated another order of T-90s in 2016. It was finding it hard to secure a place in the country of its own origin. Recent comments from Indian sources reveal that it will be the T-90 tank that will form the backbone and mainstay of Indian armor and not the Arjun.

Similarly, Khalid is powered by a 6TD-2 liquid-cooled diesel engine
, designed by the Kharkiv Morozov Design Bureau (KMDB) of Ukraine. Unlike the Indian tank which is only used by India and that also in limited quantity, Khalid tank is presently in use by Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Morocco. Tests have also been done by other nations. In short, on paper they are both the same and if we were to compare them in singular capacity, matching specs with specs then they may not hold any significant edge over the other. In reality Khalid is presently in use by a greater number of nations. It would be similar to KIA vs HONDA comparison. You can compare specs and on paper they may look the same but even in Honda presently has the greater global market.
Oh my, where do I begin with this.…
 
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