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Turkish Land Vehicle Programs

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120 mm caliber is made for smothbore guns.
The reason tank guns are smoothbore is the switch from HEAT (High Explosive Anti-Tank) to kinetic energy rounds sabot as the primary anti-tank round. Kinetic energy rounds are subcaliber rounds (smaller than the bore) and aren't effective if the spun by rifling. So tank gun designers moved to smoothbores, stuck fins on the penetrator to give it the stability lost by not spinning the projectile, the use of a sabot around the penetrator provides a better gas seal and the smaller projectile achieves much higher muzzle velocity.

The reason for the shift was advances in protection against HEAT rounds via explosive reactive armor, spaced armor, composite armor and so on. Their effective penetration began to fall and with the development of kinetic energy penetrators, they found not only was the KE round easier to make, it was able to slice through the defenses arrayed against HEAT rounds. HEAT rounds were (and still are) popular in missile warheads, the dominant anti-tank weapon other than another tank. So HEAT defenses dramatically reduced the effective of HEAT warheads, especially those on man-portable anti-tank missiles.

Taken together, the smoothbore kinetic energy round can penetrate twice or more the amount of armor as compared to a HEAT round. HEAT rounds also required a smoothbore to eliminate the spin to allow them to be effective. Previous generation kinetic armor piercing round needed rifling to work and were more accurate at long range but lacked HEAT penetrating power. HEAT lacked accuracy at long range due to the smoothbore design and lack of stabilization for the round.

The kinetic energy long rod penetrator and sabot combination flipped the balance and provided the long range accuracy of a rifle stabilized round with better armor penetration compared to a HEAT round.


Current US army doctrine uses Armor-Piercing, Fin-Stabilized, Discarding Sabot (APFSDS) rounds against tanks, and high-explosive anti-tank warhead (HEAT) rounds on softer targets. The spin, caused by the rifling, lowers the linear kinetic energy of the APFSDS projectile, and interferes with the HEAT rounds plasma stream, decreasing overall effectiveness.
 
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After Nefer, Korhan is also teafy for production.

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https://aa.com.tr/tr/bilim-teknoloji/aselsanin-yeni-silahi-korhan-goreve-hazir-/1120432
 
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For some reason I prefer Otokar's Tulpar just purely for aesthetics wise, overall it just looks more tidy despite the fact that Korhan has a stance that looks like the next generation IFV.
 
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