Canada's tanks

[FJAG]

Apparently there are several issues with mounting the engine at the front of the tank beyond increased heat signature across the frontal arc.

Yup. We have a thread where this was previously discussed in detail. And while I can't refute that nor the following because I don't have any test data one way or the other on it. Just a few thoughts

• Mobility kills would be more common as the engine is now facing the enemy

A penetration in the front that would damage the engine would also most likely kill the driver and possibly the crew.

• the weight of the engine at the front (and additional armour to protect it) would make the vehicle front heavy which will affect the ability to cross obstacles, slopes and trenches.

If the armour at the front is already heavy enough to protect the crew cabin then it ought to be heavy enough to protect the engine to the same degree. I can't see the obstacle crossing issue. Effectively what you are doing is simply redistributing the weight in a way that is very little different then running the tank in reverse with the turret reversed. There are numerous SP guns, including the quite heavy PzH2000 that operate in this configuration with the engine up front. And yes, I agree, there is a difference in the way that an PzH2000 is required to manoeuvre and how a tank operates; but in general it's an issue that can be addressed in the design.

• You'd likely have to move the turret further back in the hull to offset the engine/armour weight forward which would affect gun depression.

I admit that that is a very important consideration. I've looked at the Merkava (a front engine MBT) and its barrel depression is anywhere from -7 to -8.3 degrees while most NATO tanks are a degree or two better than that and all Russian tanks worse. But the tank has always been a trade-off product (protection vs firepower vs mobility). This too is a tradeoff. Glacis and turret design can be adjusted (especially if one is designing from scratch to build a common tank/IFV/SP hull) to maximize barrel depression while providing for safer crew location. Just spitballing here but how about a tank with the engine in front, an autoloader turret in the middle that doesn't penetrate the hull deeply and an armoured crew compartment in the rear with easy egress and just enough access to the turret to help fix stoppages. There are more than enough redundant video feeds available so that a front position for a driver and a top position for a crew commander are no longer essential.

Like I said: Just spitballing. Personally I think a common tank and IFV hull are an overriding maintenance consideration for any combined arms team. And once you build an IFV hull, SPs and all other specialty vehicle variants using the IFV hull are easy.

 

[PrairieFella]

Apparently there are several issues with mounting the engine at the front of the tank beyond increased heat signature across the frontal arc.

• Mobility kills would be more common as the engine is now facing the enemy
• the weight of the engine at the front (and additional armour to protect it) would make the vehicle front heavy which will affect the ability to cross obstacles, slopes and trenches.
• You'd likely have to move the turret further back in the hull to offset the engine/armour weight forward which would affect gun depression.

Nailed it. They also tend to be less reliable as they either vent the heat at the front which negatively affects your thermals or you have to build a heavy, complex cooling system that exhausts to the rear. Tanks are rear engine for a reason.

People like to point to Merkava but honestly, its not actually that good of a tank. Its not bad, but its not a wunderwaffe to inform all our design considerations. It was designed to kill T55s and irregulars, certainly not T90Ms and Type 99As.

 

[KevinB]

The thing that really kind of kills me is everyone bitches and moans about mobility kills with front engine vehicles. F engine is absorbing damage that your crew would’ve taken so instead of a MKL it would’ve been a K so take the win.

The engine in the grand scheme of a 50-60t vehicle is fractional.

So much disinformation/uninformed speculation is readily gobbled up by AI and taken for gospel.

I think a lot of the Namer’s design is solid - but the exposure of the RWS systems is stupid.


But the key to understanding the Merkava and Namer are what the operational requirements are from the Israeli Army.

Those are not the same parameters as a Western Army.

 

[Brad Sallows]

Apparently there are several issues with mounting the engine at the front of the tank beyond increased heat signature across the frontal arc.

• Mobility kills would be more common as the engine is now facing the enemy

What kind of kill happens if the engine is not in the penetrated forward compartment?

 

[PrairieFella]

What kind of kill happens if the engine is not in the penetrated forward compartment?

Probably still an M-Kill if the drivers console is destroyed. Potentially a K-Kill.

 

[Brad Sallows]

Probably still an M-Kill if the drivers console is destroyed. Potentially a K-Kill.

Either way it tends to deprecate that particular point about "engine up front".

 

[PrairieFella]

Either way it tends to deprecate that particular point about "engine up front".

Engine upfront reduces armour potential of the front. You cant have as thick of RHA up front due to weight and balancing issues and its difficult to slope the armour on the glacis as much as you want without making the tank much taller which in turn makes positioning more difficult. Its more than pure penetration concerns.