We talk in more detail: why do Ukrainians put Soviet dynamic protection on the Leopard 2A4
It's no secret that the supply of Western weapons to Ukraine, especially armored vehicles, has been established and is in full swing. However, fortunately, not all combat vehicles, passing by echelons across the Polish-Ukrainian border, can be called modern and suitable for the current combat conditions.
In particular this applies tanks "Leopard 2A4", of which only from Poland, Spain, Portugal and Norway will be typed into a whole battalion - 31 units. But the trouble is that these "steel cats" have relatively low armor characteristics. And our enemy understands this very well, therefore, the fact that soon German tanks, at least artisanal, at least in factory conditions, but will acquire dynamic protection, was only a matter of time.
Known equivalents with unknown armor
Starting a conversation about armor, one can turn to explanations of the term “main tank” that are abstruse and boring for the average reader, including the part that talks about the impact of enemy firepower, but why? Few will be a secret to anyone that when a tank appears, absolutely everything that can somehow cause damage to it begins to fly into it. Here, even Ukraine does not need to be mentioned - there are examples for the whole history the existence of these combat vehicles has accumulated a myriad.
It is logical that, based on these circumstances, tank armor is one of the foundations of its combat effectiveness and survivability. But it is simply impossible to design armor and, as they say, to make it in metal with such a huge backlog that it will be enough for many decades to come - everything corresponds to its time and the near future.
The frontal part of the body of the Ukrainian "Leopard 2A4" is equipped with dynamic protection "Contact". The forehead of the tower, apparently, will also receive this innovation.
However, "Leopard 2A4", a 37-year-old old man, will soon become a kind of "fall" from the past into the too distant future. And he will not end up in a war with conditional Basmachis, but in fierce hostilities using powerful anti-tank weapons, against which his armor will no longer be relevant.
Serial production of this tank began back in 1985 and lasted almost seven years until 1992. At the same time, it is worth paying tribute to the Germans and their allies: the vehicles have spread to many countries, but for all this time no one has dismantled the armor filler of the vehicles in order to give out information about its composition to the general public. Therefore, there is only guesswork about what is hidden behind the outer steel sheets of the Leopard 2A4, the most likely of which are ceramics and semi-active protection in the form of a steel and rubber sandwich.
Nevertheless, it is known for certain that tanks produced in 1985-1987 had type B or B-tech armor protection, and later versions became happy owners of improved type C or C-tech armor, respectively. But in this case, these letters do not play any role: both modifications are most likely already in Ukraine, and their differences in durability do not make any weather in general - you can break through both.
Clarity regarding the equivalents of the durability of armor of both types is brought by a documented British assessment, the purpose of which was to compare the German vehicle with its counterpart from Foggy Albion. She, by the way, is consistent with the data from the Swedish tender, where the "Leopard 2A4" took part.
It deals exclusively with towers, which, in principle, is not surprising: the towers of the vast majority of modern tanks have the highest protection compared to the hull - they are most susceptible to shelling in combat conditions, and sometimes placing a heavy array of armor in them is purely constructive easier.
British assessment of the resistance of the tower "Leopard 2A4" with old and new armor
Based on these data, it can be seen that the Leopard 2A4 turret with armor B (in service) in the frontal part gives the equivalent of 350 mm of medium hard steel against sub-caliber projectiles and 700 mm against HEAT ammunition. But the "head" with armor C (improved as proposed) already produces 410-420 mm from sub-caliber and 750-800 mm from HEAT shells.
The forehead of the hull will give somewhat less resistance, but it can be equated to a tower - in any case, more will not work.
In practice, this means that the frontal part of the Leopard 2A4, as the most protected, when firing at more or less reasonable combat distances within a couple of kilometers, will be vulnerable to the main sub-caliber shells of our tanks in the face of the Soviet Mango and the Russian tungsten variation of Lead ". But the conditions of hostilities in the special operation zone in Ukraine are such that, in addition to mines and other abominations, cumulative weapons come to the fore.
There are undisputed leaders in the arsenal of our troops: the Kornet and Khrizantema-S anti-tank systems, whose missiles, depending on the modification, pierce more than a meter of steel armor behind dynamic protection. These gentlemen, in principle, do not care whether the tank is directed towards them by the side or forehead - the penetration is such that the Leopard 2A4 will have little chance.
Export version of ATGM "Kornet" - "Kornet-E"
The tandem missiles of the Metis-M, Konkurs-M, Shturm-S complexes and guided tank missiles will cause no less problems for the German tank - this entire arsenal has armor penetration characteristics in general up to 900 mm behind dynamic protection. Also dangerous for the vehicle (especially in the forehead of the hull and with type B armor) will be contact with both the old RPG-7 grenade launchers with their PG-7VR grenades, and the more recent RPG-29 "Vampire", RPG-27 "Meadowsweet" and exotic RPG-30 "Hook".
Here one could also mention aviation anti-tank weapons, but, unfortunately, it has not yet reached its mass use - the presence of a large number of anti-aircraft systems of various sizes in the Armed Forces of Ukraine affects.
RPG-27 "Tavolga"
In general, the “Leopard 2A4” without additional protection is just the case when you can even hit the forehead with everything at hand, and in most cases you won’t go wrong with the exception of the very ancient anti-tank weapons and cumulative cannon shells.
RPG-30 "Hook"
Dynamic protection can fix the situation
Of course, such an unpleasant situation in which Leopards 2A4 may find itself requires some kind of solution. And the simplest thing is the equipping of vehicles with hinged dynamic protection "Contact", which is already being carried out in artisanal, and possibly in factory conditions.
Yes, "Contact", although old - its state tests were completed in the USSR back in 1982 - and it is effective only against cumulative ammunition, but it is quite working even at the present time.
Its design, as well as its work, is known to everyone who is at least somehow interested in armored vehicles - just a huge amount of materials has been written about it. Therefore, we will not go into details. And in short: the principle of its operation is based on the effect of metal plates due to the detonation of an explosive at the moment of penetration of a cumulative jet, which significantly reduces the penetrating ability of cumulative anti-tank weapons.
Block of dynamic protection "Contact" and its component 4S20
In practice, this means that with the correct installation of the Contact blocks with a large inclination from the vertical, it is able to provide protection against monoblock anti-tank missiles and anti-tank grenades in the range from 300-350 to 400-450 millimeters of steel equivalent. As for HEAT projectiles for cannon artillery, here the protective characteristics of this "reactive armor" fall and average up to 250 mm. The latter is due to the fact that the projectile, having a large mass and initial speed, as well as thick walls, literally breaks the dynamic protection unit and prevents the normal throwing of plates during detonation.
Opened element of dynamic protection 4S20. Between the plates is an explosive
Formally, the Leopard 2A4 armor, together with dynamic protection, can give impressive results. Still, resistance to cumulative weapons can reach 1 millimeters of steel equivalent. However, the trouble is that we are talking exclusively about monoblock ammunition (single-shot), which simply do not have such penetration.
It turns out that all this is done in vain? After all, the armor of the Leopard copes well with monoblock shells, and tandem missiles and grenades demolish dynamic protection at once and hit the armor with the main charge? No, not really.
A little higher, we mentioned the monsters in the form of "Cornet" and "Chrysanthemum" for a reason - they really don't care if the tank has dynamic protection or not. The power of their main charges is more than enough to pierce the forehead of a German, even if the leading pre-charge "falls like a hero's death", neutralizing the block of reactive armor.
How would a full body kit by "Kontakt" on a German tank look like - a photo walking on the net that looks like a photomontage
But with all sorts of tandem grenades, as well as Metis-M, Konkurs-M, and missiles not of the first freshness of the Shturm complex, the situation is somewhat different. The fact is that their superiority over the Leopard 2A4 armor is mainly achieved precisely due to the interaction of the leading (designed to neutralize dynamic protection) and the main shaped charges.
Roughly speaking, if the main charge penetrates 650 mm of armor, and the leading one - 100-150 mm, then these indicators can be conditionally added up with some discrepancies in the amount. Then it seems like a very impressive number of millimeters is obtained, which can make the German guest tremble. But if the leading precharge is spent on overcoming dynamic protection, then the overall penetration of the projectile drops significantly. Then it may turn out that it will either simply not work to break through the armor, or with a minimal armored effect on the crew and equipment of the vehicle.
In general, the effect of "Contact" will be in any case, and this effect will be very unpleasant for us and will seriously limit the arsenal of tools that can be applied to the "Leopard". Fortunately, this dynamic protection complex is a kind of one-time use in the sense that a projectile hit and the subsequent detonation often demolishes a considerable number of neighboring blocks, exposing armor.
At the same time, one should not forget that the Ukrainians can put "Contact" not only in the frontal projection of the car, but also at least on the sides. This will not give any total protection from shots almost perpendicular to the side - the maximum is only from monoblock low-power ammunition, but even then not always. Therefore, it is impossible to talk about a powerful body kit for battles, for example, in urban conditions. But the safe maneuvering angles of the tank will clearly expand.
In short, they put the "old man" on German technology for good reason.
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