Quote:
Originally Posted by Archer
There is one design flaw in the Challenger, its lack of separate ammunition storage behind armour with blow off panels. The HESH rounds are stored within the tank without the above, the charges are in an armoured bin, but without blow off panels.
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There are trade-offs all over the shop here. Any of the non-inert CR2 ammunition (i.e. everything apart from the APFSDS penetrator) is stored in the main hull, rather than the turret as (I think - if I've got this wrong my arguament falls flat on it's face) is the case with the M1 family. I'm not a tanker, but I would question exactly what chance the crew have of surviving any explosion in the hull big enough to set off the charges inside the armoured bins, even before the charges themselves go off. If any explosion big enough to set the charges off will kill them, blow-out panels are introducing a weak spot to the armour for no benefit.
This line of thinking does not apply to the M1 series, due to the fact that ammunition stored in the turret bustle is inherently much more vulnerable to fire and arguably more likely to kill the crew if it cooked off without the blow out panels being present.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Archer
That apart, the power to weight ratio of the tank is somewhat unimpressive.
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Standard CR2 engine is 1200 BHP compared to the 1500 BPH of the M1 series. Weights are pretty comparable. There is an engine upgrade for the CR2 to a 1500 BHP diesel about - it's standard on the 2e variant - but HM Treasury are too tight fisted to pay for it on the standard tanks.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Archer
But I still consider it to be an overall better design, on account of its crew protection measures.
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Ummm... I think you're taking a long step on a thin branch here. The three greatest crew protection measures are situational awareness, crew training and armour protection. Two of these are largely independent of the tank, while armour protection is classified and only known to be very good on both tanks. One minor niggle which as I have outlined above may be unnecessary on the CR2 for design reasons seems rather a thin basis to state one is better than the other.