Here is an article that may help in the indigenious developers of
Armoured Vehicles to be independent from manufacturers of modern
armour.
'Star Trek' shields to protect
supertanks
Robin McKie, science editor
Sunday August 19, 2001
The Observer
Scientists are developing super-tanks which would use powerful
magnets to melt and destroy incoming missiles and shells.
Each vehicle would be covered in 'smart armour' using electrical
fields, instead of thick metal, to give protection against
anti-tank weapons. The technology, which is being perfected by
defence researchers on both sides of the Atlantic, would transform
armoured-vehicle construction.
Current machines, such as Britain's Challenger tank, weigh more
than 60 tonnes because they have to carry plating that is more than
2ft thick. Such vehicles require massive amounts of fuel and other
supplies, and cause logistical headaches when being transported to
conflict zones, say military experts.
But a tank that relied on electromagnetic pulses, instead of
plating, to provide a shield against missiles would weigh a modest
20 tonnes. A fleet would form a light but powerful rapid deployment
force, and would transform Western nations' ability to take
international military action.
Smart-armour research is treated as highly confidential by military
officials and manufacturers. A Ministry of Defence spokesman would
only confirm that projects aimed at transforming tank construction
- part of the Army's Future Land Command project - were taking
place. 'Developing technologies that will cut back on armour weight
are a key part of that research,' he added.
However, scientists at the US Army Research Laboratory in Aberdeen,
Maryland, have now revealed details of how smart armour would
work.
According to research published in the current issue of New
Scientist, each tank would be covered with tiles made of strong
plas tic under which a sandwich of different materials would be
installed. First there would be a mat of optical fibres, then a
thin sheet of standard armour plating, and underneath that would
lie a series of metal coils.
When an anti-tank shell explodes on standard armour, the copper
cone of its head is projected as a powerful jet of metal that
travels at five miles a second. This jet focuses an immense amount
of energy on a tiny area and so can slice easily through several
feet of dense metal, causing devastation inside a tank.
However, on striking smart armour a shell would produce a very
different reaction. Firstly, it would sever optical cables in the
mat below the tank's outer plastic cover. This would trigger
sensors to activate electrical capacitors inside the tank which
would send a mighty electrical current surging through the metal
coils at the base of the smart armour.
A massive electromagnetic field would be created inside the armour,
as the high-velocity copper jet begins to pass through it. This
field would induce electrical currents in the copper.
'If you get enough current into the copper, you can heat it up and
start pinching it in certain regions, making it unstable,' states
Mike Zoltowski, of the Army Research Laboratory, in the New
Scientist article. The thin copper jet would be flattened and
broadened out and so would be unable to cut through the thin
standard plating at the base of the smart armour.
Essentially, electromagnets would be used to dissipate the energy
of an anti-tank missile or shell, like the force shields that
protect the fictional Starship Enterprise.
'This kind of development is now seen as urgent by military
planners,' Chris Foss, editor of Jane's Armour and Artillery, said.
'For example, some countries are working on "top attack" missiles
which fly over the turret of an oncoming tank instead of striking
it front on, where it is most strongly shielded. They would drop
their payloads on the tank's relatively unprotected turret
area.'
To protect against that, designers would be forced to add even more
thick armour plating to these other parts of the tank, adding to
its weight and fuel consumption and making it more unwieldy. The
answer is magnetic pulses, says Zoltowski. 'The benefit is that you
wouldn't need 800 millimetres of steel armour.'
[email protected]
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers
Limited 2002
http://www.observer.co.uk/Print/0,3858,4241755,00.html
