S1A1 Main Battle Tank

[Uzb3kistan]

S1A1 Main Battle Tank

The S1A1 Main Battle Tank is the latest development of Ireland's Main Battle Tank and is an upgrade from Ireland's traditional S1 MBT's. It features a number of enhancements in most aspects of the tank. It features a tougher armor, more advanced on-board digital fire-control system, newer engine and propulsion system, and new munitions as well as countermeasure systems upgrades. Improvements to Ireland's main battle tank no doubtedly incorporates a more advanced modular design, but also includes new types of smart-munitions and guns.

Design: The Basics
The layout of the S1A1 is almost identical with the S1, except for a few new visible exterior systems. The layout of the S1/A1 follows a design that accommodates a crew for three: Commander, Gunner, and Driver. The Commander and Gunner are seated on the right side of the turret, whilst the Driver is seated at the center front of the hull. However, the S1/A1, rids the need of an extra crew member, the Loader; because of the autoloading system installed. The powerpack assembly is located in the rear, which can be removed in roughly 30 minutes. At nearly 50 tons, the S1A1 is heavier than the original 42 ton S1 layout, but features more horsepower to help accomodate this gain in weight. And it still retains its noted mobility and speed when in comparison to a good majority of Main Battle Tanks, including the M1 Abrams.

Armor: The New Protection
A good majority of the exact layout and composition details of the S1A1's armor is classified. However, the outside layer is thought to be comprised of layers of Titanium sandwiched with Carbon/Polymer Nanofibers that is backed with a layer of Chobham armor. The layers of hollow nanofibers spun from a carbon/polymer composite are tougher than Kevlar, steel, or spider silk; and is literally the toughest material known to man. The Chobham Armor itself, although its exact materials classified, is believed to be a combination of ceramics, plastic, boron carbide, titanium boride, and depleted uranium layered between armour Titanium plating. Behind the Chobham there is a layre of depleted-uranium mesh and another layer of Titanium plate. The S1A1 also features an additional layer of super-dense depleted uranium armor sheathing much of the exterior. Although the S1 featured an exterior electric armor system, it did not feature Electric Reactive Armor within the armor composition. It is made up of two electrically charged plates seperated by an insulator. When an incoming round penetrates the two plates and closes the circut, a high current and voltage flows through the penetrator, vaporizing it, and thus significantly reducing the resulting attack. The system offers a very effective function against KE-penetrators and shaped charged jets.

This is assuming that said "shaped charged" munitions even enter the first stages of the armor composition. The tank features an electric armor system just like the S1 featured. This is the help combat a good majority of penetrators, but most specifically Rocket-Propelled Gernades (RPGs). RPGs are very easy to find, and are very cheap; thus making them a very popular and numerous weapon to use against armored vehicles in even the poorest locations. RPGs and other "shaped charged" munitions have cones of copper embedded in their noses. When the warhead explodes, it crushes the cone, shooting out a jet of hot copper at 5,000 mph -- instantly destroying a wide array of different vehicles. However, with Electric Armor, the jets are stopped even before they attempt to penetrate the composite armor, when the Electric Armor electrifies the jets with tens of thousands of amps of current. Thus, vaporizing some of the deadly copper jets and reduces the rest to a relatively harmless mixture of melted and pulverized debris that disperses around the vehicle.

All in all, the entire armor system of the S1A1 features one of the strongest counter-measures to being penetrated, and can hold up to virtually all tank rounds and most missiles. In order to help prevent the tank's rounds from going off from attack and destroying the tank from the inside; the rounds are kept in heavily armored compartments. The tank also features an onboard fire suppression system that quickly extinguishes any fires that occur inside the tank. The S1/A1 Main Battle Tank is also equipped with an advanced air filter system that purifies all air coming into the tank so that the crew is safe from outside airborne dangers. This feature eliminates the risk of a crew in a potential chemical or biological attack.

Defensive Systems: Stopping the threat before it arrives
The S1/A1 features the UZ-3 integrated laser rangefinder/warning/self-defence device, which takes existing technologies and adapts the latest in powerful laser technologies. Unlike other tanks, for instance, the contemporary Russian active tank self-defense systems like Drozd, Drozd-2, and Arena, which launch projectiles to disable or "shoot-down" incoming anti-tank missiles and projectiles, the Irish system apparently uses a high-powered laser to directly attack the enemy weapon's optics and gunner. This way of stopping projectiles proved to be much more efficient than most "hard-kill" techniques. The Chinese were the first to use this type of "soft-kill" technology, and now the Irish were taking it a new level of power and effeciency. Using the latest in super computer and even nanocomputer technologies, It features highly-powerful jammers to confuse the enemy and stop incoming missiles from hitting it's target.

However, the S1/A1 Main Battle Tank features a number of other systems in dealing with inbounds. Unlike the S1, the S1A1 also features a "hard-kill" active defense system as sort of a "last chance" defense against anti-tank missiles and other munitions. The S1A1 features the SADS-I automated system which is capable of defeating anti-tank guided missiles and grenades. The system has a full 360-degree view around and above the tank via an advanced search and track radar system integrated with a stabilized, forward looking infra-red (FLIR) detector. As soon as it detects a target, it despenses High Explosive Smart Fragmentations, out of its two quad-round launchers. The smart munition is launched and explodes in mid air once it senses the inbound's presence. The system also employs eight 107mm anti-missile rockets, triggered by a pair of millimeter-wave radar sensors mounted on either side of the turret facing forwards. Both the S1 and S1A1 MBTs feature 4 Light SA-7 SAM launchers as its main anti-aircraft defense mechanism. They can be automatically controlled by the targeting computer system installed, or by the secondary gunner. Also equipped are two turret-mounted grenade dischargers that can launch smoke grenades in any direction desired by the crew, to help avoid being seen by the enemy and help escape a risky situation.


Shortstop Electronic Protection System (SEPS)

Irish military planners are fully integrating land units with the Shortstop Electronic Protection System. The SEPS was first initiated by the US Central Command as a quick-reaction response capability for Operation Desert Strom. Units have been deployed in US major operations, and they have been with the US Army Europe (USAREUR) since 1998. The Irish military decided to integrate the system in the majority of its land forces, giving them a hudge advantage against proximity-fuzed weapons such as mortor rounds, artillery shells, and rockets. What Shortstop does, is it detects signals emitted from proximity-fused weapons, modifies the signal and sends it back to the weapon making the fuze think it is close to the ground. The fuze then prematurely detonates the warhead rendering the weapon essentially harmless. The system is automated, works silently, autmatically and cannot be electronically jammed. The system acts as an "electronic umbrella" that can protect military forces, equipment, personnel and high value assets. It is effective against single shot and barrage attacks. Soldiers can be proficient in set-up, operation and maintenance of the Shortstop system after just a few hours of training. Analysis indicates deployment of SHORTSTOP against these weapons can increase survival by as much as 80% during an initial attack.

Propulsion: Getting You There on Time
The S1A1, to accodate for its increase in weight, features a more powerful engine. The original S1 was powerd by a liquid cooled, turbocharged 1,200 hp diesel derived from Germany WD396 diesel technology; an outdated and sometimes weak engine when in comparison to some systems used in Main Battle Tanks around the world. However, Irish war planners felt that the S1A1 is very indigenous in design, and has its own very special attributes; they needed a cooresponding Irish built engine. The Shaitan Corporation, Ireland's leading military technology suppliers answered this call. The S1A1 is powered by a 1,500 horsepower diesel, giving it a power to weight ratio of 30 hp/tonne and a maximum speed of about 93km/h (about 58 mph).

Armament
The main armament of the S1/A1 is a 120mm ETC gun with autoloader. The Electro-Thermal Chemical (ETC) process is where electricity is used to increase the propagation rate of propellant combustion and increase the total amount of energy released by the propellant. ETC is able to be integrated into existing weapons systems. What's more, ETC is completely scalable. You can apply a relatively low amount of electrical energy (less than 100 kilojoules) to speed up conventional propellant ignition (which would cause an earlier peak in chamber pressure, allowing more expanding gas energy to be used to accelerate the projectile). Or at the other end of the spectrum, you can apply very large amounts of energy (5 mega joules) for tailor-made propellants, converting them to a high energy plasma rather than burning in the conventional sense -- this results in even higher chamber pressures than through electrically charged conventional propellants. The gun is capable of firing traditional HEAT (High-Explosive Anti-Tank), APFSDS (Armor Piercing Fin Stabilized Discarding Sabot), and traditional HE/HE-FRAG (High-Explosive / High-Explosive Fragmentation) rounds, as well as Irish developed smart munitions. The main gun carries 50 rounds stored in protected compartments, with 17 being mounted automatically in the auto-reload. After the initial 16 shells have been fired, either the gunner or commander is forced to begin an automatic reload sub-routine, which takes some 50 seconds to complete, though it can be interrupted to resume firing.

The S1/A1 utilizes new generation smart tank munitions, including the X-ROD, a kinetic energy round that contains a wave rader sensor and computer chip in its nose. Fired in the general direction of the enemy, the X-ROD scans the area for a possible target while in flight. After locating and identifying the target, the X-ROD fires a rocket motor, accelerating until it strikes the target. This is the new generation of "fire and forget" munitions used by tanks, and if proven to be very effective in eliminating its targets. Also being used, by both tanks and artillery units, are precision-guided special munitions, including the impressive new Jabberwocky round. The Jabberwocky "shell" contains a powerful broadband-radio noise jammer that disrupts enemy communications over a wide area. A deployed parachute slows its fall, and after landing it deploys a powerful antenna and starts working.

The secondary armament on the S1A1 is a powerful four-barreled Metal Storm machine-gun capable of firing and astounishing 180 thousand rounds per minute. It reaches this astounishing rate of fire by a revolutionary type of ballistics technology called Metal Storm. It utilizes electrical impulses to fire projectiles, rather than conventional mechanical impulses. These weapons have no moving parts aside from the projectiles themselves. The bullets are stacked on end in the barrel, separated only by a thin layer of propellant. A small electric current passing through the barrel ignites the propellant, firing the bullet from the barrel. To prevent one layer of propellant from igniting the rest of the propellant in the barrel, causing a disastrous chain reaction, the bullets are modified so that the head of the bullet will expand, sealing the barrel, when the bullet ahead of it is fired. Because of this and the nature of its electrical firing system, Metal Storm offers a variable rate of fire, from semi-automatic to a devastating 45 thousand rounds per minute per barrel, with each bullet leaving the barrel at only 4” behind the last. Also, because all that is necessary to propel a bullet from the barrel is an electrical impulse, many barrels can be placed in an array and fired all at once. Although it may sound like hypathetical 'near-future technology', it was actually put to use as early as 2002. In fact, the technology is being used not only in Irish weapons systems (such as a handgun varient, sniper-rifle, Area-Denial Weapons System, and even used by an Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicle that carries a total of 14,400 x 40mm grenades, which can be fired electronically from 2,400 barrel tubes), but also for commertial uses such as application for precision fireworks, firefighting, agricultural, and mineral exploration systems. Also for secondary armament is a one 7.62 mm machine-gun in the superstructure, with smart bullets that explode when it reaches its target.

Fire Control System
The advanced, on-board digital fire-control system is a sure signurature of the S1/A1's killing power. The commander's station is equipped with six periscopes, providing a 360-degree view. The S1A1 features a new Commander's Independent Thermal Viewer (CITV) with new-generation thermal imager, a commander's display for digital color terrain maps, DRS Technologies new-generation thermal-imaging gunner's sight with increased range, as well as infra-red imaging, and the Driver's Integrated Display and thermal management system. Also integrated are the tank's own RADAR and LIDAR system that can detect imbounds, and has the ability to track and give firing solutions for more than 30 targets at once. The fire-control computer automatically calculates the fire solution, for targets on the ground and in the air, and fires accordingly. All units, including the S1/A1's are integrated in the military's network centric warfare system, that interlaces units from the air, ground, sea, and space to a tactical network that sends real-time information to units anywhere. This is integrated with the S1/A1s, and a real-time 3D image of the battlefield filled with information is created on the commander's display.


Crew: 3
Weight: 50 tons
Cruising Range: 650 km, or 750 km with external tanks
Maximum Speed: 93km/h (about 58 mph)
Main Gun: Indigenous 120 mm ETC w/ autoloader
- Rate of Fire: 11 rounds/min
Auxiliary Weapon: 1 four-barreled Metal Storm machine-gun, 1 7.62 mm machine-gun
Defensive Measures: 4 SA-7 light SAMs, 2 turret-mounted grenade dischargers, air filtering system, UZ-3, hard-kill defensive system (Smart Fragmentation despensers and eight 107mm anti-missile rockets), SEPS

Cost per Unit:: $6.7 Million (USD)
Production Rights: Unavailable