Frag Out! Magazine
Issue link: https://fragout.uberflip.com/i/1150145
Kontakt 1 (sic!), the simplified drawings of a cleared armor as presented on the next slide leave no doubt – they show the exact structure of a hull and a turret of the T-80U as manufactured since 1988 (!). So, how good was the armor? The equivalent thickness of the turret armor for the angle of 30° with respect to the longitudinal axis was up to 550 mm. For 0° – about 740 mm. On the right and left side of the turret there were two chambers for special armor – each about 260 mm wide. At the angle of 30° with respect to the longitudinal axis of the turret the special armor featured a 30 mm air gap, followed by two 40 mm layers of ceramics enclosed within 25 mm-thick steel plates, with a 50 mm-thick rear plate. The final element was a 50 mm-thick high-hard plate. According to esti- mates, the structure offered about 460 mm against kinetic energy pene- trators and 550 mm against shaped charge ammunition. It is reasonable to mention here the range of resistance, which – assuming the position- ing at an angle towards the rear of the turret head – would amount to up to 630 mm against kinetic energy penetrators and up to 750 shaped charge ammunition. The entire structure is shielded with 4s22 Kontakt 5 ERA tile. Round is then able to overcome the armor of the turret and the hull of the tank in question head-on (!). And this holds true in the case of not only the T-80U (Object 219AS) but also the T-80UD (Object 478BE), the T-72B from 1989 (Object 184), and the T-90S (Object 188). It can be therefore acknowledged that thanks to the excellent shaped charge warhead, the tanks manufactured in the Soviet Union and later in Russia (also in their later modernized versions) were prone to PzF-3IT600 attacks from the front. There is some lack of clarity when it comes to the T-90A (Objest 188A1), and only the latest T-90M (Object 188M) seems www.fragoutmag.com