The Armed Forces of Ukraine have several tanks of the T-84 family, which are essentially heavily improved T-80UDs. The Ukrainians improved the T-80 to increase protection and survivability of the three-man crew.
These tanks are produced in two versions. The first is the T-84 Oplot, and the second is its budget variant, the T-84U. Ukraine should have had at least six T-84 Oplots – and one or two T-84Us – when full-scale war with Russia began.
Interestingly, even though these military vehicles are used in combat, there are no confirmed losses so far. They were hit several times by Russian Lancet-3 drones, but the tanks withstood these attacks without any problems.
Tanks “T-84” – an improved version of the best Soviet tank
The biggest difference between the T-84 Oplot tanks and the T-80 is the abandonment of the carousel loading system, which remained only in the budget variant of the T-84U tank. It has been replaced by western solutions of automatic loading.
The second major change is the use of heavy, two-layer reactive Dupelt armor, which provides effective protection against projectiles with tandem warheads.
Thanks to such protection, the weight of the tank has increased significantly – up to about 51 tons, which is a weight record for post-Soviet tanks. By comparison, the Russian T-90M weighs 47 tons. This necessitated the use of a more powerful 1200hp diesel engine to maintain satisfactory mobility.
In addition, the Ukrainian tank is also equipped with the Zaslon active protection system, which can shoot down incoming anti-tank missiles, similar to the Israeli Trophy system.
All this and a modern fire control system with a 125 mm KBA-3 gun with an installed thermal imager and the ability for the crew to operate in the “hunter-killer” mode (some Western tanks, for example, the Leopard 2A6 have this function), make The T-84 Opłot is a powerful tank. With the crew operating in “hunter-killer” mode, the commander first points the gun at the target using a panoramic sight, leaving the gunner to aim more accurately, which significantly reduces the time from target detection to destruction.
Tired command „WP tech“.
2024-09-06 07:54:34