What amazes me is all the pictures of destroyed tanks with the turrets blown completely off, relatively intact, and anything from 10 to 50 feet from the hull. Anyone have any idea how that actually happens? I know the NLAW is pretty potent but from what I've seen it's an overhead blast directly above the turret. From what I've seen of tanks, the turret is held on by eight or more extremely heavy roller bearings so getting it to "pop" like that would take some very rapid and serious internal overpressure.
Normally the ammo goes off in the tank after a fire and blows the turret off ..
Good example here of a Syrian tank getting hit .. commander is blow out of the tank, then a flare up .. often after the flare up more ammo cooks off and the turret flies ..
I'd agree with that except that an internal explosion of that magnitude would result in a lot of other significant damage to the hull. There have been multiple shots of tanks that show the hull being pretty pristine aside from the fact that the turret laying on the ground. I guess an internal overpressure developed from a fuel/air explosion over the tank could produce enough of a low pressure area to pop the turret and anyone inside the hull.
I'd agree with that except that an internal explosion of that magnitude would result in a lot of other significant damage to the hull. There have been multiple shots of tanks that show the hull being pretty pristine aside from the fact that the turret laying on the ground. I guess an internal overpressure developed from a fuel/air explosion over the tank could produce enough of a low pressure area to pop the turret and anyone inside the hull.
Based on the videos I guess these new antitank weapons are design to target the joint between the turret and the hull. Still doesn't bode well for the tank crew.
What amazes me is all the pictures of destroyed tanks with the turrets blown completely off, relatively intact, and anything from 10 to 50 feet from the hull. Anyone have any idea how that actually happens? I know the NLAW is pretty potent but from what I've seen it's an overhead blast directly above the turret. From what I've seen of tanks, the turret is held on by eight or more extremely heavy roller bearings so getting it to "pop" like that would take some very rapid and serious internal overpressure.
I think the damage isn't immediately obvious a lot of the time. It uses a shaped charge - I believe you can see it in the slow mo of the explosion in the Saab video someone posted above.
NLAW is laser guided I believe which means Explosive Reactive Armour doesn't work because there's no RF emiitted. It flies to I think 3-6 feet over the vehicle then detonates a downward facing shaped charge that fires a jet of moulten meltal through the top of the tank. That's why most tanks burn out after being hit and many crews get incinerated. As for turrets, I believe they are held on by gravity only. At many tons, they're not exactly going to fall off easily.
Not sure what happened in the video of them going into that town and then retreating or what weapons were used. Probably mostly rpg's. Whatever they tried to hit the front tank with clearly exploded in front so if guided someone moved the aiming point at the critical moment. However, NLAW has proven effective in most scenarios just has Javelin although I believe ERA can detect Javelin. It's top down mode evades it though from what I've heard.
I spent a week out in Letterkenny Army Depot, in PA, some years ago. That base rebuilds, refurbs, armor like howitzers and tanks. From what I saw the turret has a set of rollers that sort of clamp the turret onto the hull from below. Even at a few tons the recoil of the main gun could probably bounce the turret out of place if that weren't the case, especially if the main gun is fired with the tank in motion on rough terrain.
EDIT for context. I saw this again, and took it a very different way-- as though it was diminishing or minimizing the Ukraine war.
I initially saw this as satirical of the unthinking myopic liberal being led to spew the narrative of the government/media "hypnotist" in charge, and That is why I posted it.
