" Jane's International Defence Review 7/1997, pg. 15: "IMPENETRABLE RUSSIAN TANK ARMOUR STANDS UP TO EXAMINATION "Claims that the armour of Russian tanks is effectively impenetrable, made on the basis of test carried out in Germany (see IDR 7/1996, p.15), have been supported by comments made following tests in the US. "Speaking at a conference on Future Armoured Warfare in London in May, IDR's Pentagon correspondent Leland Ness explained that US tests involved firing trials of Russian-built T-72 tanks fitted with Kontakt-5 explosive reactive armour (ERA). In contrast to the original, or 'light', type of ERA which is effective only against shaped charge jets, the 'heavy' Kontakt-5 ERA is also effective against the long-rod penetrators of APFSDS tank gun projectiles. "When fitted to T-72 tanks, the 'heavy' ERA made them immune to the DU penetrators of M829 APFSDS, fired by the 120 mm guns of the US M1 Abrams tanks, which are among the most formidable of current tank gun projectiles." It has to be noted DU rounds seems even more fragile than Tungsten rounds as they shatter more easily when hitting Kontakt 5 ERA . See a X-ray photo of DM53 penetrator after hitting Kontakt there : http://armor.kiev.ua/fofanov/Tanks/EQP/era.html For more infos , check Tanknet there : http://63.99.108.76/ubb/Forum13/HTML/003585.html Cheers .

1. It's a never ending game of keeping up with the "Jones's". Why do you think there is M829A2 and better today? 2. ERA is not a cure all. A lot of what the Russians say is greatly over exagerated for sales. A RPG7VR is "claimed" to penetrated "X" amount of RHA. This may be true if your hitting aluminum or the warhead is afixed on a stand next to the plate but not flying. They tend to over inflate their stuff. 3. ERA is HIGHLY dependant on what hits it and WHERE. A large steel plate has fairly conformal protection. ERA is NOT that way. If the armor tile is hit in the bottom it provides MUCH less protection than if it is hit on top because of the physics of how it all works. If you have ERA on the side of your vehicle and a oblique shot the performance isemensly different. ERA values are to be viewed as conditionally ideal protection. Red6

But for all practical purposes, K-5 will add an extra ~250mm worth of protection vs. KE. Long Rod-penetrators typically come in from a very much general angle (i.e. horizontally), so ERA will work much more reliably against them than, say RPGs or ATGMs, which could be coming at you from a great variety of angles, especially if launched from a building or aircraft. You've read the article on Fofanov's web-page regarding the steel plates+explosive filling's destructive action vs. APFSDS-T rounds. This basically means that K-5 uses the penetrator's hyper-sonic speed against it by de-stabilizing it in flight and causing (ablatic) shear. While the penetration figures are, of course, very much lower, K-5 would not work against the traditional cannon-ball.

" 1) Why do you think there is M829A2 and better today?" Irrelevant . Penetration values are for RHA and NOT vs active ERA . Kontakt 5 will stop/deflect/shatter M829A3 as easy as M829A1 . " 2) A RPG7VR is "claimed" to penetrated "X" amount of RHA. This may be true if your hitting aluminum" RHA is Rolled Homogeneous Armor . Usually , Rolled Homogeneous Armor (RHA) appears in 3 forms : Armored steel(RHA) Value :270-300 BHN Semi Hardened steel (SHS):400-450 BHN High Hardeness steel (HHS):500-600 BHN The M1 steel is "High Yield Steel" (HYS):320-380 BHN . " 3) .............." That is correct . Cheers .

I looked at that link and no where does it mention DM-53. Where did you get that info from? The article that reports the 'impenetratable tank', a Jim Warford [author who frequents Tank Net], said that was the original M-829, not the more advance M-829A1. If you read the latest book by Zaloga [with the authors Markow and Hull], you will see he quotes about 3 different values for kontact 5 ....if memory serves thats 120mm 200mm or 250mm . These are all against KE warheads.

There are actual standards "norms" that are used for determining penetration. What the Russians use is not a NATO RHA standard. They make up their own $hit. A RPG7VR will NOT achieve its “claimed” penetration values. Besides, there are other variables. A warhead must explode at the right distance from where it needs to begin to penetrate to achieve maximum penetration. This is not so easy when impacting at an angle or flying at 1400 meters per second towards a target. Where it impacts on the ERA is crucial! ERA plates if struck at the bottom of the plate will achieve LITTLE. ERA Plates struck near the top will achieve A LOT. The degree of protection is not homogenous over the area of the plate with ERA. After the Ogive bites in, the rod begins its work. The rod itself is SIGNIFICANTLY different between the types of penetrators even though they look the same to you. There is more than just changes in mass. Newer Sabots are designed to not fracture so easy. They have less decay of KE over distance and can perforate targets where the older ammunition would fail. Their PRIMARY purpose for being is to defeat more advanced armor and be effective at greater range. Red6

"Irrelevant. Penetration values are for RHA and NOT vs active ERA. Kontakt 5 will stop/deflect/shatter M829A3 as easy as M829A1." Um, no. Kontakt 5, as Boris put it, adds 250mm RHA equavalent to the armor. We work under the assumption that all armor can be simplified into RHA equvalent. When we cannot do so, we creat threat-specific RHA values, differing between kinetic and chemical threats. When you look at the math, Kontakt 5's RHAe just doesn't ad up to the penetration latter M829 is capable of. Of latter design, made specifically with defeating Kontakt 5 in mind, they would of necessity not be sheared and deflected as easily as their predesesors. Kontakt 5 is about the best ERA out there, but what it cannot do is mythically defeat all top of the line DU rounds without regard to the base armor it is enforcing. This has been discussed ad nauseum on this board--Kontakt 5 will not defeat M829A2, much less M829A3. Check previous posts for reference.

Rgr that , will do . Cheers .

I do believe you can find some reference to K-5 under a thread I began about the evolution of Russian and American tanks throughout cold war, maybe the thread was called M1A1PI v. T-80BV.