Sanctions against Russia

[onetrack]

In an article dated 24th April 2022, the news is that the main Russian tank factory is in serious difficulties as regards tank production, with a lack of availability of crucial components, as well as having major financial problems. The factory has set aside an area for damaged tank reconditioning, but that operation will obviously be stalled, thanks to the forementioned problems. 

 

https://argun-kazakhstan.com/tpost/sca8umolk1-media-production-of-new-tanks-stops-in-r

 

The T-90M is a potent bit of gear, but the claims about it being able to resist explosive hits from any direction are not borne out by the Ukrainians success with their T-90M kill.

In what seems to be a bit of afterthought engineering, the T-90M carries two drums of fuel on the outside of the tank body at the rear - for additional range, obviously. These would have to be a prime target for guerrilla attacks with a shoulder-fired missile.

 

https://www.rbth.com/science-and-tech/330065-4-facts-about-russias-т90

 

The logs carried on the side of the T-90M are a simple and basic idea for de-bogging. You simply tie the log across the tracks, and this will pull any tracked machine out of the deepest bog.

If they carried them lower, they would provide an increased degree of protection to the road wheels, the most vulnerable area of a tank.

 

https://www.armyrecognition.com/russia_russian_army_tank_heavy_armoured_vehicles_u/t-90m_proryv-3_model_2017_mbt_main_battle_tank_pictures_video.html

 

I can't find out anything about the T-90M's steering system. But steering clutches disengaged by levers, and track brakes operated by foot, are pretty much the standard design for all tanks.

However, it appears the T-90M has gone to an integrated system whereby the steering controls are combined into a steering wheel.

This is a copy of the early (1950's) Fiat bulldozer (Fiat 55L) design. We all used to have a laugh at a bulldozer with a steering wheel, but it worked O.K. once you got used to it. The steering box was simply connected to the steering clutch disengagement system.

 

Cat dozers have had a system for a while called "diff steer" which is a very complex system that utilises two hydraulic motors operating planetary gear sets that are inserted in the cross shaft, between the bevel gear and the steering clutches. You operate the diff steer control to actuate the planetary gear set, and it causes the output speed of that side to alter, resulting in a smooth but steady speed variation between right side and left side tracks. I do not know of any tank utilising diff steer, but the design would be very useful in a tank for gentle directional changes at speed.

 

 

 

Edited May 17, 2022 by onetrack

[willedoo]

I seem to remember a bren gun carrier having a steering wheel. I think it had long rods running back to the steering clutches.

[onetrack]

Yep, the Bren Gun Carrier (Universal Carrier) had a neat steering setup. Basically, the BGC only used a complete Ford 3 ton truck drivetrain - complete with truck rear axle and diff.

The track drive sprockets were simply mounted in place of the trucks wheels and the steering setup simply utilised the trucks rear axle brakes.

 

However, this arrangement alone was quite dangerous at speed, as application of just one rear axle brake could cause a major course deviation at high speed, when you really only wanted a minor course adjustment.

The designers got around this by designing a system that laterally displaced the front track bogie slightly, in the initial steering wheel movement. This was all that was needed for minor course corrections at high speed.

 

Further movement of the steering wheel started to apply the rear axle brake, which gave you sharper turns. The truck diff allowed for variations in track speeds - but it's rare for tracked machines to have a diff, because a diff means more power goes to the track with least resistance - when you really need full, even power, to both tracks.

 

A drive system with a diff means, in a bog situation, the track that is stuck further into the bog won't drive as fast as the track that is further out of the bog, and you either start going in a circle, or you have to really stand on the brake for the track that's out of the bog, meaning this is a self-defeating, power-consuming exercise.

 

The Cletrac and Oliver tractors were one of the few crawler designs that utilised a diff, and Cletrac and Oliver bragged it was of benefit - but really, it wasn't - and buyers of crawler machines eventually resisted purchasing crawlers fitted with diffs, and Oliver sales fell away in the late 1950's, and White Motor Corporation (who had purchased Oliver) closed the tractor factory in 1961 to concentrate on truck manufacturing.

 

Interestingly, all the Australian built BGC's omitted the track bogie displacement system, possibly to simplify the design, and speed up production.

We produced a total of 5,600 BGC's, and they were built at the Ford factory, Homebush, N.S.W, the Victorian Railways Workshops, the Railway Workshops, Islington, S.A., and the State Engineering Workshops, Fremantle, W.A.

 

https://ww2db.com/vehicle_spec.php?q=532#:~:text=Mechanically the same as the,braking for more abrupt turns.

 

Edited May 17, 2022 by onetrack

[old man emu]

Australian Bren Gun Carrier:

 

• Carrier, Machine Gun, Local Pattern, No. 1: Also known as "LP1 Carrier (Aust)". Australian production similar to Bren carrier but welded and some minor differences.
• Universal Carrier MG, Local Pattern No. 2: Also known as "LP2 Carrier (Aust)". Australian-built variant of the Universal Carrier. Also produced in New Zealand. Used 1938–1939 Ford commercial axles; the 2A had 1940 Ford truck axles.
• 2-pounder Anti-tank Gun Carrier (Aust) or Carrier, 2-pdr Tank Attack: A heavily modified and lengthened LP2 carrier with a fully traversable QF 2 pounder (40 mm) anti-tank gun mounted on a platform at the rear and the engine moved to the front left of the vehicle. Stowage was provided for 112 rounds of 2pdr ammunition. 200 were produced and used for training.
• 3 inch Mortar Carrier (Aust): A design based on the 2 Pounder Carrier with a 3-inch (76 mm) mortar mounted in place of the 2 pounder. Designed to enable the mortar to have 360 degree traverse and to be fired either from the vehicle, or dismounted. 400 were produced and were ultimately sent as military aid to the Nationalist Chinese Army.

 

[octave]

Not particularly an area of interest to me but this clip shows a the Bren Gun Carrier being driven  What is interesting (at least to me at least) is that at the guy driving it at the 9:40 point in the video is my son. 

 

1942 LP2 Bren Gun Carrier: Regular Car Reviews

[willedoo]

55 minutes ago, octave said:

Not particularly an area of interest to me but this clip shows a the Bren Gun Carrier being driven  What is interesting (at least to me at least) is that at the guy driving it at the 9:40 point in the video is my son. 

Looks like real strongarm steering.

[willedoo]

An interesting interview with Leonid Dyachenko, former son in law of Boris Yeltsin:

 

https://vickyward.substack.com/p/how-can-you-win-a-war-with-the-whole?utm_campaign=post&s=r

[Yenn]

The old bren gun carriers certainly did need a strong arm. The first 90 degrees of steering wheel rotation moved a cross arm, which moved the road wheel in the centre one way or the other. That put a bend in the track and gave you a big radius turn. The drive train was a 4 speed box and a flat head V8 Ford. Driving them in my opinion was great fun.

The C class British tanks, that is Comet, Centurian Conqueres etc had a very complex gear box with two inputs from the engine. One ran through the gears in the normal way and the other powered an epicyclic steering system. I used to be able to explain how it worked, but that was nearly sixty years ago.

Neutral gear gave you one track going forward and one in reverse when you pulled the steering lever. First gave you a fairly sharp radius turn and from memory fifth gear gave 110' radius turn. To really stuff you up though reverse gear reversed the steering. In the few write ups in motoring magazine by journos who have drive a Centurian, none of them mentioned this fact.

After time in the army working on tanks among other things, I can think of nothing worse than having to go to war in one.

[old man emu]

This explains it all:

 

[pmccarthy]

We loved to climb over them at the Albury show when they were brought in from Bandiana.

[willedoo]

19 hours ago, Yenn said:

After time in the army working on tanks among other things, I can think of nothing worse than having to go to war in one.

I recently read a comparison of Russian tanks and the Abrahms. It was in relation to the spate of Russian tanks suffering secondary explosions from ammunition cooking off. In the end, it came down to whether you'd rather blow up in a Russian tank or burn in an Abrahms. Not good options either way. Even staying alive in one would be a hard experience.

 

[old man emu]

On 15/05/2022 at 11:21 PM, Jerry_Atrick said:

Another interesting interview.. Gotta feel for the pawns in this deadly and traumatic game.

 

 

A kid like this is the same as a German kid grown up in the Hitlerjugend. The same as a Japanese kid. The same as a modern Chinese kid. The same as a kid amongst the Taliban. The same as an American kid.

 

During WWII, Disney made a lot of propaganda cartoons/cartoon format pictures. Here's one of them

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Education_For_Death.ogv

[willedoo]

The start of that interview where they discuss the wounded reminded me that I read somewhere that the FSB was checking injuries. Presumably if they determined the wounds were self inflicted, the soldier would be in a lot of trouble.

[nomadpete]

Quote:

"During WWII, Disney made a lot of propaganda cartoons/cartoon format pictures."

 

OME, at risk of playing devil's advocate, watching your Disney propaganda cartoon made me wonder ....

Could it be a parody of modern USA - once you replace the swastika armbands with little american flags?

[willedoo]

The Russian naval blockade in the Black Sea is taking it's toll on the grain industry. 2019 figures for Ukraine's contribution to world grain supplies were: 42% of the world’s sunflower oil exports, 16% of corn exports, 10% of barley and 9% of wheat. Currently, it's estimated that 25 million tonnes of grain is stuck in Ukraine, along with 85 commercial ships. Ukraine farmers are about to start harvesting winter crops but lack storage.

 

Adding to the problem, Russian forces have been accused of destroying storage facilities and stealing farm equipment. Theft of Ukraine's grain by Russia is so far estimated at 440,000 tonnes, including a cargo of 27,000 tonnes of grain sent to Syria.

[willedoo]

The Ukrainians have been using fish bait bombs to drop grenades on Russian troops from small commercial drones. The grenades fit neatly inside, and on impact, the two plastic halves pop open and release the unpinned grenade. The grenade fuse delay can also be modified so they explode on impact without the delay.

 

[old man emu]

3 hours ago, nomadpete said:

Quote:

"During WWII, Disney made a lot of propaganda cartoons/cartoon format pictures."

 

OME, at risk of playing devil's advocate, watching your Disney propaganda cartoon made me wonder ....

Could it be a parody of modern USA - once you replace the swastika armbands with little american flags?

No need to be the Devil's Advocate. In fact, the great Greek philosopher Aristotle once said, “Give me a child until he is 7 and I will show you the man.”  And in a similar vein, Alexander Pope said in  Epistles to Several Persons (1732): ‘'Tis education forms the common mind, Just as the twig is bent the tree's inclined.’

 

Goebbels was a master at the art of political espalier. So's ScoMo. 

 

It seems that in modern times, those people who are more aggressive in expounding their opinions home in on children to cause change. Remember when you kids harped on at you about smoking? Now they are indoctrinated with Global Warming, protecting bushland from use by anyone, political correctness. And that's just kids in societies not expressing by right or left wing extremes.

[Marty_d]

4 hours ago, old man emu said:

Now they are indoctrinated with Global Warming...

I'd actually argue that children are ahead of the adults and most politicians on this issue.  It's not a matter of indoctrination - it's the reality that it's their world to inherit, and it's going to be a far worse one in terms of the effects of climate change than the ones their parents and grandparents lived in.

 

If you see the disparaging and dismissive way that most politicians - especially those from conservative parties - treat young people who are protesting or advocating action to mitigate these effects, it's really the reverse of indoctrination.

[old man emu]

8 hours ago, Marty_d said:

I'd actually argue that children are ahead of the adults and most politicians on this issue

That could be true, and it could be a good thing as "the meek shall inherit the Earth". However, getting back to the point of propaganda and indoctrination, who provided these concepts to the children? They certainly didn't come up with them themselves?  It's the same as the advertising side of merchandising. Who creates fads and exploits them? It all starts with propaganda.

 

"Propaganda" as a word has an interesting history. Originally it was short for Congregatio de Propaganda Fide (congregation for propagating the faith), a committee of cardinals established 1622 by Gregory XV. Later it came to mean any movement or organization to propagate some practice or ideology (1790). The modern political sense of information intended to promote a political point of view dates from World War I, and was not originally negative implying bias or deliberate misleading. By the start of the 1930's it was picking up its current negative sense.

[nomadpete]

I at least agree with the amazing reversal of the meaning of the word 'propaganda'. It now means 'spreading total BS.'

 

Many of the kids -moreso than the millennials or the oldies - are not being meek about climate change. Sure, there are adults showing them how to voice their concern. But many kids are actively thinking about it, which is much more questioning than mindlessly swallowing propaganda.

 

The only thing that the propaganda machine is achieving, is distracting their concern from all the other pollution problems facing the human race. And overpopulation. Which are even more immediate than climate changes.

 

 

Edited May 18, 2022 by nomadpete
added more opinionated propaganda of my own. And it belongs in the 'climate change' thread anyway

[Jerry_Atrick]

The difference between propaganda and accepted science is, well, as OME states:

43 minutes ago, old man emu said:

propagating the faith

or, in other words, an ideology and certainly not proven. Accepted science holds itself up for critical peer review. Even when it is accepted, it is not always right, but the most likely explanation based on emperical observations and some interpolation and extrapolation - but it does get corrected when new data or technology is able to. Of course, it's reporting is subject to propaganda, but there are many who review the actual research rather than propaganda based presentations baased on someone or some news proprietor's ideology.

 

Even science can succumb to confirmation bias and the like.. But kids don't have as entrenched belief systems because they simply haven't been around as long for them to become so entrenched.. so they tend to be more open to new things..

[old man emu]

I don't mean to go down the religion/science path in this thread, but when I wrote Congregatio de Propaganda Fide (congregation for propagating the faith), I should have used upper case for the English translation of the 1622 name of the papal committee. That would indicate that the name referred specifically to a Catholic instrumentality which was clearly established to counter the spread of Protestantism. A fight between two approaches to the same spiritual topic and nothing to do with the secular world. 

[spacesailor]

Indoctrination! .

Flouride is good for your teeth !

But never has children's teeth been as bad as todays.

Global warming  !,

Could be GOOD for our world .

Longer  growing season, for our food crops, 

Less houses wil burn down trying to keep warm.

No more burst water pipes after they are frozen.

No more cracked engine blocks from frozen coolant.

This list may go o  for ever !.

BUT

No more chilblanes on my toes is a GOD send. 

AND not least !.

This COLD WORLD 

SNOWBALL EARTH

Is Not Earth,s natural temperature .   Archeology tellsj us, it WAS much warmer in those old days.

spacesailor

 

 

[nomadpete]

The natural temperature of a planet in free space might be somewhere around minus 200 degrees or so, once the internal magma cools down. Our goldilocks temperature is but a passing phase of the long term life of a planet. It happens to be relatively suitable for habitation at present.

The pollutions spread by these transient beings who call themselves human, must effect the planet.

Personally, I think our impact is significant. I also think we should be doing everything possible to have a cleaner place to live - even though that might have some (transient, mild, non life threatening) increase in the cost of living.

Edited May 19, 2022 by nomadpete

[nomadpete]

I wonder how much global temperature rise will result from the release of a couple of thousand nuclear explosions?

 

Judging by the historic pictures of atom bomb tests, they appear to release quite a bit of heat