Merkava 4B/M Discussion Thread

[SubZero_0 268]

I think gaijin hates israel

[GLhsHaxBadAudio 33]

On 17/03/2022 at 18:56, Zucc_Boi said:

Exhibit 1:

Merkava 3D side turret armor. 

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 2:

Merkava 4A side turret armor.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 3:

Damaged Merkava 4A with exposed side hull and turret armor.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 4:

Merkava 4M with open hull front armor module.

Hide contents

 

Exhibit 5:

Close up on exhibit 4.

Hide contents

 

Exhibit 6:

Merkava 4B turret side armor.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 7:

Merkava 4B or 4M with lifted hull front armor module.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 8:

Merkava 4M with removed side armor module.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 9:

Merkava 4M showing different bolt patterns on turret armor.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 10:

Merkava 4B or 4M turret side module showing "T6 explosive series 01 05 TZ" (TZ could possibly be acronym for IMI which is now an Elbit subsidiary.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 11:

Merkava 4B or 4M hull front module showing "Explosive series 01 11 Ramta" (Ramta is a division of IAI).

Reveal hidden contents

 

 

Putting these photos here, will possibly write a post soon.

 

Additional photo of the frontal plate, with some hazy pixel measurements. Angle of the image is likely to skew, but possibly relevant still.

[SquinkleToes 29]

On 17/03/2022 at 22:56, Zucc_Boi said:

Exhibit 1:

Merkava 3D side turret armor. 

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 2:

Merkava 4A side turret armor.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 3:

Damaged Merkava 4A with exposed side hull and turret armor.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 4:

Merkava 4M with open hull front armor module.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 5:

Close up on exhibit 4.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 6:

Merkava 4B turret side armor.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 7:

Merkava 4B or 4M with lifted hull front armor module.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 8:

Merkava 4M with removed side armor module.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 9:

Merkava 4M showing different bolt patterns on turret armor.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 10:

Merkava 4B or 4M turret side module showing "T6 explosive series 01 05 TZ" (TZ could possibly be acronym for IMI which is now an Elbit subsidiary.

Reveal hidden contents

 

Exhibit 11:

Merkava 4B or 4M hull front module showing "Explosive series 01 11 Ramta" (Ramta is a division of IAI).

Reveal hidden contents

 

 

Putting these photos here, will possibly write a post soon.

Im so insanely pissed they nerfed and removed all of the Mk4M ans 4bs armour last second. I thought the armour in the test server was perfectly fine, made this thing competitive, add a new flavour to top tier but no, instead they just made it another glass cannon, removed all its armour it should have and gave it one of the slowest reloads at its tier. Ridiculous balancing. Wont be grinding isreal anymore 

Edited March 29, 2022 by ThyOnionChild

[SquinkleToes 29]

I seriously hope they give the Mk4M the armour values it had on the dev server. It was more realistic and made this thing worth while. Im so pissed of they removed all its armour last second and gave it a terrible reload on top of that. Whats the point of grinding this tank then? I won't until it gets buffed. Give the turret armour back. 

 

[Lord_Prism 1,824]

1 hour ago, ThyOnionChild said:

Im so insanely pissed they nerfed and removed all of the Mk4M ans 4bs armour last second. I thought the armour in the test server was perfectly fine, made this thing competitive, add a new flavour to top tier but no, instead they just made it another glass cannon, removed all its armour it should have and gave it one of the slowest reloads at its tier. Ridiculous balancing. Wont be grinding isreal anymore 

Anything not Russian doesnt get its proper armor values

[Cairn_67 537]

Here are two photos of a Merkava Mk4 damaged in a training accident in 2016. Apparently one Mk4 manoeuvred into the blind spot of another Mk4 moments before the second tank fired.

Spoiler

According to the few details I could find, this tank was hit (point-blank) by an inert 120mm HEAT round, and none of the tanks had the standard combat armour package.

 

I just found this photo of a Mk4 destroyed in Lebanon (2006). Two Mk4s were destroyed in that war, one fell to Kornet strikes the other to a 'super-heavy' IED. This tank is cited to be the IED victim.

Spoiler

One crew member KIA, the others were listed as wounded.

Many years ago I read that the Mk4 lost to Kornets was recovered but considered not worth the repair costs, and so the Mk4 was donated to the Latrun tank museum.

 

Most of the IDF's tank losses in the 2006 War could be attributed to multiple IDF / Knesset errors...Absent OPSEC, indecisive Senior Command, inept political leadership, poor training, accountants placed in charge of the Mk4's production (the Wadi Saluki battle featured several such blunders)...None of those mistakes were repeated in the following Gaza conflicts (2008, 2014), and as a result no Merkava crews were harmed by opposing ATGMs. 

 

Some random Merkava Mk4 photos I've extracted from the internet...

Spoiler

 

(^an IDF selfie-stick)

 

 

Oh, and here's one of my favourite photos of the Mk4. I acquired this pic from the militaryphotos.net website many years ago. Pity the website is no longer active. Although there might be some other decent Merkava photos dispersed throughout the Military Images' IDF thread.

Spoiler

Note: the colours may appear off as I processed the original image in Photoshop (and converted it to .PDF) to prepare for printing...I got a decent A3 print out of the experiment...The .PDF image was converted back to .JPEG so I could post it here (the .PDF file is 24mb), and that probably affected the colour sampling / bit depth / formatting (CMYK to RGB?).

Update: TinyEye image search led me to a scaled down (and otherwise unaltered) copy of the original image... 

General note: Laminating is a cheap way to enhance the colours of a printed image, and it helps to preserve the print too. 

 

Edited March 29, 2022 by Cairn_67
Another image + more info

[Ariesv 692]

I just posted a bug report to try to get the weight of the Merkava Mk. 4s corrected to closer to 80 tons. One source included an video from the IDF's official Youtube channel stating such a figure. If anyone has additional sources for that figure I can attach them to the report. 

If the weight gets changed to 80 tons it'll hopefully be easier to argue for better armor.

 

In other news does anyone know why the turret traverse speed is lower than that of the earlier Merkavas?

Edited March 29, 2022 by Ariesv

[Cairn_67 537]

40 minutes ago, Ariesv said:

[...]

In other news does anyone know why the turret traverse speed is lower than that of the earlier Merkavas?

The Mk4's turret traverse speed should be faster than the earlier marks. The Mk4's fire control, and turret traverse, is advertised as being able to track and engage combat helicopters with the cannon, and rotate independent of the hull...Steering changes by the tank's driver will not affect the turret's aim or tracking...

 

Oh, the most common weight listing I can find for the Mk4 is 65 tons. If the tank was 80 tons or over the IDF would need multi-linked trailers to carry it, instead of standard heavy-load trailers.

Spoiler

 

I doubt the Mk4 is heavy enough to warrant one of these...

...Although it would be an interesting Euro / US Truck Simulator mod.

 

Edited March 29, 2022 by Cairn_67

[WarStalkeR 15]

On 26/03/2022 at 18:58, WingardiumLevioS said:

I think gaijin hates israel

Same here. There is so much public material about it, including live performance in battles that any "classified" information is just unnecessary (like in some *cough* other *cough* threads). And yet Gaijin was "kind" enough to implement only 1/10 of real Merkava 4. My conclusion that Gaijin were either too lazy to analyze all the public materials, or Gaijin has some personal vendetta against Israel in general, or Gaijin will post yet another "balance" excuse soon.

 

I was very shocked to find that "famous" Merkava 4's composite armor (that is actually famous for its survivability) was effective against KEPs pretty much as butter is effective against hot knife. Also, from the photos posted here it seems like Gaijin "removed" some blocks of armor from the sides, for whatever reason.

 

Also, regarding Trophy and how it is implemented in War Thunder (everything is based on publicly available information):

* Trophy's radars being treated as Trophy launcher module and having 6 ammo is funny in its own way.

* Having only 3 ammo per Trophy countermeasure launcher, when it is physically obvious that it holds much more is a screw up.

* There is a lot of public information from official sources that it grants 360° protection with very wide elevation angles.

* There is a lot of public information from official sources that it stops, almost everything, including HEAT rounds. I don't see it in game.

* There were messages as early, as when Trophy had been released officially (2007) that it is planned to be able to counter KEPs as well. I'm pretty sure that during these 15 years it acquired this feature, even if it isn't mentioned anywhere officially. Gaijin, stop gaijining things around and implement them as they are.

 

Furthermore, my dear Gaijin... WHERE IS THE LAHAT ATGM ON MY MERKAVAS!? Won't it be very sad, if I will stop buying gold from you, Gaijin?

Edited March 29, 2022 by WarStalkeR

[Ariesv 692]

10 minutes ago, Cairn_67 said:

Oh, the most common weight listing I can find for the Mk4 is 65 tons. If the tank was 80 tons or over the IDF would need multi-linked trailers to carry it, instead of standard heavy-load trailers.

Funny you should mention the trailer limit; one of the sources I found for the 80 ton weight is the following article from 2006 talking about transporter weight limits:

https://www.port2port.co.il/article/הובלה-יבשתית/בן-הרוש-חושף-שורת-ליקויים-בהובלת-טנקים-ונגמ-שים-במלחמת-לבנון-השנייה/

"The chairman of the Council of Carriers and Drivers in Israel claims that 50% of the transports of tanks and APCs in the last war were done on unsuitable carriers and that the latest legislation makes it difficult to transport weapons properly."

and 

"Harush Has limited the weight of the Israeli carrier to 50 tons, and that it brings to an end the period in which two APCs can be loaded on a carrier, or even one chariot tank weighing 80 tons."

 

10 minutes ago, Cairn_67 said:

The Mk4's turret traverse speed should be faster than the earlier marks. The Mk4's fire control, and turret traverse, is advertised as being able to track and engage combat helicopters with the cannon, and rotate independent of the hull...Steering changes by the tank's driver will not affect the turret's aim or tracking...

I shudder to think what logic Gaijin used to make it slower in-game. 

Edited March 29, 2022 by Ariesv

[Zucc_Boi 656]

2 hours ago, WarStalkeR said:

Having only 3 ammo per Trophy countermeasure launcher, when it is physically obvious that it holds much more is a screw up.

3 per launcher is the right number. Apparently one forum member I still follow, went to a defense expo where Rafael presented, and they told him it was 3 charges per launcher.

It also makes sense because adding any more than that is just unnecessary IRL. In WT it would be nice but it's not developed for WT.

The reason, very briefly, is that external modules are likely to be damaged til inoperability by the time all charges are exhausted.

 

2 hours ago, WarStalkeR said:

There were messages as early, as when Trophy had been released officially (2007) that it is planned to be able to counter KEPs as well. I'm pretty sure that during these 15 years it acquired this feature, even if it isn't mentioned anywhere officially. Gaijin, stop gaijining things around and implement them as they are.

The implementation of an anti-KE mechanism was delayed again til 2023, and Rafael spoke in IAV 2021 about the remaining difficulties in doing such thing, and that any working solution would still have not so high reliability.

It requires changing the interceptor itself. The solution was the Iron Fist launcher, but as I said it was delayed several times.

[SubZero_0 268]

merkava mk4 takes pressure damage.gaijin you are a really lousy company

 

[WarStalkeR 15]

10 hours ago, Zucc_Boi said:

3 per launcher is the right number. Apparently one forum member I still follow, went to a defense expo where Rafael presented, and they told him it was 3 charges per launcher.

It also makes sense because adding any more than that is just unnecessary IRL. In WT it would be nice but it's not developed for WT.

The reason, very briefly, is that external modules are likely to be damaged til inoperability by the time all charges are exhausted.

Well, I'm pretty sure what was presented is export variant. And all of us known that in a lot of the cases export variant is half of the original at very best (and sometimes even less of that). I'm pretty sure that non-export variant of Trophy-HV has more charges and is undisclosed for safety reasons. I'd bet on 6 at very least, as non-export charges may be even more compact than they seem.

 

10 hours ago, Zucc_Boi said:

The implementation of an anti-KE mechanism was delayed again til 2023, and Rafael spoke in IAV 2021 about the remaining difficulties in doing such thing, and that any working solution would still have not so high reliability.

It requires changing the interceptor itself. The solution was the Iron Fist launcher, but as I said it was delayed several times.

It is either truth or they just decided not to disclose it. To greatly reduce KEP's effect it is enough just to shift projectile's heading/direction without shifting it's flight course. And current Trophy's charge has more than enough explosive power to do so. It won't make KEP change it's course, but if KEP will just slam into tank under wrong angle, it's effect will be greatly reduced. It is pretty obvious that such feature will be implemented as soon, as somebody will get the right idea - and I'm pretty sure that people in Rafael more clever than I am to get such idea. To implement it properly, Gaijin will have to expand upon existing APS mechanics, where APS' charge can change projectile's heading/direction, without changing it's flight course.

 

9 hours ago, WingardiumLevioS said:

merkava mk4 takes pressure damage.gaijin you are a really lousy company

Oh lol. This really feels like personal Gaijin's vendetta against Israel.

 

Edited March 29, 2022 by WarStalkeR

[Zucc_Boi 656]

2 hours ago, WarStalkeR said:

Well, I'm pretty sure what was presented is export variant. And all of us known that in a lot of the cases export variant is half of the original at very best (and sometimes even less of that). I'm pretty sure that non-export variant of Trophy-HV has more charges and is undisclosed for safety reasons. I'd bet on 6 at very least, as non-export charges may be even more compact than they seem.

"Export variants" aka "monkey model" is a myth that was created around Soviet equipment during the cold war to try and explain the miserable combat performance of non-Soviet states, particularly the Arab states.

Any differences between domestic and exported Soviet equipment was better explained by factors like availability and customer demands.

Israel, as all western countries, does not sell downgraded export variants of domestic systems. If anything, on a global scale, export models tend to be more capable and sophisticated than domestic ones.

What Israel may change in export systems is items desired by the customer, and inner mechanisms/algorithms that do not affect performance whatsoever and only with the aim of protecting the system's secrecy.

 

I have personally inspected only 1 Merkava 4M tank, which for some reason had empty charges, so I cannot comment with absolute certainty, but you should just accept the fact that Trophy does not have more than 3 charges per side.

 

As I said, realistically it makes no sense to put any more than that. And these things are expensive. They are made of tungsten, which is a very expensive metal to acquire and work with.

2 hours ago, WarStalkeR said:

It is either truth or they just decided not to disclose it. To greatly reduce KEP's effect it is enough just to shift projectile's heading/direction without shifting it's flight course. And current Trophy's charge has more than enough explosive power to do so. It won't make KEP change it's course, but if KEP will just slam into tank under wrong angle, it's effect will be greatly reduced. It is pretty obvious that such feature will be implemented as soon, as somebody will get the right idea - and I'm pretty sure that people in Rafael more clever than I am to get such idea. To implement it properly, Gaijin will have to expand upon existing APS mechanics, where APS' charge can change projectile's heading/direction, without changing it's flight course.

Yeah, a company that tries to make profit would hide a game changing product while competitors are already claiming to have working prototypes, and would itself cast doubts on its possibility in international forums. Doesn't seem right to me. 

 

Rafael was open about it, publicly, that if they want an anti-KE solution they'll take Elbit's Iron Fist's interceptors and add them to the Trophy system. They were contracted to do that in 2014 and stopped work shortly after. 

As I said, a working system will appear no earlier than 2023.

 

The current mechanism will NOT work against APFSDS in any capacity. It is the same mechanism it was for almost 2 decades, and the interceptor prototype that was tested vs APFSDS never made public appearance.

[Cairn_67 537]

13 hours ago, WingardiumLevioS said:

Merkava mk4 takes pressure damage. gaijin you are a really lousy company

 

Shouldn't the Merkavas' NBC / fire suppression system protect the crews from rapid cabin pressure changes? And how could shrapnel penetrate multiple layers of armour?

 

Watching other Mk4 War Thunder videos also left me with the questions of  where are the Mk4's digital battlefield management system, automated threat detection / acquisition, and wireless intel-sharing network?

16 hours ago, Ariesv said:

Funny you should mention the trailer limit; one of the sources I found for the 80 ton weight is the following article from 2006 talking about transporter weight limits:

https://www.port2port.co.il/article/הובלה-יבשתית/בן-הרוש-חושף-שורת-ליקויים-בהובלת-טנקים-ונגמ-שים-במלחמת-לבנון-השנייה/

"The chairman of the Council of Carriers and Drivers in Israel claims that 50% of the transports of tanks and APCs in the last war were done on unsuitable carriers and that the latest legislation makes it difficult to transport weapons properly."

and 

"Harush Has limited the weight of the Israeli carrier to 50 tons, and that it brings to an end the period in which two APCs can be loaded on a carrier, or even one chariot tank weighing 80 tons."

 

I shudder to think what logic Gaijin used to make it slower in-game. 

If the IDF's tank units ever get a budget increase they could acquire a few Lowboy trailers, or their European counterparts. Some variants are qualified for 100 ton cargo loads. However, ground clearance and turning circles would limit their use (many axels involved).

 

[Lolman345 588]

17 hours ago, WarStalkeR said:

* Having only 3 ammo per Trophy countermeasure launcher, when it is physically obvious that it holds much more is a screw up.

If I recall correctly I remember reading a old US acquisition document from way back when the US was looking at the Trophy and it had something along the lines of 6 charges in the magazine with 1 on the launcher for a total of 7 shots per side, with each panel being reloaded in 1.5 seconds. 

 

Sadly it was a paper document and I no longer have it, but I know there has to be some picture of the magazine or copy of the document somewhere. As it stands the system should 100% have more charges.

 

The 4 is in a terrible state currently, and as others have said, it's dev server armor should have been it's live armor, hell, even then it has worse overall turret armor compared to even the base T-72B3.

 

Its almost comical at this point how poorly gaijin treats western NERA components while artificially inflates Russian estimates. 

Edited March 30, 2022 by Lolman345

[Zucc_Boi 656]

 

5 hours ago, Lolman345 said:

Its almost comical at this point how poorly gaijin treats western NERA components while artificially inflates Russian estimates.

Aye. The Merkava 4 doesn't even have NERA. It's the more modern NxRA, which Gaijin intelligently calls "composite screen".

[WarStalkeR 15]

19 hours ago, Zucc_Boi said:

"Export variants" aka "monkey model" is a myth

There is no way to prove that either my words or your words are correct, so let move on from this impasse part of discussion.

 

19 hours ago, Zucc_Boi said:

I have personally inspected only 1 Merkava 4M tank, which for some reason had empty charges, so I cannot comment with absolute certainty, but you should just accept the fact that Trophy does not have more than 3 charges per side.

You've inspected Merkava 4M with empty Trophy ammo box and you want me just to accept that it has 3 charges there, just because you think it so? Sorry, it doesn't work that way.

 

19 hours ago, Zucc_Boi said:

Yeah, a company that tries to make profit would hide a game changing product while competitors are already claiming to have working prototypes, and would itself cast doubts on its possibility in international forums. Doesn't seem right to me.

Making profit for Rafael is least priority. I want to remind you that Rafael is a national, fully state owned, R&D defense company, not a private one that seeks as much profit as possible. Rafael's main objective is to develop tools in relation to current situation and need of Israeli military and government. All their current undisclosed projects are classified. Rafael stays silent as long as possible, when it comes to releasing newest technology, because this is how they operate.

 

Also, competitors' claims about working prototypes are absolutely pointless, until they are finished/refined and combat proven. The "competition" Rafael has is last thing they afraid of. Rafael cares little of opinion and doubts of others at international forums, as their priority lies in security of the Israel and when can they prove efficiency of their products through the actions in live warfare. Actually, all (or almost all) the companies that supply military equipment to Israel are either fully state owned or partially state owned with control stake in shares.

 

 

 

[Zucc_Boi 656]

1 hour ago, WarStalkeR said:

You've inspected Merkava 4M with empty Trophy ammo box and you want me just to accept that it has 3 charges there, just because you think it so? Sorry, it doesn't work that way.

That information came from Jon Hawkes, writer for Janes. He's credible. And he's actually going to defense expos and meets company representatives.

 

1 hour ago, WarStalkeR said:

Making profit for Rafael is least priority. I want to remind you that Rafael is a national, fully state owned, R&D defense company, not a private one that seeks as much profit as possible.

Rafael pays dividends to the government, which the government then uses to fill up its budgets, including defense budgets. Rafael is, just like any company, very much profit oriented. That's why it stopped being a division of the military, and became a company. Even if a government one.

 

The way companies work is they usually pitch products to customers that are not yet fully developed, and complete their development through contracts that induce a cash flow. Many times companies first export their products before being adopted domestically.

Never seen Rafael offering a downgraded product to a customer unless specifically required to meet a low price.

 

1 hour ago, WarStalkeR said:

. All their current undisclosed projects are classified.

That's... what undisclosed means.

All companies have secrets. That's why the term "corporate espionage" exists.

 

1 hour ago, WarStalkeR said:

Actually, all (or almost all) the companies that supply military equipment to Israel are either fully state owned or partially state owned with control stake in shares.

The most dominant defense company in Israel, Elbit, is entirely private.

There are many defense companies in Israel. Only a few are government owned.

 

So yeah, Rafael still very much cares about advertising its products. Otherwise Trophy would not be in its second decade of appearing in defense exhibitions worldwide.

[WarStalkeR 15]

7 hours ago, Zucc_Boi said:

That information came from Jon Hawkes, writer for Janes. He's credible. And he's actually going to defense expos and meets company representatives.

Maybe that Jon Hawkes is trustworthy authority to you. But not to me. I don't trust somebody just because they're calling themselves expert. YouTube is filled with such "experts" to the brim.

 

7 hours ago, Zucc_Boi said:

Rafael pays dividends to the government, which the government then uses to fill up its budgets, including defense budgets. Rafael is, just like any company, very much profit oriented. That's why it stopped being a division of the military, and became a company. Even if a government one.

Military R&D is money sink. And always been. They might try to recoup money through export, but this is least priority. Their topmost priority is development of what Israeli military and government needs. It stopped being military division and become company to have more development freedom without annoying bureaucracy, so inherent in military (and any other government establishment). You can take a look at DARPA for example. Except in DARPA, they have even less creative freedom than in Rafael.

 

7 hours ago, Zucc_Boi said:

The way companies work is they usually pitch products to customers that are not yet fully developed, and complete their development through contracts that induce a cash flow. Many times companies first export their products before being adopted domestically.

What you described is workflow of normal private owned companies that have nothing to do with military R&D. Military R&D companies that related to Israel, work in a completely different way. And they are money sink. But they R&D what they're asked to.

 

7 hours ago, Zucc_Boi said:

Never seen Rafael offering a downgraded product to a customer unless specifically required to meet a low price.

You've never seen stats/parameters/features of the products that aren't intended for export. And this is how it should be.
 

7 hours ago, Zucc_Boi said:

All companies have secrets. That's why the term "corporate espionage" exists.

This is not what I am talking about. I'm talking about that if Rafael was profit oriented company as you claim, it would've advertised all their "classified" in-development technologies.

 

7 hours ago, Zucc_Boi said:

The most dominant defense company in Israel, Elbit, is entirely private.

There are many defense companies in Israel. Only a few are government owned.

Now, take a minute to google things up. Look up who owns 51% of shares of all these private military R&D companies in Israel.

 

7 hours ago, Zucc_Boi said:

So yeah, Rafael still very much cares about advertising its products. Otherwise Trophy would not be in its second decade of appearing in defense exhibitions worldwide.

For somebody, who cares about advertising its products - they're doing rather poor job. Rafael advertises only Trophy a lot. What about their other products? What about their in-development tech? It should make obvious, where their priorities stand. Military R&D is money sink. And money mostly comes from government. Money from investors and export is "side effect" so to say, because no Israel military R&D company can sell technology without Israeli government's approval.

Edited March 31, 2022 by WarStalkeR

[Zucc_Boi 656]

1 hour ago, WarStalkeR said:

Maybe that Jon Hawkes is trustworthy authority to you. But not to me. I don't trust somebody just because they're calling themselves expert. YouTube is filled with such "experts" to the brim.

Janes is a highly credible defense publication, and is quoted frequently on this forum.

1 hour ago, WarStalkeR said:

Military R&D is money sink. And always been. They might try to recoup money through export, but this is least priority.

All private defense companies do R&D once they're big enough. You won't find any on the global top 100 that doesn't do R&D.

1 hour ago, WarStalkeR said:

You can take a look at DARPA for example. Except in DARPA, they have even less creative freedom than in Rafael

DARPA is the equivalent of MAFAT, which is an actual military division, so no, I won't look at it.

 

1 hour ago, WarStalkeR said:

What you described is workflow of normal private owned companies that have nothing to do with military R&D.

So me describing the workflow of private companies which revolves around customer-demanded R&D, shows it has nothing to do with R&D? This is a big brain moment. 

At this stage I'm asking for proof. Prove to me private companies don't do R&D and that Rafael is a money sink and not a profitable defense company.

1 hour ago, WarStalkeR said:

This is not what I am talking about. I'm talking about that if Rafael was profit oriented company as you claim, it would've advertised all their "classified" in-development technologies

No defense company releases classified material to the public. 

Lockheed Martin is a private defense company which develops and makes the F-35. You think they sell the F-35's secrets to the Chinese or to the entire world so they can copy it?

1 hour ago, WarStalkeR said:

Now, take a minute to google things up. Look up who owns 51% of shares of all these private military R&D companies in Israel

I did. Elbit's ownership is divided to 44% by Michael Federman, an Israeli billionaire, and 56% public.

 

1 hour ago, WarStalkeR said:

For somebody, who cares about advertising its products - they're doing rather poor job. Rafael advertises only Trophy a lot. What about their other products?

And Samson, many years before the IDF bought a 30mm turret which has more from Elbit than from Rafael. 

And Spike 2 missiles. And FireWeaver. And Litening. And Iron Dome and C-Dome. And SpyDer (which the IDF never bought). And David's Sling. And Python and Derby. And ROCKS (not in use by IDF). And Typhoon. And Sea Breaker (not in use by IDF). And BNET.

 

If the IDF does indeed use in any way the ROCKS and Sea Breaker, it wouldn't tell it to the public, yet Rafael has already unveiled them a while ago for the world to see.

 

1 hour ago, WarStalkeR said:

What about their in-development tech?

Like the Carmel, which they offer to the US OMFV program? Rafael calls it the NGCV-S, and is in partnership with Hanwha for its marketing.

 

 

So now that the Rafael rant is over, we have accounts of officials saying 3 charges per side for the Trophy. We have also heard fairly convincing arguments that post-interception fragments will statistically render existing APS inoperable after 2 interceptions.

 

Where is your argument? You claim it should be more much but you don't say a concrete number, nor provide any concrete evidence to refute it.

[CyrusJackson 1,823]

On 30/03/2022 at 03:02, Lolman345 said:

If I recall correctly I remember reading a old US acquisition document from way back when the US was looking at the Trophy and it had something along the lines of 6 charges in the magazine with 1 on the launcher for a total of 7 shots per side, with each panel being reloaded in 1.5 seconds. 

 

Sadly it was a paper document and I no longer have it, but I know there has to be some picture of the magazine or copy of the document somewhere. As it stands the system should 100% have more charges.

 

The 4 is in a terrible state currently, and as others have said, it's dev server armor should have been it's live armor, hell, even then it has worse overall turret armor compared to even the base T-72B3.

 

Its almost comical at this point how poorly gaijin treats western NERA components while artificially inflates Russian estimates. 

 

The real problem in one picture:

 

These numbers are directly extracted from the game files. As long as this is a thing, Soviet side rubber skirt will keep performing better than the Merkava 4 NxRA and every other Merkava composite. As I said before, according to Gaijin, stacking tires on top of one another provides more protection against APFSDS than NxRa. Not enough facepalm can demonstrate just how absolutely stupid(not gonna use a more insulting word) I find that but that's how it is.

Also yes, the Merkava Mk3D turret addon armor has the exact same material and modifier as the Merkava Mk4 armor in-game. The Challenger 2 TES has the exact same issue. The forum really needs to get together and fight for Gaijin to increase that imbecile 0.10 value. Having it go from 0.10 to 0.20 would already contribute a lot to buff many tanks, including all merkavas.

Edited March 31, 2022 by CyrusJackson

[Zucc_Boi 656]

Not to mention the Merkava 4s are very likely using a form of armor that has a KE weight efficiency of above 1 in some areas.

 

Rafael unveiled in 2021 a new product that was said by a defense publication that it was not yet purchased by the IDF, could reduce penetration of APFSDS by 56% in simulated environment, and ~50% in real conditions, in a module that weighs 300kg/m2 for hull, and 750kg/m2 for turret.

[SubZero_0 268]

 

[SubZero_0 268]

i tried it in other mbts. The difference between apds and apfsds penetration is 50-60mm but penetration difference between apds and apfsds on the merkava mk4 is 410mm