Electromagnetic (EM) Guns as Tank killers

[fylr71]

A Railgun if ever brought down to a man portable or even small unit portable (WW II pak 37) could spell a disaster for tanks. A railgun can speed up a kinetic energy projectile to mach five and have a tremendous range (250 miles). However it is unlikely to spell the end for tanks. There is talk that the tank is a dinosaur. This would be true with the current generation of armor and if portable railguns become as prolific as RPGs. However there is plenty of hope for tanks. Two new armor types are being experimented with and current railguns take up a small room. The two types of armor are liquid armor which would suddenly become very dense due to the squezzing together of molecules at the point where it was struck by a projectile. The second type of armor is electromagnetic armor which works as follows:

"ELECTROMAGNETIC ARMOR - A form of ACTIVE ARMOR that is an application of SMART ARMOR which offers protection as follows: (1) The penetrating jet of a shaped charge (SC) is detected; (2) an intense electrical discharge is created between electrically conductive plates, creating a powerful magnetic field; (3) the magnetic field interacts with the charged particles of the penetrating jet; and (4) magnetohydrodynamic instabilities occur, disrupting the jet. "

http://www.sew-lexicon.com/gloss_e.htm#ELECTROMAGNETIC ARMOR


Additionally active high powered laser defenses are starting to be employed. Suprisingly the Chinese supposedly have a high-powered laser that not only detects incoming projectiles but also can take out the thermal sights for enemy tanks.

 

[TrangleC]

Yes, EM armour is an interesting concept against shaped charges, but i doubt that a railgun would fire those, because the jet of hot gas from a shaped charge is already that fast that adding a bit speed from a railgun wouldn't change much. EM armour would be not much use against solid kinetik penetrators, which were the more logical ammunition for a railgun.

And i'm skeptical about that liquid armour thing. After all, even the hardest steal behaves like a liquid when it is hit by a high speed penetrator or hot gas jet and i doubt that a liquid can create a higher density than steal and uranium.
After all the molecules of a solid material are displaced and crushed together just the same like the ones of a liquid, so that principle alone can't really be the clever trick behind that new concept.

Liquid armour is interesting for body protection packs, of course, but not because it would offer more protection than a solid armour, but because it is more flexible and comfortable to wear as long as nobody shoots at it, that is.

The problem with railguns is that they need a lot of energy. Too much to be provided by the engine of a MBT, i wager. Otherwise we probably would see the first MBTs with railguns already, since they are developing it since the early 70ies now in the USA and Germany and most likely in GB and France too. (I know, i know, there are other technological problems too.)
The energy could be an obstacle for the Em armour too, for that matter.

Considering how normal the civil use of lasers of all kinds has become, i always wondered that the military use is that far behind.
On my university there is a development project for the military going on to develop a pulse-laser that can shatter glass to destroy optical sensor systems. I heard they are even trying to make it accurate and fast enough to destroy the sensor optics of a falling laserguides bomb or an aproaching laserguided missle (Hellfire for example).
So i don't wonder if the Chinese already use something like that too.

 

[Awang se]

EM propulsion principals are far more complex then any average peoples can imagine. It's one thing to use EM force to work the car door lock, but it's another thing to use it to throw a projectile at extremely high speed. the principal of EM work diferently when taken to an extreme level. there always unexpected and puzzling things happen, even after the test were carefully calculated. i know, i've seen it first hand. magnetic field are not easily contain like a force of explosion. when people use a powerful magnetic field to do something (like propeling things) the effect will be widely spread. Don't be surprise when EM tank fire it's weapon, it will also throw away the rifles from the hand of the close by infantries.