NationStates Jolt Archive

The Imperial Army design institute of Europe and Eurasia and the Ministery of the Military are proud to present to the world the latest tank to roll out of the Imperial heavy machinery corporation factories: the Rhino class heavy battle tank.

http://www.kitsune.addr.com/Rifts/Rifts-Earth-Vehicles/Triax/NGR_Tiger_HBT-02.jpg
http://www.kitsune.addr.com/Rifts/Rifts-Earth-Vehicles/Triax/NGR_Tiger_HBT-03.jpg
http://www.kitsune.addr.com/Rifts/Rifts-Earth-Vehicles/Triax/NGR_Tiger_HBT.gif

Stats:
Armor: 40mm-185mm amorphous titanium steel alloy with carbon microtube 'Duraskin' coating (not compromising)
Armament:
1x 88mm High-velocity Railgun (this stays, I am not compromising on this)
1x 40mm MG 400 Machine cannon (mounted co-axially)
3x 25mm MG 250 Machine cannon
1x 250mm Mortar
1x 35mm MG 350 Anti-Aircraft Cannon
Engine: One 50,000kw Hafnium QNF reactor driving two 900rpm Tesla bladeless turbines driving two 400 volt electric motors (not compromising)
Crew: 4 (1 Commander/Navigator, 1 Driver, 1 Gunner and 1 Engineer)
Speed: 85 kph on road, 57 kph off road
Height: 3.26 Meters to top of turret
Width: 4.6 Meters
Length: 10.87 Meters with mine plow, 9.9 Meters without
Weight: 71,600 kg
Sensors and Communications:
1x LPI Phased array Air/Ground RADAR with 29 km range
1x Laser Rangefinder with 150 km range (but less accurate)
2x Periscopes, allow Commander and Driver to see without leaving tank, both have up to 100x magnification and night and infra-rad vision
1x Fully stabilized gun sight, a computer aided gunsight with up to 200x magnification, night vision, infra-red vision and integral laser rangefinder
2x Datalink transmitters, secure form of wireless communication between the tank and other tanks, forward scouts and the Battle Group Commander

This tank is the pinnacle of Europe and Eurasian military hardware on the ground, it is a veritable moving fortress, capable of wiping out whole battalions of enemy infantry and companies of enemy tanks all on its own. This tank is to be the mainstay of the Europe and Eurasian Army, replacing the old Tiger and Lion class tanks which were woefully inadequite in the first place, these tanks will be the strengh in the arm of the Imperial Army and our Brilliant leaders, Emperor Alexius Mabus II and Supreme Chancellor Andreus Fazekas.

Imperial Marshall Simon Gioias
Supreme commander of the Imperial Army Armored Battle Groups

OOC: Note that this tank is NOT FOR SALE at this time, this thread is to show you a glimpse of what we have in our arsenal. I am aware that some of the tanks statistics or features may seem a little too much, well keep in mind that I am not an Engineer and am utilizing technologies that are still only in the developmental stage.

Ooh, shiny. Makes me want to buy one :D
Pity I'm wrong Tech. :(
Nice pics.

OOC: How does a 70 tonne tank go as fast as a car?

The tracks are very hard-wearing and the electric motors that drive the tracks themselves make up to 80,000rpm on-road without seizing up or breaking thanks to the amorphous (non-crystallised atomic structure) metal alloys used almost everywhere in the tank and in most Europe and Eurasian technologies in general.

Interesting. But not moderntech. Or even near modern tech.

wow, extremely nice design, and nice pictures, but the speed is massive for a vehicle that size, you would need some sort of hovering device to allow it to move that fast

Verdant, must you dump on all of the technologies I reveal to the public :rolleyes:

OOC: Seriously, I am no engineer but the technologies i'm using in the tank are considered by most reputable scientists and engineers to be able to be developed within this decade (if they work, that is) trust me on this, I read New Scientist and National Geographic cover to cover as soon as the next issue is out, as well as my ample collection of physics and engineering encyclopedias and specialty books (including several on military hardware, past, present and future) just because I am not an engineer yet doesn't mean that I am not interested and intelligant in the subject.

OOC: Yay, another tank that has too many weapons, too much weight, and too much speed(for realistic purposes on each). Wont even get started on railguns, or all these magical alloys.

Sorry =) But here you've combined an MLRS with something that carries a railgun (power intensive little things), a gauss cannon, a powerful 2 megawatt laser, and three fairly heavy cannon. And it goes twice as fast as an Abrams. ANd weighs less. While using a speculative generator. Which puts out 50 MEGAWATTS of power. That's as much power as some CRUISERS. It's 40 times as much as a modern tank. I'm not sure about the armor... that sounds reasonable, but I'd want to hear it's value in RHA.

Maybie I overdid it a little with the speed issue, but you have to remember that this tank uses technologies that are still several years away for us, but one that is not is the amorphous or 'glass-like' metals that I use almost through out the tank. These metals are extemely friction and heat resistant, enabling a tank which has its tracks and engines made out of the stuff to go much faster than a tank whose tracks and engines would fall apart at those speeds.

Maybie I did over do it a little in the weapons suite and the power ratings, but I was just making sure that all the systems in the tank would have enough juice and that these tanks could fight off all enemy vehicles it may come across, and in NS, that could mean anything :eek:

Magical alloys?...magical alloys?...magical alloys, huh?

HERES YOUR "MAGICAL" ALLOYS! (www.liquidmetal.com) :mad: :mad: :mad:

Sorry =) But here you've combined an MLRS with something that carries a railgun (power intensive little things), a gauss cannon, a powerful 2 megawatt laser, and three fairly heavy cannon. And it goes twice as fast as an Abrams. ANd weighs less. While using a speculative generator. Which puts out 50 MEGAWATTS of power. That's as much power as some CRUISERS. It's 40 times as much as a modern tank. I'm not sure about the armor... that sounds reasonable, but I'd want to hear it's value in RHA.

It weights more, actually.

the very fact that you did that makes it impossible. It's impoissible to have something that can defeat anything. If it were dedicated futuretech, I'd have no problems with it. But nothing like this will be around for 50 years. At least.

Here are the problems one at a time. If you fix them, you'll end up with a nice vehicle.

Weight and size are good for a vehicle it's size

Speed, cut it by a quarter.

Railguns are highly experimental and have many problems. Power generation, for one. Barrel wear. A lack of different kinds of rounds that can be fired. Fragility. price.

I'm not even sure what a gauss cannon is, it sounds like a rail gun. See above.

Lasers have all the problems that railguns have, and are even more fragile.

35mm guns are called cannon, not machineguns, and they are BIG. Bigger than the guns that a bradly carriers. Bigger than most AA guns. Bigger than an A-10's tank killing gun.

The rocket launcher would look better on a dedicated artillery vehicle. THose rockets are heavy.

Phased array radar require many transmitters scattered over an area. Horribly vulnerable to damage, and just where are you going to put them.

Laser rangefinder has too long a range, but that's not really important.

All in all, even if all the technologies weren't very experimental, it would be a fragile machine, a mechanic's nightmare. ONe hit from anything, and the concussion will knock out most of the systems regardless of armor.

Magical alloys?...magical alloys?...magical alloys, huh?

HERES YOUR "MAGICAL" ALLOYS! (www.liquidmetal.com) :mad: :mad: :mad:

Most things that sound to good to be true, are.

Most likely, its either the cost, the durability, or some other grave issue that makes it un-usable. Otherwise, we would see RL nations grabbing it up, as it seems to already be usable.

Depends on the version of the abrams and... oh. Right. He's using all metric measurements. Ok, it weighs slightly more.

the very fact that you did that makes it impossible. It's impoissible to have something that can defeat anything. If it were dedicated futuretech, I'd have no problems with it. But nothing like this will be around for 50 years. At least.

While I agree he's practicing gross overkill, something like this will be viable in less than 20 years, I'd be willing to bet on it.

Railguns are highly experimental and have many problems.

No where near as many as you'd think.

Power generation, for one.

He's got a freaking nuclear reactor on the thing.

Barrel wear.

Liquid hydrogen could be used as a barrel liner to make railguns not only usable more than once, but actually pretty efficient, too. It's just that the R&D costs scare the tie-wearers in Washington.

A lack of different kinds of rounds that can be fired.

At the speeds railguns produce, you don't NEED to fire anything but a dense metallic slug.

Fragility.

No more fragile than any other tank cannon.

price.

Bingo.

I'm not even sure what a gauss cannon is, it sounds like a rail gun. See above.

Gauss cannons, while related to railguns, are not the same. Also known as coil guns, they use a barrel lined with electromagnets to accelerate a magneticly charged slug out of the weapon. It's silent and fires much faster than gas or powder operated weapons. Basically, they're a next generation metalstorm weapon.

Lasers have all the problems that railguns have, and are even more fragile.

While you're right about them being fragile, lasers are quite oftenly used today and especially in NS as air defense weaponry.

35mm guns are called cannon, not machineguns, and they are BIG. Bigger than the guns that a bradly carriers. Bigger than most AA guns. Bigger than an A-10's tank killing gun.

The big problem I see with this is ammunition storage. When you're using machine guns with such large ammunition...

The rocket launcher would look better on a dedicated artillery vehicle. THose rockets are heavy.

Agreed.

All in all, even if all the technologies weren't very experimental, it would be a fragile machine, a mechanic's nightmare. ONe hit from anything, and the concussion will knock out most of the systems regardless of armor.

A lot of these aren't as fragile as you'd think.

I have to disagree with you on a bunch of points.

The not even the theory behind the nuclear reactor he's using has not yet been proven and is therefore futuretech. One successful test has been achieved. All other lab tests have failed. Until the basic premise of the system is proven, it has no place in a moderntech RP.

Liquid hydrogen presupposes that you are willing to supercool a tank of inflamible gas and strap it to your tank.

The solid metal slug is an effective penetrator. Not so good at infantry supression, destroying bunkers, flatening buildings, removing obsticals.

And yes, they are signifigantely more fragile than normal cannon. Shere concussive force can easily damage the cannon. An artillery barrage would render it unusable.

The coilgun has all the problems of the railgun, and it would be staggeringly easy for one of the magnets to get missaligned.

Lasers are often used as non-vital targetting and communications devices. While they may be used as airdefence weapons, those lasers tend to be airborne (safe from enemy fire) or shipborn (plenty of power) they aren't mounted in tanks (neither).

Ammo storage is indeed a problem for the 35mm autocannon, but a bigger problem is weight and space.

I may be underestimating the robustness oif these systems, but you're certainly underestimating the effects of combat. If the airforce can't keep 80% of it's conventional B1 bomber fleet operational at once (an aircraft using mature and robust technology) then this miracle tank is going to be even worse.

I'm not trying to rain on your parade... honest. But I think that the term Moderntech or even near modern tech should be reserved for things that really are. Call it future. Call it near future. But don't try to misrepresent it as modern, or even being designed within the next 20 years.

This is obviously post-modern tech....... even though the note at the end of the original post effectivly stated this was to be modern+1, it does not qulaify due to the experimental and some merely theorhetical nature of most of the technology, and the speed is obscene..... this, coming from me... is well not a very good sign.

Official Positon,
--Chief Stats Wanker, International Incidents
:cool:

It's further along than that. I wouldn't accept a post modern vehicle that combined all these features either.

http://ns.goobergunch.net/wiki/index.php/Tech_level#Postmodern_Tech

So is it powered by steam or what? I'm assuming the nuclear stuff has to heat up something and make it expand.

And what are the differences between railguns ang gauss cannons?

Try making the machine guns 13mm, and reduce any image magnification by 90%.

EDIT: BTW, nice drawings, and good effort on this, the fact that we've only found a few things wrong is a good thing.

A solid slug is no good against chobham (burlington) or reactive armor, IIRC. This AFV is no MBT, but rather an up-powered IFV. Why an 88mm railgun, instead of a 120mm firing APFSDS or HEAT? Know thy enemy.

The Bradley of the next generation, not the Abrams.

That's a bad definition. Too nebulous. Near modern are things that are possible but not available yet, like ECT, naval railguns, airborn and ship based laser systems, carbon nanotube mass production, space elevators, and the like. NEar future are things like plasma cannon, fusion reactors, and effective hovertanks.

Or... alright. I believe this is being represented as Modern+1 if you go by NS wiiki definitions, when it's really postmodern.

Solid slugs are the best against chobham... or at least I'm assuming it's firing APDS-FS rounds. And Reactive armor is usless against anything but HEAT shells, unless it's momentum transfer armor, and even then the benifits are unproven. Calling it a bradly is innaccurate... the Bradley is an IFV, and this has no space for infantry.

The solid metal slug is an effective penetrator. Not so good at infantry supression, destroying bunkers, flatening buildings, removing obsticals.

When you have an object moveing at even 20%-30% C, which is what I rember being about as fast as you can get something in an atmosphere to go and still have it avoid being distroied by friction withen a few feet, you dont need any spechel munitions to do any of the taskes you listed, at that speed, you will have a blast of X-rays and gamma rays formed when the slug crushes air in its path, on hitting anything, it will produce enough energy as of E+MC2, that makeing it explosive would be somewhat redundent, which would distroy bunkers, buildings, or any pesky terrain obsitcals rather soundly.

If you want it to go that fast, you need to MAKE it go that fast. Which would take, for a one kilogram projectile, 10000 terrajouls of energy to speed it up to .1c, I think that's definately futuretech. I was guessing it was going 8000m/s. Which is only about 4 times faster than most sabots

Why can't people just stop making t3h OMFG ub3r1337y invincible tanz0rz that have completely unrealistic technology.

I mean I took a bit of persuading to accept the 135mm - 145mm ETC as main armament and the 20mm co-ax, but the nuclear reactors that have only been successfully tested once in a lab (ie not a vehicle)? And the railguns, none of which have yet been built? And the liquid metal that's so expensive it's only been used in tennis rackets thus far?

Why cant people JUST STOP taking "this is being looked in to in labs" as meaning "This is definately going to work because NOTHING scientists think might work ever turns out not to, does it? And because Im a post modern modern tech nation I can do it better and cheaper and make it 1337er"

DOn't come down too hard. It's unrealistic, but if you take it as postmodern instead of modern+1, it's not that bad. I might even accept it as modern+1 if the nuclear reactor were removed and the deficiencies in the weaponry were adiquitl RPed: ie throws treads constantly, suffers coilgun malfunctions, needs to replace railgun lining, needs to wait to charge laser and coilguns, suffers massive system failures when hit...

OK... :confused:

I see alot of constructive critisism here, now I don't know anything about modern tech, future tech etc. settings that you guys are talking about, remember that I am new to the NS RP 'scene' OK. I just intended to make a tank that included the best aspects of modern tanks combined with technologies that are being developed now or that i've heard are being considered for development. First off, the Rhino tank is based on a design I saw on a Rifts Earth (for those of you who've heard of that RPG) website, their tank had alot more advanced systems in it than mine (theirs had A.I constructs in every tank :rolleyes: ) and they said theirs came out in the early 2100's, so I thought that it would be OK to design a tank based on it with less advanced systems and everybody would be alright with it. Secondly, anybody who thinks that my tanks systems and features are doing things that they're not supposed to, I defer them to the Liquidmetal technologies website I sent Chellis to, it explains in fair enough detail the physics behind the amorphous (more liquid-like than solid-like in atomic structure) metal alloys that I use everywhere in the tank. There metals give the tanks systems better resistance to heat and friction and it higher kinetic energy output (if you bounced a ball off a wall of this stuff then it will go alot farther than if bounced off a wall of regular metal) this, in my mind, gave the tanks sytems the ability to do things its counterparts made of regular metal or polymers could not do, like the railgun lasting alot longer than normal, and gave the armor the abilty to stop almost anything the enemy might shoot at it, if you believe that this is not the case then I understand. The Rocket launcher was a last-minute addition that I thought would be good for long range standoff attacks if artillery support was not available, again, I am sorry if this is not the case from your perspective. Finally, the speed/weight issue, I knew this was going to be a problem fron the start, in my rush to get the thread out, I simple cobbled together the speed of the Rifts tank and combined it with the weight of the WWII King Tiger tank (plus one ton because I thought the extra systems would weigh heavily on the tank) I knew that this would make the tanks specs look impractical and I am sorry for this flaw also. In conclusion, I made this tank bith the best intentions and I hope that I can iron out most of the flaws, because despite what you might think, it's still a good tank, but there are some things that I know that I am never going to get straightend out, and for that I am very...very sorry. :(

When you have an object moveing at even 20%-30% C, which is what I rember being about as fast as you can get something in an atmosphere to go and still have it avoid being distroied by friction withen a few feet, you dont need any spechel munitions to do any of the taskes you listed, at that speed, you will have a blast of X-rays and gamma rays formed when the slug crushes air in its path, on hitting anything, it will produce enough energy as of E+MC2, that makeing it explosive would be somewhat redundent, which would distroy bunkers, buildings, or any pesky terrain obsitcals rather soundly.

OOC: You're still my favourite mod!

Why can't people just stop making t3h OMFG ub3r1337y invincible tanz0rz that have completely unrealistic technology.

I mean I took a bit of persuading to accept the 135mm - 145mm ETC as main armament and the 20mm co-ax, but the nuclear reactors that have only been successfully tested once in a lab (ie not a vehicle)? And the railguns, none of which have yet been built? And the liquid metal that's so expensive it's only been used in tennis rackets thus far?

Why cant people JUST STOP taking "this is being looked in to in labs" as meaning "This is definately going to work because NOTHING scientists think might work ever turns out not to, does it? And because Im a post modern modern tech nation I can do it better and cheaper and make it 1337er"

OOC: Tut tut tut, grumpy Praetonia!

I'll give you a quick layout of NS technology (well the mainstream tech, there are a few derivatives) below:

PT = Past Tech
WWIT = World War One Tech (Doubtful about the acronym, sorry in advance!)
WWIIT = World War Two Tech (^)
CWT = Cold War Tech
MT = Modern Tech (What most NSers use)
PMT = Post Modern Tech (What I use, I have an extremely advanced military but that's soon to leave in favour of an old, creaky one!)
FT = Future Tech
??? = The rest I'll leave for you to find - have fun!

Yarg sorry about that... it's obviously had a lot of effort put into it... Im jsut getting a bit sick of things twice, if not three times as powerful as RL tanks being sold as "2010 tech" or "2020 tech" which I just dont believe.

EDIT: Rift's Earth would be classed as Future Tech on NS. The liquid metal is possible, but not practical. Do you know how much that stuff costs? There's a reason why the only thing featured on their site as using it is a tennis racket, and there's a reason why that tennis racket is only owned by a world champion. You could make a tank out of nanotubes in Modern Tech, but ti would cost tens of billions.

Yarg sorry about that... it's obviously had a lot of effort put into it... Im jsut getting a bit sick of things twice, if not three times as powerful as RL tanks being sold as "2010 tech" or "2020 tech" which I just dont believe.

EDIT: Rift's Earth would be classed as Future Tech on NS. The liquid metal is possible, but not practical. Do you know how much that stuff costs? There's a reason why the only thing featured on their site as using it is a tennis racket, and there's a reason why that tennis racket is only owned by a world champion. You could make a tank out of nanotubes in Modern Tech, but ti would cost tens of billions.


OOC: OH! I didn't quite know that...sorry Prae!

Europe and Eurasia (great book, by the way, basing my nation off it after the revolution), I have to say that this tank is at LEAST 2040 kind of tech, it is a nice tank and you HAVE put alot of effort into it but this is defintely a PM or FT tank.

Believe it or not, I do understand what you tried to do with it, and I appricate the amount of effort. You just set your technical sights a bit too high. Rather building from Rifts tanks, use a modern one and modify it. Liquid metal seems like an interesting material, but when you come down to it, it's simply a stronger metal (it's not so much liquid as extencively cold worked... non crysteline and still solid). And given it's price, I can't see it being used throughout the entire vehicle. In specific parts that need to deal with high stresses, sure, but you can't build the whole thing out of it.

Also, take a close look at what people say about a technology. If there isn't even a prototype made, it's likely post modern. Try to see the flaws in your design and rather than cover them up, embrace them. No one wants to see Ubertank194. Give your vehicle some personality, and that means some flaws.

Try to think of the mission the vehicle is going to perform. Anything extranious, delete. Why does your tank need an amaizingly powerful laser? Are you expecting to deal with balistic missiles? Of course not. Swap it for an active defence grenade launcher like Arena.

Do you need a rapid fire coilgun AND three 35mm cannon AND a railgun? What's the advantage? Does the disadvantage of having three different ammunition types to be stored and four independant turrets that can each fail and all need power outweigh the advantage? Has anyone ever made a functioning military style coilgun? Why use a railgun instead of a cheaper chemical cannon?

Considering that the five 250mm rockets you've tacked on would probably increase the price of the vehicle by an astronomical amount (consider the fact that you need to fit in the launchers, reload mechanisms, failsafes to keep the rockets from blowing up when hit, fire control computers, and that the missiles are about half as long as the entire tank), would it not be better to buy a 10 ton truck and mount 10 of the rockets on a set of rails on the back? It won't need the armor because it's not going to be in the line of fire. It won't need the reload mechanisms because it can be done manually. WOn't need failsafes because if it blows up, who cares, you have lots of trucks.

If you start with a mission in mind, find an applicable modern vehicle, and then add a bit of new technology onto it, you'll find people are a lot less critical. If you try to make one that can do everything, it usually turns out to be a dud that can't do anything well or a 1337ubertankofdoom that pisses people off.

what is a tank?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tank

I appreciate you're honesty, I really do, and I understand why you think I should use more down to earth technologies to base my designs on. It's just that I have wanted to design war machines since I was a little kid (pretty messed up, I know :rolleyes: ) and I always had this type of tank in my mind. Ever since I first heard of railguns and QNF reactors and amorphous alloys I've been thinking about how I could build a tank that incorporated all of these cool things. I designed this tank with high speed assault battle groups of the British/Australian kind in mind, where tanks would spearhead a mass assualt with high speed APCs trailing close behind. I figured that a tank that could withstand heavy defense from enemy tanks and AT weapons and then wipe them out on their own would make it easier for the infantry to be deployed and clear up the enemy infantry. Then the battle group could just move on futher into enemy territory, I designed this tank to make invasions go alot quicker and to lessen infantry casualties. I have been formulating a tank like this in my mind for several years, and I wanted it to be unique, to stand out from all the other tanks being used in the battle, I wanted it to make a significant phyciological impact on the enemy when this tank rolled into battle like the seemingly unstopable German Panzers did in World War II, I thought that the sight of a massive light gray beast like this rolling into view and then discharging Rockets, laser beams, great hails of bullets and big slugs of dense metal and explosive (or perhapse some sort of radioactive material) in a geat flash of electicity would send the enemy fleeing for their lives. This tank, and the subsequent designs I have also been working on, was to be the major battlewinner for my army, which is optimised for the get in, do as much damage as possible and then move futher into enemy territory as quick as you can tactic.

Okay, I've made a few changes to the tanks design, there are a few things that I will not compromise on and they have been clearly marked. But for the most part I hope that these changes will make the tank more acceptable.

Well you got rid of all the things I didnt complain about. So whatever, have your ubertank.