A second look at the photographs show that this issue, although seemingly apparent from the photograph angle and the bulging base of the cupolas, is not a significant malformation. The armor modules extend all the back to the side and top of the grenade launchers, arching all the way to the side of the gun. Hence, the only truly exposed portion of the turret roof would be the segment directly posterior and superior to the gun, and anterior to the cupolas.
Actually, if you take a detailed look at the third and fourth photograph, let me post them again, here
and
it would be clearly visible to you that it's not just the patch of rooftop lying immediately posterior and superior positions of the main gun but the entire right side, including the commander's cupola base is exposed to a good degree.
Sure, the armor blocks extended as far back as the smoke grenade dischargers but it doesn't not block the bulge or the cupola at all, simply because it lies at a lower level,since the roof is canted upwards towards the behind!!
It is clearly visible in the following photograph of a Type 99
As we can see in the above photograph, none of the two bulges are covered in anyway by the turret front armor modules and the tank is also sitting over a flat patch of ground and is not tilted towards either back or forth, so that means if those parts are visible to us, it would be visible to the other side as well.
Here is the marked version :
The line A (in black) denotes the upper most edge of the armor blocks.Now, as we can see, it's not just the portion immidiately above and posterior of the main gun that would be exposed as you have theorised but the commanders cuopla base and the raised cupola itself would be exposed as well!!Why??Because the armor blocks are simply not high enough to cover the raised portion, since they are placed at a lower plane.
Here is the last photograph :
Between line B and line A, that entire portion is sticking out, above the upper most edge of the frontal armor.And by the way, in this photograph, the tank is actually tilted backwards slightly, which means, had it been on a flat patch of ground or tilted towards the front, even more portions of the roof would have become exposed from the front.
And here is the clearest one so far, it just doesn't get clearer anymore
The red line is the upper most limit of the frontal armor and any and all parts, sticking out above that plane would be directly exposed from the frontal arc.
And that's the reason why it's not advisable to design the turret roof this way.It creates avoidable weak zones which could other wise be completely masked by the turret front armor modules, by welding the roof parallel to the surface instead of canting them upwards.But then again, I think the engineers were already aware of this fact but still went ahead with this as a design trade off, since they were probably asked by the Army to keep the overall height lower (or so it seems).Now if you want to keep the height low, it would mean you will have less room inside to put all the gizmos, and may be in the end, they just had to go for a slopping and bulged rooftop, in order to make room for the crew as well as various electronic equipment and also, to an extend, to ensure unobstructed field of view for the Gunner's main Sight.
Well, it's a fair trade off I must say, cause no gunner really aims for roof top.
Correct that sandwiching ERA and composite blocks is arguably the preferred method for stopping kinetic energy rounds. The point of contention here, in my perspective, is how easy (or difficult) it is for a gunner to target the strip of exposed area on the ZTZ-96A's turret whilst facing counter-fire.
You probably overlooked what i wrote in my end note, here it is again,
"Now coming to the most important part, and i can not and I repeat, I can not stress this fact hard enough, that this one design flaw doesn't turn the Type series of tanks into some utterly crappy design, not at all!!Anyone, drawing such a conclusion from my post would simply be deluding himself because that's not what I'm implying here and neither it's the truth.In reality,they are very potent tanks and can become extremely dangerous in the right hands and should always be treated with utmost caution.
And besides, gunners are always trained to aim for centre-mass and not for the sides or the top, so a partially exposed turret roof isn't really that big of a trouble if you look at it.But as we know, gunners do tend to miss and therefor, nothing should be left to chances.Just one unlucky hit at such a point might result in the crew being severely incapacitated or even killed altogether if the fragments manage to hit any exposed propellant bags or the hydraulic fluids."
Source:
https://defence.pk/threads/third-regiment-of-t-72-tanks-to-be-moved-to-ladakh-soon.440124/page-4#ixzz4F1dFFmgt[/QUOTE]
The thing is, I'm not really comfortable with leaving things, no matter how small they are, to eventuality or chances.Sure, the gunners are trained for taking aim at the centre-mass and for a valid reason.Anyone who has ever tried their hands on a good quality simulator would know what I'm trying to convey here.but the thing is, even with the most sophisticated computing and most sensitive and stable of the stabilisation systems in place, one can never completely do away with shot dispersion and even the most well aimed shots sometimes get missed the spot you originally aimed for if you know what I mean!!
Of course no vehicle should be evaluated on the sole aspect of firepower, but my argument was precisely in response to your premise that the 2A46M4 exceeds the ZTZ-96 gun (which remains unknown today) in energy.
Well, the M4 is a comparatively newer design and it was only fitted to the later models of the T 90s,like the S and M models.The original T 90A, with cast turret and earlier b models were fitted with the M2 version.Now if i'm not wrong, the ZTZ 96 first entered service around 1996 or so ,which would put its gun at the same time level as the M2.That's why I said that logically m4 should be somewhat better.But for the sake of debate, I'm willing to accept that they are at the same technological level of maturity even if more knowledgeable guys on this subject would surely disagree to this notion.
The make and finish of the guns are not the only factors that need to be constant if barrel length is the only deciding factor. Propellant quantity (which can be affected by autoloader design), propellant burn rate, etc., are key unknown parameters.
Again fair point but again you are shifting your focus towards the realm of firepower instead of power of the gun itself.
Now, coming to your points, the autoloader dimensions between the two tanks would not differ that much because the hulls themselves are of very similar dimentions if not identical, so obviously the room left for the carousel wouldn't differ much from one another and as a result, the propellant charges should be quite similar as well.Now propellant quality can play a significant part but then again, it has got nothing to do with the gun itself!!
Please try to understand the point i raised.What i meant to say was that, for a given type of ammo and charge bag, the 2A46 would be able to hurl the projectile at higher muzzel velocities than would be possible for the one on board ZTZ 96.
For example, if both guns fire the Mango round, the 2A46M2 would be able to propel the rod at somewhat higher velocities than the 96's gun, it's as simple as that.
Now obviously you can have better ammo and turn the table on the 2A46M but that would be triumphing in terms of firepower and not necessarily the power of the gun itself!!See what am saying here??
Moreover, without calculations, it remains unknown as to the magnitude of change 4 calibers would bring.
Well, definitely not to a degree significant enough to tilt the balance completely in favor of the longer model, that's for sure.
However, I'd like to mention that even though Russians have been in the MBT business far longer than the Chinese, the latter has been pumping R&D and effort into this phase at a far higher rate.
While it's true that pumping in more resources in R&D has its own merits, it still can not make up for experience gained through years of painstaking research, at least not on short order it can not!!For example, despite pumping in billions of dollars, your companies are still struggling with your jet engine programs and you still need to buy them from your northern neighbour.
Or, like you guys still need to import Su 35BMs despite of having years of research and again billions spent in your aircraft industries (not mean to say that you have nothing to show for your efforts though).
Or, like despite of building so many versions of S 300 for so long a period, you still find it necessary to import S 400 along with its entire sets of ground radars.
Ever asked yourself why??Because it's a misconception often held by even many educated persons (like yourself and me as well in the past) that money alone can compensate for experience but it doesn't work that way.in the worlds of high end R&D, experience still play a very major and important role and is as necessary as resources, if not more than that.
) Even then the Russian gun would come out on top for pure law of physics!!
