Many questioned why the first pre-production Challenger 3 Main Battle Tank was sent to Germany for trials. Now we know.
The information came to light in response to a Written Parliamentary Question.
John Healey, Shadow Secretary of State for Defence, asked:
“To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, for what reason the first pre-production Challenger 3 main battle tank was sent to Germany for trials.”
James Cartlidge, The Minister of State, Ministry of Defence, responded:
“The UK has the necessary facilities to undertake Challenger 3 trials and most of the trial activity will take place in the UK. The first pre-production vehicle was sent to Germany for a small number of trials that use Rheinmetall proprietary ammunition which would not be cost effective to clear on UK ranges for important but limited trial use. The remainder of the Challenger 3 prototypes will undergo full trialling in the UK, including firing trials.”
What a pathetic excuse for an expensive jolly. “Clear UK ranges”? lol
Bloody pen pushers!
It really isn’t. Anyone who has been involved in booking a range in the UK knows the amount of paperwork required, it’s a nightmare.
You need to get safety clearance on any natures you’re going to use on any range in the UK, for most ranges that isn’t a problem: 5.56, 7.62 etc is all already cleared for use. 120mm smoothbore isn’t. Eventually it’ll have to be cleared of course, but no point doing it for a trial of one vehicle, almost certainly cheaper to send it to Germany.
Right you answered the question I was going to pose, ie surely they will have to practice with said ammunition on various occasions at some time in the future to ensure those capabilities are kept viable and going to Germany each time hardly seems practical. My only additional question would be that knowing they were going smoothbore have they actually started the regulatory process esp in light of what’s happening east of Germany.
Possibly? It’ll happen eventually, but I suspect it’s more of a “In year budget management” kind of thing.
Why do they not just use a MOD owned range. Surely at some point a nato nation that also uses 120mm smoothbore ammo like the US, france, Germany, etc has used one of the MOD ranges for a joint exercise and so whatever safety checks have been done before.
It’s a non issue doing it in Germany as it would barely cost any more to do so, but seems an odd excuse.
You’ve never held a Range Management Qual, have you?
Jolly! I would call a work trip to the Caribbean or Goa a ‘jolly’, not a short visit to a windswept German range.
No, MoD have not used a lame excuse. It would be less time-consuming and disruptive tothe programme if the shoot could be done in UK, but UK ranges are not yet approved for firing this new (to us) ammunition type. Ammunition and range safety is parmount. You can’t use a range that has not undergone full accreditation.
Absolutely, Graham, some people have a different perspective on this deployment. Having visited Germany countless times it ain’t a ‘Jolly’ apart from the duty-free on the return trip. Hopefully, we will soon see the CH3 on U-Tube charging across the Bovingdon ranges.
“Jolly! I would call a work trip to the Caribbean or Goa a ‘jolly’, not a short visit to a windswept German range.”
There’s no such thing as a bad ‘run ashore’, just bad runners. I’m sure the pongos have an equivalent.
A sensible response from someone who understands the complexities of this sort of thing
Thanks mate.
If you had ever used a windswept,cold firing range in Germany,you wouldnt call it a jolly.It makes perfect sense as the gun,and ammo are German sourced
I have and it was fun. Light lnfantry are like that 🤣
Are you involved in procurement of and/or
designing goods and services that meet stringent regulation (probably put into place for good reason)? If you have such experience you’ll realise that there are complexities and rationale behind these things that may seem trivial or ‘red tape’ upon first inspection but are in place for reason. Think of Chesterton’s fence principle which basically means don’t remove something without understanding why it’s there in the first place.
You’d think Healey would be happy with this, he’s very pro EU defence collaberation, having already co-authored a paper on collaberation with Germany.
Defence collaboration with Germany, so under Labour the RN will work closely with the Germans and sail round and round the Baltic counting seagulls and a far Eastern deployment will be a trip to Kent.
The Baltic is now to be known as nato lake number 1.
‘Not cost effective to clear on UK ranges’ talk about a vague answer.
“which would not be cost-effective to clear on UK ranges”
I don’t get it.
So it’s cheaper to ship a 66-ton tank to Germany rather than shipping some test ammo to the UK?
More like to certify it on the ranges maybe?
Exactly.
This is a solution to get the testing and trials done.
What is needed is progress and not messing around which is what this appears to be directed towards.
👍
Does anyone know how long it takes to get accreditation on a UK range it’s just with a war on it’s not too comfortable imagining red tape might still take precedence. Either way it’s good that they have done what’s necessary to get around that and get the testing started, and I guess it won’t hurt to test out the tank as a whole in representative terrain and location it would likely be operating in.
The issue is more HSE driven duty holder lunacy than anything else.
Unfortunately it feels like the large European war going on close by has many permitted the UK political class groupthink yet.
Maybe once Putin starts monkeying around in Moldova…..which he will if he starts gaining ground in Ukraine on his 3 year special operation.
It’s actually the opposite of faffing about, but people who don’t understand are actually arguing for more faffing about; as long as it’s in the UK.
It’s certifying it to be safe on UK ranges, which is time consuming and expensive and a lot of paperwork. We routinely move vehicles back and forth from Germany so the latter is almost certainly easier and less expensive.
For 1 prototype tank, yes.
It’s not about that. It’s about the time and cost to certify a range to fire a new type of ammo fired from a new type of cannon (new, to the UK, that is). I thought the article was clear on that point.
I have to say its an odd sight seeing what appear to be rivets back on a British tank
And I still reckon they could make the turret a touch wider to squeeze more rounds in. Only 31 down from 49(?) on the Ch2. Plus less tanks overall, it’s quite a drop in shot capacity, so should they then fix up more than the 148 tanks to compensate for any loss in capacity? Or, are they doing or getting more effectiveness even with less (148) tanks?
I’m pretty sure the Turret is already almost as wide as the tank. Anyway well past modifying the turret now.
In terms of numbers. Probably down to the realistic amount of hulls that can be brought back into service without building new ones.
i did hear 66 hulls were stripped and totally scrapped, no idea if that true, plus the out going C2 when out of service could be used? If more were needed. Or are you saying its going to be built out already stored hulls only?
I’m not totally certain but I have heard that there were discussions over how many C2 could be kept active while C3 conversions are going on. So must be a portion of thr active fleet.
we all know the whole on paper fleet is not all available, and has not been for a while, more like a token force working the rest gathering dust
213 vehs in the active fleet. Typically 70% will be fit to use. Does not mean 30% are stripped out hulks gathering dust in a shed and about to be scrapped!
When I served, REME remit was to have 70% of a key fleet available at all times increasing to 90% in TTW after 24hrs solid work by REME and crew, with spares available.
70% routine availability rising to 90% in TTW is hardly indicative of a token force.
not in my regt, we had less than 40% ever fully working, pity you were not my fitter section
Oh! CR1 or CR2? When? That is a huge surprise to me.
no MLRS, we could never get the spares as our launchers were old and spares were just no longer made for some bits
CR3 conversions are going on until FOC in 2030. Of course we need to retain a CR2 capability of progressively reducing size during the period up till then. We have to be ready for a war! 213 CR2s in the active fleet, of which 148 are being fed in tranches to the RBSL build line.
It should be 213 fed in tranches into the RBSL build line, as we have discussed before 148 is just way to small a number..even for two type 56 regiments ( and I think moving to Two regiments is beyond idiotic as well).
This is a similar amount of rounds stired in the bustle, to the Leopard and Abrams. However the Leopard and Abrams also have a hull magazine. That was factored in during the design of the tanks. The Chally was not. This is important, as the Chally’s hull would need a redesign, to accommodate the nearly 1 meter length ammunition. Plus it would additional armour surrounding the magazine, making the tank even heavier. By having all the main gun ammo in the bustle, that are covered with blow out panels. Means the crew are a lot safer if the ammo cooks… Read more »
What is going in the spare space?
As far as I’m aware there is no spare space available for the one piece rounds. With the rifled gun, the Chally 2 could store ammo below the turret ring in water filed containers. As the two piece ammo was easier to package. Without handling a one piece 120 round. its difficult to put into perspective how large the rounds are. For example if a Leopard needs to re-arm the bustle magazine. It takes the loader a fair amount of juggling and manipulation to get the rounds from the hull storage, up past the main gun and into the bustle.… Read more »
Difficult to get my head around that it’s a heavier tank than its rivals but has less stored rounds and would be heavier still if it had to have additional hull magazine armour too. Is there room in the hull potentially I would presume not.
The hull would need to be heavily modified. At which stage you might as well design a new hull. Thereby including a purpose made hull magazine.
The thing is Challenger 2 was always heavier than Leopard 2 anyway. There was always a bit of a difference of opinion between the Cold War British and German design philosophies, with the Germans building lighter and more mobile tanks to us (Chieftain weighed a full 16 tonnes more than Leopard! When you consider that Leopard was a 40t tank…). So when the Challenger 3 upgrade is made it’s not really a surprise that it remains heavier.
Thanks for the reply Davey and others too. Understand the length of the new ammo means restrictions and safety and armour are paramount. It’s still a huge drop in shell capacity and reduced tank numbers. Question is, is it all worth it? Why the need for one piece ammo, could they have developed a hybrid two piece ammo for the 120mm smoothbore? 1m is huge, almost a missile length. Is there an autoloader in the CH3 or is it a crew of four?
Chally 3 will be keeping a 4 man crew. There is no need for an autoloader with the 120mm ammo. The possible future Rh 130mm gun, the ammo is around 1.3m long and significantly heavier than the 120’s ammo. It will need an autoloader. The current US M829A3 120mm one piece round used by Abrams is an armour piercing fin stabilized discarding sabot (APFSDS). It weighs 22kg and is 892mm long. The dart is a two piece dart. Where 100mm of the dart’s tip is sacrificial and is designed to initiate the target tank’s ERA . This tip is 34mmin… Read more »
Thanks Davey, for another brilliant reply. What detail! The Ch3 looks good after getting the “Coopers” treatment and will probably go like fang too! 🇬🇧 🇩🇪
Developing a hybrid two piece ammo would defeat the point of going to the 120mm Smoothbore. The Rifled 120mm with three piece ammunition that the Challenger 2 had was fine, in theory, but nobody else in NATO used it. But when the Germans introduced the Rh-120 with Leopard 2 and the Americans swapped the 105mm L7 on the M1 out for it, suddenly pretty much all of NATO (Stand fast Ariete and Leclerc we see your OTO Breda and GIANT guns, but they use the same ammo as the RH-120) was using the same 1 piece ammunition designed to be… Read more »
Thanks for the great reply too Dern. All makes sense when it’s explained.
The only other thing to add is what seems to be a potential causal link between autoloaders and crew casualties. Russian tank crews and crews of soviet/Russian designed tanks do not tend to survive penetrate. The crews of western tanks almost alway do. This is probably related to sub standard ammunition security due to auto loader design. The design means there are always a number of rounds in the fighting compartment. It’s been a common problem for all Russian designed auto loaders.
Most say 49 down to 31 isn’t good
Judging by what we see in Ukraine restocking isn’t exactly a trivial issue and the less overall targets and opportunities for drones the better. A 40% decrease despite a new turret is a concern but I guess you are stick with 40 year old design choices that can only be partly offset.
Maybe an “Overwatch” type vehicle (Ajax/Boxer based) with ATM’s operating in the mix will help make up some of the shortfall.
It’s a compromise tank. This is one of the few negatives. Even then is it such a big negative? It would take some time to use up 31 rds.
So the question i have to ask is exactly what is the difference between a 120mm Smooth bore round and a 120mm rifled round when it comes to British tank ranges? Now I’m pretty sure that I read that German armour trained in the Uk the other year (As in ranges) also the German army used to be based in Castlemartin and used the ranges there, ranges which continued to be used by Armour. Finally if the Uk is upgrading the Challenger 2 to a smoothbore Challenger 3, then why hasn’t somebody started classifying a range or two in which… Read more »
“small number of trials that use Rheinmetall proprietary ammunition”;
Sounds to me like they may be using overproof rounds to stress the barrel and chamber, a process that normally takes place before the weapon is delivered, just a thought.
I have heard that a new armour piercing fin stabilized discarding sabot (APFSDS) or Fin for short, is being co-developed by BAe and Rheinmetall. This Fin round is a development of the DM73, so uses a tungsten carbide based dart. But I suspect it includes a sacrificial tip of the dart, used for detonating ERA. Thereby leaving a gap for the main dart to pass through. I would also expect it to be self-sharpening, which is a new design technique. Which only DU darts could previously do and gave them an advantage over tungsten based darts. Chally 3 uses the… Read more »
You didn’t “hear” it, you read it. Publicly announced news.
Someone who read about it could have told them in which case they did “hear it.”
Wow you had to edit that.
I think you are probably right something rather new and specific as indeed the wording does suggest when you analyse it, a round still in development that perhaps if it is still subject to alteration and not fully signed off it would not indeed be worth clearing for uk ranges at this stage.
Probably minimal, but it would still need to go through safety clearance under UK law. I’m not sure when the Germans last used Castlemartin (last reference I can find is the 60s when they’d have had 105mm armed Leopard 1’s (remember also that pre-2007 all German Leopard 2’s had a different gun to the Challenger 3, a small number still do so that’ll generate paperwork even if the round itself is signed off). As for why we haven’t signed off on the new ammunition and guns yet, probably in year budget management and possibly availability. *edit apparently the Bundeswehr stopped… Read more »
Started leaving in 1996, and they used the Leo 2, but as mentioned I did read that the Germans popped across to the Uk with their tanks not so long ago.
As I said, Leo 2 in 1996 had a different gun then CR3, the new one only started coming into service 2007 and still haven’t been competely replaced.
proprietary ammunition is specifically designed to test the gun. It’s not standard 120 mm
Perhaps as Rhienmettal made the gun and turret they wanted it close so if things did go tits up they would be on the spot🤔? It says further firing trails etc will be in the UK so I suppose there was a reason somewhere.
That’s what I assume. It’s a German gun who have made lots of them and probably have specialist testing equipment that perhaps the U.K. doesn’t.
Now could the gun be fired in the U.K without issue. Probably.
Does the U.K. range have all the sensors, measuring devices, experience of testing guns etc used by the German gun manufacturer. Probably not.
The gun could not be fired in the UK without issue – the ranges have not been safety-cleared for 120mm smoothbore ammo. Thats why it is going to Germany.
I think the clue is in the statement “Rheinmetall proprietary ammunition” Put simply it means Rheinmetall doesn’t want this kind of ammunition outside of its immediate control. There maybe something very special about the test rounds that they don’t want any one else getting their hands on.
We have proprietary things in my work place and they cannot leave the building no matter what.
would it not have been wise to clear at least one live fire range even before chally 3 was built so it was done ready for this trial??
We have live fire ranges, we use them all the time. It’s just we haven’t yet cleared the ammunition to be fired on them.
Sure CH3 will be a fine Tank like 1-2 .For getting tested in Germany why ripe our country side up 🤗 🇬🇧
Before jumping to conclusions this is not such a bad move. think where the tank could be used in the future and it is not on Salisbury plain??
Really doesn’t make much of a muchness for this kind of thing to be honest. Senelager is no more like Estonia than Salisbury, and for test firing and initial trials it wouldn’t really matter if it was Estonia or the Canadian prairie.
Odd put the tank in the photo looks riveted together ! Glad is the prototype…