Unbreakable stubbornness?

Russian manufacturers of armor elements for military equipment and civilian vehicles invite experts to the training ground

The word "armor" evokes associations only with tanks, including thanks to the patriotic song popular in the thirties. But the experience of almost incessant hostilities in hot spots has shown that tanks cannot solve many tasks ...

The word "armor" evokes associations only with tanks, including thanks to the patriotic song popular in the thirties.

But the experience of almost incessant hostilities in hot spots has shown that many tasks are beyond the power of tanks to solve - they are too clumsy. A revision of the entire military doctrine was required, one of the directions of which was the development of special military vehicles.

A few years ago, one of the central channels showed a series of films about re-equipping our army with modern combat vehicles. The quality of the novelties of Russian armored vehicles in the frames of documentary films was “assessed” not by representatives of the defense department, but by bandits who shot armored vehicles at close range.

The technology has survived!

If you want peace, prepare for war!

This formula has been determining the nature of many, many processes taking place in different countries and called scientific and technological progress for more than one century. It is difficult to argue with the thesis that the demand for breakthrough technologies has been and is being presented primarily by the military.

Created exclusively to counter enemy fire, a special steel sheet, durable and sufficiently ductile, capable of taking on a bullet from any small arms, is now gradually becoming a thing of the past. Having faithfully served the cause of protecting soldiers' lives for several decades, traditional armor is giving way to a fundamentally new material - a polymer alloy with the use of ceramics. Because of this, by the way, new armor in everyday life is increasingly called ceramic.

The recipe by which this most durable pie is prepared is generally well known to specialists and is not a secret. But each of the manufacturers has its own characteristics in creating a new generation of armor, which distinguish the original product from competitors' products.

One of the world's best enterprises for the production of polymer armor is located in Russia. The enterprises of Zashchita Corporation assemble, perhaps, the best armored vehicles of their own design in the country, which have proven themselves from the very best side both at test sites and in real combat conditions.

“Perhaps the best ...” is not said for a red word. This opinion is shared by many experts, including influential foreign experts in the arms and special equipment market. However, despite the convincing results of the tests, the so-called shooting of samples made by Zashchita, some Russian departments and law enforcement agencies are in no hurry to support the domestic manufacturer, but buy foreign analogues that are steeper than their domestic counterparts in only one indicator - in price!

Italian touchy

Armored vehicles of the Italian manufacturer under the trademark "Iveco", it would seem, have long been known to specialists. Proven brand, time-tested quality. Has it been verified? The Italians, unlike Russian manufacturers, did not send their samples of armored vehicles for testing. Does a brand that implies high reliability need no additional verification?

At the same time, the opinions of experts on the level of reliability of armored cars from Iveco vary greatly. First of all, because the exploitation of the natives of the Apennine Peninsula in the harsh Russian conditions, to put it mildly, is difficult. But do not think that I will once again remind the reader of Italian diesel engines, which, with the known quality of the corresponding fuel, sometimes show their weakest sides on our roads. Forget about engines for now. At the moment, we are talking about armor and only about it.

The armor of the Italians, for example, at temperatures below 20-25 degrees, loses its best properties. It seems that for Russia, where winter lasts from four to nine months, depending on the region, this is the first signal that should alert those who decide to buy this miracle of overseas technology.

And the categorical refusal of the Italians to participate in the shooting of samples demonstrates not so much the manufacturer's confidence in the quality of its products, but the disregard for the procedures and rules in force in our country. Of course, substituting a car for 300 thousand euro rubles at a training ground under dagger fire from all types of small arms is an unprofitable pleasure. But after all, order is only then order when it is the same for all. And you can’t imagine other ways to actually check what this car is worth! Unless it's just a real fight...

The organizers of tests of armored vehicles from the Russian Ministry of Defense argue that there should be no preferences in determining the supplier company for the needs of the defense department. But this is in words. In fact, an experimental batch of Italian armored vehicles was recently purchased at a price that was about three times higher than the cost of direct Russian counterparts!

Breakthrough

At the same time, domestic armored vehicles, demonstrating the preservation of protective properties even at a temperature of minus 55 Celsius, and at least not inferior to Italian ones in any other indicator, are still kept at a distance by the military department.

Let's talk about a specific sample submitted to the exacting court of army buyers. The car developed by Zashchita Corporation is no longer just an armored car in the traditional sense, but a complex set of electronic navigation, communications and combat control systems that allows you to solve any operational and tactical tasks on the battlefield. It may sound a little official, but in fact it is absolutely true. The machine will not be lost in any corner of the globe, which allows us to offer it to the widest range of potential customers. Communication with it is almost never interrupted, duplicated simultaneously through several channels. At the same time, the machine is also capable of solving the tasks of fire destruction of the enemy, for which it is understaffed with the necessary weapons.

But the main difference between this car and a special pride of its creators is the armor itself. The know-how of Zashchita developers lies primarily in the fact that it was possible to carry out a unique selection of the shape and layout of composite protection elements using binders originally developed for the space industry.

Such interpenetration of technologies may seem strange, but in fact it is logically explainable. Zashchita Corporation conducts its research and development activities within the framework of the STK Soyuz holding, the financial core of which is OJSC Fondservicebank. It was the coordination of the efforts of scientists working in a single information and economic space that allowed Zashchita engineers to take such a serious step towards creating modern composite armor.

The practice of using composite materials to increase the armor protection of a particular product (object) has been around for more than a dozen years. Over the years, it has been possible to achieve a significant reduction in the mass of the armor itself. But until very recently, such problems remained as the low survivability of composite protection and the decrease in its bullet resistance at low temperatures. Did not contribute to the introduction of composite armor and its extremely high cost.

Work on the creation of a new generation armored car was intensified five years ago, when in one of the hot spots, during the operation to destroy a gang of foreign mercenaries, almost the first experimental vehicle of the corporation in a dagger fight withstood more than two hundred shots fired at different angles on all surfaces new armored car. The result exceeded all expectations: there was not a single hole in the bodywork. And most importantly, none of the crew members were injured.

Perhaps for someone this result would be too good, but not for developers. After all, they initially focused on the GOSTs of military acceptance, which in our country are an order of magnitude more stringent than the requirements for armored vehicles, say, collection. Collector's GOSTs (developed, by the way, taking into account the standards of foreign armed forces) allow up to 10 holes per 100 shots.

In addition, mine protection was also raised to a qualitatively new level. The principle was taken as a basis, which is quite understandable not only to specialists: in the event of an explosion, the details of the car's structure should not become additional damaging elements. But to this day, this is a sore spot for many, including foreign analogues.

What our armor specialists can produce today can only be called a breakthrough. The new generation of Russian armored vehicles, created according to the principle of armored capsule construction, provides the crew with comfort and safety at a level superior to any foreign analogues. Russian armored vehicles are becoming more reliable and more maneuverable day by day than their foreign counterparts.

Specialists from a number of foreign military departments, not constrained by intra-bloc military-political obligations, are already working on issues of servicing Russian armored vehicles. But it is known that these problems are discussed by the parties after the main decision has been made - to purchase the products themselves. This news cannot but rejoice: after all, the start of serial production of cars will lead to an inevitable price reduction.

And it’s sad because if the Russian military department doesn’t make a really balanced decision, these machines will protect the bodies and lives of any soldiers, but not Russian ones, from bullets ...

PS "Novaya" filed an official request with the Ministry of Defense. We look forward to hearing.