Never understood why they took so long to add a APU to them? Our hovercraft used a turbine (RR Gnome), you could adjust the fuel pump to run different fuels. Jet B was really hard on the fuel pumps as it had poor lubricating properties. That would not be an issue with diesel. However for Canada, it would be a matter of getting any fuel in the required amount at the right time that would be the issue.
Built it and they will come...
GWOT was the main driver there, as turret watch burned a lot of fuel, and engine hours for no other good reason than it wasn't possible to plug in to a generator with a slave cable in most locations, and a lot of wartime assumptions had been the tanks would mostly be ON or OFF.
It's been done for some export customers -- I dont know who off the top of my head.
The Abrams X will have a hybrid diesel electric. I can't find any other with a diesel.
How are the Leo's refueled? The same manner would apply to the Abrams would it not? Different fuel (or not?) but same logistics vehicles.
A turbine will burns something like 70 gals at idle, doing nothing but charging the batteries.
As @Colin Parkinson pointed out the turbine burns a horrific amount of fuel regardless of if going full speed or sitting.
Having the same fuel makes rolling replenishment a much simpler task I imagine.
Many more of them, with all the ripples in drivers, maintainers, additional spare vehicles, footprint in garrison and in the field, etc. before even getting into what fuel is being carried.
In the grand scheme is really isn't that significant - about 12 more trucks for a Bde, based on a 97 ish Abrams component.
Sheesh that's about 50% of the vehicle allotment for 39 brigade.
not as long as you control the roads, the transfer stations and the skies to allow for fuel to be brought in. If you don't it becomes very significant. An additional 12 trucks is 12 more targets on the road to conceal
For completely instinctive reasons, I thought it might be a bit of a jump in capacity.
As has been the case since Sopwith Camels were throwing bombs out of their cockpits. I don't know what drills the Ukrainians are using but the ones our SSM's echelon uses are pretty good. They travel about two or three tactical bounds behind the tanks. The echelon can be split with the Maint WO taking command of the second portion. Resupply can be done by battle replen, caches and running replens. Not all the echelon vehicles are trucks, there's some amour that can fight. It's something we have faced since the tanks showed up at the Battle of Flers-Courcelette and the first mass use of Mk IV's at the Battle of Cambrai . It'll likely never be perfect, but we've brought it to the point where we can mitigate a lot of the threat.
Not sure but we usually have a FAAR in a combat team to fuel us daily. If you change fuel types for the tanks your doubling that off the hop.
Can't speak for the Leo brigade, but a US ABCT has 6 x M978 HEMTT tankers (2,500 US gal each) with 6 x PLS trailers with fuel modules (2,500 US Gal each) which totals 30,000 US Gals within each of its three Combined Arms battalions. On top of that, the brigade's support battalion's distribution company has another 18 x M978s and 18 x PLS fuel module trailers for another 90,000 US Gals held within the company.
