Suppose you had examples of the world’s main battle tanks - the Challenger 2, the Leopard, the Abrams, etc - lined up on tarmac. They’re all fully crewed and loaded. Which one would win a 1 mile drag race? What about a 5 mile drag race?
Brucie bonus: what about racing around a dirt track? So you’ve got things like cornering and braking to also consider.
No idea whom would win (does the Abrams have to leave it’s governor on?) but man does that sound like FUN!
Take it a step further: Demolition Tank Derby!
Minus the guns, of course.
Can the competitors shoot at each other?
Dunno, but something tells me that the microsecond-quick reaction times of he driver to the “Christmas Tree” aren’t going to be all that important in this race.
I couldn’t find any “zero-to-sixty” statistics but wikipedia gives top speeds.
Type 99 (China) 50 mph
Leopard 2 (Germany) 45 mph
Arjun (India) 45 mph
Leclerc (France) 44 mph
Type 90 (Japan) 44 mph
M1 Abrams (USA) 42 mph
C1 Ariete (Italy) 40 mph
K1 88 (South Korea) 40 mph
Merkava (Israel) 40 mph
T-90 (Russia) 38 mph
FV4034 Challenger 2 (UK) 37 mph
Sabra M60T (Turkey) 36 mph
So if these figures are accurate, it looks like China’s taking home the Guderian Cup.
But how long do they take to get to those speeds? Hence the 1 mile and 5 mile issue.
Slight dispute with your cites: I’ve consistently beaten Leo II’s with an M-1 in a 1 mile+ drag on pavement. Although I will admit they did seem to do a bit better off-road.
1 mile may be a long enough track for possibly slower acceleration rates to be overcome by the tanks with the faster top speeds. Plus, I wouldn’t be surprised if the faster ones also have faster acceleration. The wiki article on the Chinese tank gives some idea of the initial acceleration, and they say “only” as if it’s notably quick (relatively speaking):
0 to 20 in 12 seconds … it can probably outdrag a Yugo …
ETA:
OK, Ex Tank, is 0 to 20 in 12 seconds quick acceleration compared to an Abrams, or any other you have experience with?
The Merkava has a good chance of winning the dirt track - it’s not the fastest track on flat ground, but its suspension was designed for rough terrain, and it’s been known to cross obstacles at greater speeds than other tanks of its class.
I have to assume that most (all?) modern tanks have a rpm/speed governor on their engines? I know that when I was in the USAR, I often talked to tankers that said the M-1 could do 60mph with the governor removed. It’s scary to think that something that weighs 64 freaking TONS could possibly travel that fast.
Presumably any other tank with a governor on it could go quite a bit faster if it was removed as well.
Or maybe the tankers were blowing smoke up my ass.
Never bothered the check it; we were just faster or slower than what we were up against. The Type 99 and 3 more forwar gears than an M-1 series, probably accounting for it’s superior performance; but the M-1 has 2 reverse gears. The U.S. Army probably figures it’s good to be able to back out of a fight at least half as fast as your drove into it.
No, they weren’t blowing smoke. The M-1 has two governors, a mechanical and an electronic. The mechanical is fairly easy to fiddle with, but only yields ~5mph increase in performance. I never did find the location of the electronic governor, but figured it was a programming “soft switch” in the ECU (Engine Control Unit), accessible with one of the diagnostic tools mechanics had that could plug into the ECU.
The big problem with increased performance is increased track wear. I was told that an M-1 could go 60+mph, but only if you didn’t mind a better-than-even chance of the track assembly disintegrating under the stress.
Trains and planes manage that all the time, or am I being wooshed? :dubious:
A cousin of mine is a tanker (American, so M1), and he’s never in his life used any form of transportation at less than its maximum possible speed (Grampap used to say that he never learned to walk; he just started right away with running). He says he’s gotten his up to over 60 MPH; I assume his first priority on joining was to make friends with a mechanic who knew how to disable the governor(s).
Maybe I should have clarified: Planes, trains, ships, etc all weigh a lot more, but are also generally a lot bigger and/or longer. It’s just amazing to me that something that’s relatively small by comparison packs so much mass (and weaponry) and yet can travel as fast as it does.
I used to walk near or behind them at the tank range in Grafenwoehr as they approached their lanes to have a firing run. They are impressive in a scary way. The ground rumbles, the heat generated by the turbine engine…hoy shit.
I never felt like such a little kid.
You might think so but, when those cheap little plastic controls just snap right off, a Chinese tank goes right out of commission.
Ah right, yes fair enough. 
Tanks are impressive as you say. I’ve only seen one in motion - a Challenger II at a show - and it was like a moving castle. I can’t imagine what facing a whole armoured brigade of those things in full effect would be like.
Against tanks? The A-10 wins.
Go Air Force!
Everyone remember this little event in San Diego in 1995?
Here’s a glimpse at the destructive power this much rolling mass of armored machine can do, without even firing a shot.
