Talk:M1 Abrams

Is the "video games" section a must?

Is the "video games" section a must? Ostensibly, it was added by another editor for the purpose of linking an orphaned article, but I can see this rapidly getting out of control as IP's fill up the section with increasingly trivial appearances of the tank in every video game under the sun. Could this possibly be the topic for a new article - "M1 Abrams in popular culture" - or something? Plus, that could cover things like movies appearances and TV shows, too.--L1A1 FAL (talk) 12:02, 6 October 2012 (UTC)

No, just the usual crappy listcruft. Do any of these have any relevance to the Abrams, rather than the Abrams having relevance to them? Andy Dingley (talk) 12:13, 6 October 2012 (UTC)

OK, I'll remove it. Rklawton (talk) 23:23, 17 December 2012 (UTC)

Picture

Personaly the main picture seems a bit fake and like a toy I have in my basement are you shure this is a REAL M1? IT really does remind me of a toy that i used to have when i was a kid which is in my basement...-anymynous — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.180.192.93 (talk) 21:07, 7 October 2012 (UTC)

Look at the full resolution, but we really ought to have a pic of the tank out in the real world around people or other items of known size. Hcobb (talk) 21:50, 7 October 2012 (UTC)

Production 1979 - present ?? Sure?

Produced: 1979–present Number built 9,000+ Variants See variants

I ask because I saw an very interesting documentation about restoring the old M1 Abrams. The Docu was not absolutely new but also not "old", I think between 2007 and 2010. It is a big factory which takes out every part of the M1 Abrams and repairs or replace it with new parts, but the replacing became increasingly difficult in the last years since many components for the M1 Abrams are no more in production. This was an example for the turret,

they take the turret off, which looks quite bad (from grafitti to smaller fighting optical damages, maybe from shooting with an assault rifle on the Abrams. However the built very much parts (the M1 Abrams has I think like the later World War 2 German Tanks a quite complicated mechanic. Which is good in the battlefield, but bad for the motor mechanic and others. The turret for example they found a solution: they take the naked turret and put it into a room and than the start to "shoot" the turret with thousands of small hard metallic pellets.

The pellets are not hard enough to damage the turret, but after some hours the whole dirty turret looks like new, just the (US Army) colour is away, and I think the spray the turret before the door opens, because there comes out an good looking, shiny full grey (grey-metallic?) turret. I thought to me, that you better should not repeat this more than once, because there is a small lose of material of course. But they are building already now far beyond 100 parts by hand since you can't buy them and no company will start production for such stuff which is worth maybe only a few hundred dollars while they can produce anti-tank, anti-air, anti-xyz misilles worth over 1 million US-$.

I Think they said that the most M1 Abrams the US Army became was before Desert Shield, in the mid 80's, and that the factory becomes money from the military budget to keep the M1 Abrams running as long as possible. The "latest" models were from early 90's I thought and now or soon have to get their first check in this factory... he said a number, in piece 15 a week but now in "war times" they get 30 a week. I thought he means the iraq war with "war" since the M1 is quite rare in the mountainous areas of afghanistan.

Maybe someone even saw the documentary, it is available on yo...ube... I saw it in English with german subtitles, but you can remove the subtitles and for sure you find it 100% English. These guys are really smart, every day there is another problem since every tank is different and has different problems, they should get paid twice as much for what they are doing. Without them the US Army would already have to begin producing a new main battle tank from 2020 or earlier on with costs of hundred billions for the whole programm, or even over 1 trillion if you built thousands of them, and the US military, no matter if Army, Marines or or... the US military would need I think at least 7,500 - 10,000.

Greetings Kilon22 (talk) 13:35, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

120 percent decrease in heat signature

The article's current text claims that the under-development diesel engine will reduce the tank's heat signature by 120%. That means with the diesel engine, the tank will suck heat out of its environment at a rate one of fifth the rate the current version emits heat. Such a thing is thermodynamically impossible, at least if it's going to keep it up for any sustained period. Nonetheless, a source is cited, and the source does really say that. Can we find a better source, with either a more plausible number or a clearer explanation? 207.161.219.24 (talk) 18:58, 3 February 2013 (UTC)

I just noticed it too; I checked the reference too, and it is there like you said. This is clearly wrong ... when something is reduced by 100%, it becomes 0. I'd say just delete this paragraph and the cite since the article would be better off without it. Replacing with something else would be better still, but IMO the deletion does not need to wait on finding a replacement.
Dr Smith (talk) 05:06, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Keep it, and the ref, but lose the 120%. We can trust an innumerate journo to correctly recite a press release that there is a low-heat diesel engine being planned. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:20, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

• The percentage has already been removed and replaced. -Fnlayson (talk) 15:43, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Abrams Speed

currently, the article's info-box states that the top road speed is 35 mph. But the actual top road speed is 42 mph and is limited by a governor.

links and proof and stuff:

• [1] General Dynamics page
• [2] army.mil stuff
• [3] FAS page

==MeepSire (talk) 00:19, 21 March 2013 (UTC)

Abrams Armour

The main text referring to the armor says: "giving an estimated maximum (frontal turret) 1,320–1,620 millimetres (52–64 in) of RHAe versus HEAT (and other chemical energy rounds) and 940–960 mm (37–38 in) versus kinetic energy penetrators.[43]" So the source for this is the: "R.P. Hunnicutt, Abrams: A History of the American Main Battle Tank" I have finally managed to get my hands on the book, and it makes for a very interesting reading, so far I haven't however encountered anything stating these estimates, at the ending sections "VEHICLE DATA SHEETS" on page 293 it lists the vehicles talked about in the book all it says for any of the Abrams prototypes or later versions armor is and I quote: "ARMOR Turret: Welded assembly of rolled homogeneous steel armor with special armor arrays in the frontal area Hull: Welded assembly of rolled homogeneous steel armor with special armor arrays in the frontal area and side skirts protecting the upper half of the suspension system" with this in mind and also the fact that I haven't yet read trough the whole book, I would like someone to point me to a page or at least pages or section where these estimates about the armor are presented i.e. the: "giving an estimated maximum (frontal turret) 1,320–1,620 millimetres (52–64 in) of RHAe versus HEAT (and other chemical energy rounds) and 940–960 mm (37–38 in) versus kinetic energy perpetrators.[43]" Thank you in advance, I'm just an tank enthusiast/tank nut requiring some help on this issue especially if in the info box of this article stands: "Armor Chobham, RH armor, depleted uranium strike plates, Kevlar mesh[citation needed]

   M1: Hull & turret – 350 mm vs APFSDS, 700 mm vs HEAT[5][nb 1]
   M1A1: Hull & turret – 600 mm vs APFSDS, 700 mm vs HEAT[6]
   M1A1HA: Hull – 600 mm vs APFSDS, 700 mm vs HEAT, Turret – 800 mm vs APFSDS, 1,300  mm vs HEAT[6][7][nb 2]
   M1A2: Hull (turret) – 600 (780 mm) mm vs APFSDS, 800 mm (1,060 mm) vs HEAT[5][not in citation given]" Which directly contradicts with the info about the armor in the main text. 

So please can someone elaborate on these contradictions at least and provide me with directions (page, section/section's) in the "R.P. Hunnicutt, Abrams: A History of the American Main Battle Tank" where these estimates can be found. Also when I read trough the whole book I will provide such info or the fact that there is no such estimates. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 94.250.101.140 (talk) 15:10, 7 April 2013 (UTC)