The next generation warfare demands better solutions by removing both the soldiers and armor from the tank. Thus the concept of remote controlled main battle tank arises and its operational requirements and issues are discussed here
By Inigo Mathew, Rajkumar M, Boselin Prabhu S R, Rajkumar R and Sophia S
Electronic brain
does not- feel fear or get distracted by nearby shell bursts. This is the only
factor behind which leads us to replace live human assets away from the battle
space. During Second World War period weapons are guided by human assets and
eliminating those human assets will eliminate the threads, for example wire or
laser guided missiles which are guided by a gunner which are replaced by radar,
inertial are Global Positioning System (GPS) guidance which cannot be defended by eliminating the gunner.
A tank fired or
artillery shells projectile may have a maximum range of 3000 meters, but self
guided shells can reach an effective distance of 8000 meters approx, and the
added advantage is the course can be changed during the mid course prior to the
target, which shows the advancement in ammunition technology. Our main
objective is to save the life of our well trained soldier. Because a well
trained soldier is more important than a million dollar equipment. In this
paper we have discussed a concept of operating weapon systems like main battle
tanks (MBT), artillery guns remotely to improve the survivability and
lethality. But we have discussed operating a MBT as our prime objective.
Why Remote
Weapon Station?
Conventional
turret of any MBT requires large area over the chassis which also weights more
than two tons. The main reason for such weight of the turret is it has to
accommodate two operators and it has to be armored with a thick one inch steal
which puts some added weight. Because, from the beginning of tank design,
protection of soldiers life has given more priority over the platform
survivability. The turret is the most common point of attack, because it’s the
weakest point compared to any point on the MBT. To accommodate a heavy turret
vehicle with wider chassis is required which will increases the chance of
detection and make it more vulnerable to enemy fire. So the best solution in my
point of view is to remove the soldiers from the turret and place them far away
from the battle space, ie., take control of the tank remotely.
Advantages of
Remote Turret
1. Lighter weight- which helps
reduce total station weight by 50% and improves platform stability by placing
vehicles center of gravity centered and lowered.
2. Ammunition capacity- eliminating
soldier will provides extra space to store ammunitions.
3. Profile-reduced size will reduce
the chance of detection and can easily suppress enemy fire.
4. Cost reduction- the safety of
solder cost more than the platform and it is not necessary in this concept.
5. Power consumption-reduced weight needs reduced power to drive the turret.
Remote operability- allows us to take control from anywhere by communicating
the vehicle, say run by wire. (See fig. 1)
The Overall Concept of Controls
A normal MBT has the following controls.
1. Driver control- used to maneuver
vehicle during combat.
2. Turret control-used for
positioning control.
3. Gun control- used to aim at the
target.
For the above
mentioned control around four crew members are required and improper tank
design will put their life under thread. No tank design can be said improper,
because there was always a healthy competition between the tank designers and
the ammunition designers. When designers come with a new tank, ammunition
experts come with much better rounds to tear down the tanks(9-12). To answer the
question of the ammunition designers, tank designers added extra armor to their
tanks, increases weight which cause more problem in rapidity and
maneuverability. Only solution for this long lasting competition is to remotely
operate these tanks, and we don’t need to worry about armor. The block diagram
shows how our system functions(13-17). (See fig. 2)
Driver Control
One of the best
ways to evade from enemy fire was speed. Speed kills, but in the battle field
speed saves our life, kill enemy and vice versa. The speed and range of
maneuverability is more important for any MBT in any conflict zone. Driver
control consist of controls to help the tank move forward, backward, left as
well as right. While controlling the tank remotely the delay in signal
transmission and reaction time of the hardware in weapon system must be
minimized for effective real-time control. The below figure shows the proven
remote controlled vehicle which can be used during combat. (See fig. 3)
Image Attribute: Guardian UGV, Israel
These sort of
remote controlled weapon systems carry effective sensors which provide
real-time intelligence. With advanced display techniques and virtualization we
can make our solders feel they are in the battle, but they are not really.
These type of weapons systems carry some array of sensors like Forward Looking
Infra Red (FLIR), day and night optics like color CCD, InSb cooled night vision
cameras, laser range finders, etc.,7 . These sort of sensors helps in effective
control of vehicle remotely which helps to attain full potential.
Turret control
The turret consist of servo motor system which is controlled by the on-board
computer (in case of remote control), where the instructions for the computer
is sent from the user interface control located far away from the field7 . To
target a point target selected by the operator, the coordinate data are sent
from the user interface console to the on-board computer, which drives the
turret accordingly. Once the target is within the range of the gun, gunner can
pull the trigger remotely. To track a moving target, operator first selects a
target, the target information are continuously updated to the control consol
and the gun position is updated and guided to point on target. The system keeps
track on moving target. The servo motors are controlled by digital pins of the
on board computer, using PWM to control the movement of servos (18-21)
Image Attribute: Black Knight's Sensor System
The on board
computer is the main controller for the positioning of the turret and helps the
gunner to take the short (7,22). It acts as the on-board master controller for connecting
all the individual components and make them work synchronized. Main function is
to control the weapon station via remote commands. For a system with servo
motors, the controller has to provide PWM signals for at least three motors,
for proper positioning of the turret and to aim the main gun,(23-26). Wired
communication protocols like CAN would be aided to communicate with other
systems with in the remote station. Because it is very important that the
reaction time between targeting and firing must be as small as possible. System
for such operational capability must requires clock source of 16KHz and above.
Gun Control
The gunner has
to keep in mind that other than the force of the projectile many other external
factors also influence the projectile. They are drag, gravity, wind direction
and even the moisture content of the operational atmosphere (2-5) . The below
figure shows the various force acting on a projectile. (See fig. 4)
So the gunner
must have some sound knowledge about the aerodynamic factors. But human
approach is not appreciable for scenarios like moving targets. In an instance
if the light ray (eye sight) bends, ie., if the gunners view is off course
because of environmental parameters the gunner will target and shoots at the ghost
target. Figure shows how bending light ray, ie., gunners primary view affect
the shoot. Other than this the stability of the gun also affects the
performance to its worst. For better performance the gun has to be stabilized
in two axis. The reason for two axis control is provided in the next figure.
Here we go with Fire Control Computer (FCC). FCC calculates all these
parameters affecting projectile and correct the course accordingly. Probability
of first hit not only depends on the projectile course correction. It also
depends on the velocity of the vehicle and the tilt with respect to surface.
(See fig. 5 & 6)
Fire control
computer (FCC) FCC is nothing but a processor which considers all the possible
factors which affects the hit probability of the projectile and aims the gun
accordingly. It consist of some array of sensors which provides the input to
the computer to solve complex mathematical relation and the answer is effected
as the performance of the weapon system7 . Below figure shows how a ballistic
fire control computer looks like. In present FCC the data is fed to a system by
the soldier who is present inside the weapons system itself. In case if the
system or the system operator is eliminated, the whole weapons system can not
function and become ineffective6 . It also cost the life of the soldier.
Artificial intelligence or automatic thread elimination may provide a solution.
But in military particularly under complex weapon system use of AI is limited.
(See fig. 7)
Image Attribute: M60 NIFCS , Elbit Systems / A Ballistic Fire Control Computer System of a MBT
It acts as the
heart of the system. FCC depends on every individual sensor units and each
sensor units reports to the FCC at a rate of fifty four times per seconds (7) .
Some of the primary systems which reports to the FCC are as follow.
Electronic
sights Electronic sights are nothing but CCD cameras which provide input feeds
to an LCD display. It had replaced old mechanical sight systems. The function
of this sight system is just to display what is looks. It works at infrared
wave band of eight to fourteen micrometer. Instead of displaying the video
optical feed, it displays the heat signature of the target(8) . Because well
camouflaged targets are more difficult to find in the photograph, but they
can’t hide their heat signature easily. It is also known as Target Acquisition
and Designation System (TADS) It consist of an array of sensors includes FLIR,
CCD, day night optics, and night television system, mostly provides visual
information on the target.
Sensors FCS
depends on various sensor inputs to function, sensor includes temperature
sensor, used to calculate charge (projectile) temperature, barrel temperature,
environmental sensor (27-29), meteorological sensor, used to calculate wind
direction, velocity, humidity sensor, pressure sensor and a compass. In
addition to that CANT sensor provide the tilt level of the MBT which are all
used to find firing solution. Gun resolver provides the angle to which the
barrel had bent which determines the path of the projectile. LASER range finder
provides the distance to the target from the tank.
Upon all the
whole system has to work under a synchronized clock pulse. Tanks velocity may
vary with instance and the tilt angle varies depending on the terrain. These
variations will affect the performance badly and they have to monitored
continuously to attain first round hit probability. In other instance the
target range may increase or decrease which means they keep on vary and they
have to tracked simultaneously to improve efficiency (5) . All the parameters are
reporting to the ballistic fire control computer which displays all the
tactical information’s which are displayed to the control consol which is an
interactive LCD touch based control which is located inside the crew
compartment. Any shell burst inside the compartment will affect the crew. This
block will explain clearly. (See Fig. 8)
The solution is
to move the crew far away from the battle field. This will save our soldiers.
The block diagram clearly explains how remote operation works. (See fig. 9)
Based on the
displayed information the operator will provide the control signals remotely.
These signals are transmitted remotely to the main battle tank. Fire control
computer located within the battle tank receives the control information and
apply those to the respective ports of the computer which drives the tank,
eliminating the risk of the solders.
Conclusion:
Remote
controlled weapons will be cheaper and it will save the life of the precious
soldier. Because the life of the soldier is more important than a million
dollar platform. Due to its reduced size the stealthiest platform can be
obtained. Reduction in weight will helps to make the platform to maneuver with
ease in tough terrains. Only problem we found will be the communication link.
The link must have high bandwidth which can support real time transmission of
audio, video, command signals to the base station. Reduced size will also helps
in easy transport via airlift and reduced deployment time. The hardware used in
the weapon station and control centers must have to work with real time
schedules and with less delay. The processors must have the ability to multi-task several events simultaneously and with better performance results. In
future the same will be implemented in hardware and real time issues will be
resolved.
About The Authors:
Inigo Mathew, Rajkumar M and Boselin Prabhu S R - Department of
Electronics and Communication Engineering, SVS College of Engineering,
Coimbatore, India
Rajkumar R and Sophia S, - Department of Electronics and Communication
Engineering, Sri Krishna College of Engineering and Technology, Coimbatore,
India
Publication Details:
This article was
published under title “Proposed Method to Save the Soldiers inside the Main
Battle Tank via High Bandwidth Links-Remote Controlled Tank” at AJCSES[3][6][2015],
ISSN 2349 – 7238 / Creative Common License. 3.0 / Download The PDF
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