UK IFV Warrior, new infomation.

[PlasmaKrab]

SLAT armor will not provide much protection against bigger ATGM missiles(Hellfires,AT-6,9 e.t.c... have better pen than 33..) as their mass and speed could destroy grill and penetrate base armor.

Are you sure about that? ATGMs are generally somewhat slower than RPG rockets and such, and have therefore less kinetic energy to smash the grid. Anyway most HEAT warheads have quite a fragile front cover and thin detonator, and will get crushed against the bars without detonating.

And even if they do detonate, the penetrator will have to cross a great amount of air that will slow it down, cool it down slightly and presumably deflect and disperse it.

So the question is: how much does this air layer affect the penetrator? In other words, how much steel does it stand for against HEAT?
I think we can neglect the thickness of the grid itself, so the main up-armoring component will be air, in the case where the rocket detonates.

[JaM]

SLAT is not like a classic armor! it prevents warhead to detonate.Fuse dont hit anything, so it will not explode. Bigger ATGM like hellfire are too big. their weight is much bigger, so they demolate SLAT cage at impact and then detonate.Most of modern ATGM has tandem warhead, so if first warhead is damaged at the impact, second will penetrate thru... SLAT is perfect solution fot urban fighting, but will not help against heavy ATGM or tank HEAT round.

[JaM]

Modern warhead will not be affected. Air is not good thing at stoping jet of plasma from penetrating.WW2 HEAT were affected, but technology is far better than in WW2. If you remember, in 2004 there were a situation that wonderweapon disabled Abrams.They thought that it was EM weapon, but at the end after some tests they found that it was just tandem warhead RPG.Side skirts didnt stop penetration even of first warhead. second burned through tank and exited at the other side!

[PlasmaKrab]

OK, don't think I gto it wrong about what WAS slat armor!

I still don't see why an ATGM would have a better effect against it. A LOS-flying classical ATGM like any TOW or HOT or Konkurs or anything is contact-detonated, so in many cases the fuse has as many chances to get caught in the cage and not detonate as with a RPG rocket.

As I told you, I don't think weight will matter that much since the velocity of the thing is fixed and generally subsonic, better as fast as most AT rockets. Though the cage looks frail, it is built to withstand the sheer kinetic blow, as well as small arms fire, collisions, road vibrations and so on. I don't think the weight of an ATGM will make such a difference.

Maybe if you are talking Shturm, Krizantema or Maverick, but in many cases I bet the missile will either detonate prematuredly, get crushed out of order by the grid or even bounce off and THEN detonate. Don't forget the incidence angle!

Anyway in the cases where the warhead does detonate on the cage, a bigger shaped-charge will have more penetration and be less affected by the standoff. This is where you have to calculate how much steel it is worth!
Any data about this, lest you force me to dig out my thermodynamics printouts and bring back painful memories from the times I did study something?

On the other side, I must agree about thank rounds . That is where you have kinetic energy!

[JaM]

The only thing i want to point was that modern warheads will be more succesfull against SLAT. RPG-29 has for example thin precursor that will go thru the cage.Heavy ATGM weights around 10-25Kg so it will have much bigger punch,Mavericks, Hellfires, Sthurm Krisantemas or Kornets will be imune, they are quite big to be catched in the cage, Maverick has for example high explosive warhead and not HEAT, so it will be dangerous even for heavy armored tanks

[Pergite]

JaM said:
The only thing i want to point was that modern warheads will be more succesfull against SLAT. RPG-29 has for example thin precursor that will go thru the cage.Heavy ATGM weights around 10-25Kg so it will have much bigger punch,Mavericks, Hellfires, Sthurm Krisantemas or Kornets will be imune, they are quite big to be catched in the cage, Maverick has for example high explosive warhead and not HEAT, so it will be dangerous even for heavy armored tanks

The hellfire is also top-hitting as well as most other modern ATGM´s. The cage is good for disrupting the effect of shaped charges, makes them go of earlier and losing their penetration. That is why most modern HEAT rounds have tandem warheads, mostly to defeat reactive armour but that would probably counter this ugly SLAT thing as well.