Warsaw Pact and TI

DRG · #1 January 13th, 2007, 12:56 PM

I'm tossing this out in the hopes that some of you will have solid information. I'm not really interested in opinion ( nationalistic or otherwise.......) or anyone who starts the answer with ...."I think" unless it's " I think my uncle said he trained on one at his base in Poland/Hungary/Czechoslovakia/Russia etc etc in either 1986 or 1987".....that type of thing.

I'm really only interested in hearing from someone who KNOWSand can back it up with a varifiable source

What year did the nation members of the "Warsaw Pact" start using TI ( what we enter into the OOB's as "40" for vision ) If Anyone has info on China that would be welcome as well

Thanks

Don

Gooseman2448 · #2 January 13th, 2007, 03:20 PM

Some export versions of T-72 lacked the laser rangefinder until 1985 or only the squadron and platoon commander tanks (version K) received them.

http://www.answers.com/topic/t-72

Probaly not much help, good luck

DRG · #3 January 13th, 2007, 04:00 PM

Laser Rangefinders aren't the issue ATM. What I'm looking for is information on thermal imagining (TI)

Don

Listy · #4 January 13th, 2007, 04:56 PM

M-84, from Yugoslavia had TI. That was a T72 with a new engine and other tweaks. So this would give a point where the USSR is not using TI, as the Yugoslavians had to add it specifically.

Dunno if it helps.

Smersh · #5 January 13th, 2007, 06:40 PM

Someone should post this question on Tanknet or some other similiar site.

As far as I know, by 1981 there where no TI sights on Soviet tanks. I'm curious when do they apppear for NATO type armies?

edit: thermal sights in the game seem to be completly invunreable to any obscurants. I understand that if the smoke or dust is thick enough, thermal sights can't penetrate. Whats the official position on thermal sights in the game?

Marek_Tucan · #6 January 13th, 2007, 07:22 PM

AFAIK the TI's cannot pass through a large field of smoke in SP as well (IIRC 3 hexes of smoke block TI's, right? Don't have game installed right now).

As for USSR, Not even all of the T-90's got equipped with TI's in the 1990's, so I guess it was rather scarce - TI systems were already used for measurements etc. by 1980's in Czechoslovakia but these were scientific/industrial ones, not fit for battlefield service (either by resolution or reliability or ruggedness).
First TI-equipped vehicle Czechoslovakia got was T-72M4CZ.

DRG · #7 January 13th, 2007, 08:35 PM

Quote:

Smersh said:
edit: thermal sights in the game seem to be completly invunreable to any obscurants. I understand that if the smoke or dust is thick enough, thermal sights can't penetrate. Whats the official position on thermal sights in the game?

"What you see now is what you get" We have no plans to rework the way TI is handled by the game. All I asked was when WP started using it. That's all. I have no desire at this time, a week or two before a patch release, to start a debate about the way TI is handled in the game especially since this wasn't an issue until now. All I want is some SOLID info on when it started to be used by WP.

And BTW, If you really believe "thermal sights in the game seem to be completly invunreable to any obscurants" then you really don't know the game very well and better run some tests. You will see you are incorrect. Line some vision 40 tanks up and drop smoke in front of them. They are NOT "completly invunreable to any obscurants"

Don

DRG · #8 January 13th, 2007, 08:55 PM

Quote:

Marek_Tucan said:
AFAIK the TI's cannot pass through a large field of smoke in SP as well (IIRC 3 hexes of smoke block TI's, right? Don't have game installed right now).

It varies by how dense the game rates the smoke as. It's not a carved in stone "three hexes" but yes, enough smoke will block LOS to TI equipted tanks and if it's thick enough three or so will do it.

If the smoke barrage is patchy with some thick and some thin areas then the TI vision through it will be patchy as well with some areas obsured and some not.

Don

Smersh · #9 January 13th, 2007, 11:22 PM

well, then I was wrong about the TI sights. I made that statement based on my experiance with them and not on any tests,apparantly I was wrong, and they can be blocked.

I did not mean for it to sound like an assignment, I added it to my post just for some feed-back about it.

BaronvonBeer · #10 January 14th, 2007, 05:57 AM

According to Jane's, and KMDB (the manufacturer of the Buran seriesTI systems, supposedly the first thermal sight installed on a Russian tank) the T-80UM was the first such equipped model (with the Buran), which entered service, in '91/92. Before that the TPN-4(e?) Image Intensification was in use. Of course, that is only MBTs....

A good "Definitive" starting point might be this tool, which no bookshelf should be without.