Armor Of South Korea

[Dawes]

Is South Korea still trying to come up with a domestic powerplant for their AFV's?

[futon]

1차 양산분 K-2 흑표 전차는 독일제 엔진과 독일제 변속기를 사용하며 2차 양산분의 경우 국산 엔진+독일제 변속기(혼합 파워팩), 3차 양산분의 경우 2020년대 초반~ 중반 이후부터 생산될 예정으로 보이는데 이때 국산 엔진+국산 변속기를 장착할 예정이다. 그래서 이 문서는 2차 양산분 K-2 흑표에 들어갈 엔진 문제가 언급된 2010년도 초반에서부터 써내려온 문서이기 때문에 약간 맞지 않는 부분이 많는 것에 유의할 것.

https://namu.wiki/w/K-2 흑표/파워팩 논란

This section is probably based off of the latest, so yes.

1st batch: German engine + German transmission.

2nd batch: ROK engine + German transmission. 

3rd batch: ROK engine + ROK transmission. (by mid 2020s) 

[Helmutkohl]

a lot of nice pics of the Korean K2NO vs the Leopard 2A7 in the Norway competition

https://bemil.chosun.com/nbrd/bbs/view.html?b_bbs_id=10168&branch=20&pn=1&num=2096

 

 

[Maro.kyo]

On 1/3/2022 at 2:13 AM, futon said:

This section is probably based off of the latest, so yes.

1st batch: German engine + German transmission.

2nd batch: ROK engine + German transmission. 

3rd batch: ROK engine + ROK transmission. (by mid 2020s) 

3rd batch are also getting fitted with Renk transmissions and was reduced in numbers due to ROKA's plans of acquiring more Apaches. Production of the 3rd Batch are set to end by next year but information regarding the recent sales of K2 to Poland suggests that the initial bits partially consists of those vehicles which were meant to be delivered to ROKA so I personally speculate the production schedule to be extended for the 3rd batch. 4th batch production is currently under parliamentary review. It is rumored to consist of anywhere between 150 to 180 tanks; more recently, the most commonly mentioned number seems to be around 160. S&T developed transmission is again under review and is being considered for the 4th batch. From what is known, 2 Korea powerpacks consisting of both Doosan engine and S&T transmission is under trial and evaluation phase in Turkey for their Altay tanks so the results from the new review in Korea coupled with results in Turkey would determine the fate of this transmission by next year.

Time to revive this thread as my first contribution I guess 😃

[Maro.kyo]

Talking about APS, since there doesn't seem to be much information on this thread, it consists of 4 sensors : LWRs, 2 different kinds of radars as some of you might've already seen and a IRT. Currently there are only the LWRs and L-band MWRs mounted on the production K2s.

The L-band MWR consists of 3 patch antenna assemblies. One on the centre is the transmit antenna, powered by 100W SSPA. Receivers are separate and are positioned right next to the transmitter, on an angle. It has an effective detection angle of 90°, meaning K2 MWR has a frontal 180° coverage. Vertical coverage is 60°. Since it uses L-band, its detection range reaches few kilometers, although not exactly specified in numbers.

The hard kill APS on the other hand is slaved to a K-band FCR. FCRs have 180° coverage and are mounted behind the MWR facing sideways, giving 360° coverage. Like the MWR, it has a separate transmitter and receiver assembly(bigger transmitters antennas below the receiver assembly). Accompanying the FCRs are 2 IR trackers mounted on each sides atop between the MWR and FCR.

[futon]

12 hours ago, Maro.kyo said:

3rd batch are also getting fitted with Renk transmissions and was reduced in numbers due to ROKA's plans of acquiring more Apaches. Production of the 3rd Batch are set to end by next year but information regarding the recent sales of K2 to Poland suggests that the initial bits partially consists of those vehicles which were meant to be delivered to ROKA so I personally speculate the production schedule to be extended for the 3rd batch. 4th batch production is currently under parliamentary review. It is rumored to consist of anywhere between 150 to 180 tanks; more recently, the most commonly mentioned number seems to be around 160. S&T developed transmission is again under review and is being considered for the 4th batch. From what is known, 2 Korea powerpacks consisting of both Doosan engine and S&T transmission is under trial and evaluation phase in Turkey for their Altay tanks so the results from the new review in Korea coupled with results in Turkey would determine the fate of this transmission by next year.

Time to revive this thread as my first contribution I guess 😃

Thanks for that, welcome to TN.

[Maro.kyo]

11 hours ago, futon said:

Thanks for that, welcome to TN.

Thank you!

[Maro.kyo]

Schematics of complete KAPS suite. Gives a general idea of what is where.

Edited August 9, 2022 by Maro.kyo

[Maro.kyo]

Also it seems like some images and posts got lost after the forum was transferred to a new URL? I'm not sure if this video was posted before :

 

It's an official compilation of series of KAPS HK test campaigns conducted up until February of 2012. From my knowledge there were numerous tests which are not included in the video.

[Mighty_Zuk]

Quote

No.

So if it isn't, what is the version we are talking about? The schematics you posted don't show rear radar modules. They also don't show any unique part or placement that wasn't shown in the photo I provided.

Quote

Also it is not really wise to compare German APSs like Rheinmetall ADS/RAP(or other western products like that of Diehl or Raytheon) with KAPS since they have differeing levels of government involvement. Like I've said and will say again, the problem concerning KAPS was and is not the development maturity.

Okay. And after KAPS was a ready product, was its development continued to keep it up to date?

Quote

Also, KAPS development is done by ADD, not a private entity. In recent years Korean MoD have transferred a lot of development works and responsibilities to the private sector, namely to Hanwha, LIG and KAI, but traditional gov. institutes like ADD are still responsible for quite a few things, the next gen KAPS being one of them. So calling that "smells like industry talk of 'we can make it modern but pay up first'." or other assumptions of your only generally implies that you've misunderstood or lack information on the system in place at Korea.

Government institutes are reliant on a budget, and private entities are reliant on orders. Either way, they'll only proceed with some flow of money. 

The "next-gen" so to speak, is funded already, or is it pending an order?

 

[Maro.kyo]

2 hours ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

So if it isn't, what is the version we are talking about? The schematics you posted don't show rear radar modules. They also don't show any unique part or placement that wasn't shown in the photo I provided.

Okay. And after KAPS was a ready product, was its development continued to keep it up to date?

Government institutes are reliant on a budget, and private entities are reliant on orders. Either way, they'll only proceed with some flow of money. 

The "next-gen" so to speak, is funded already, or is it pending an order?

 

I've never said "rear radar modules", instead I've said side-facing FCRs "behind" the MWRs. Also, I don't know how you could just casually glance over those very apparent differences. It's the gray looking thing on the second schematic I've posted. Also the optical sensors you've marked with blue are not IRTs. Those are LWRs, and therefore are placed facing both the rear and the front on each sides. Like I've mentioned above, IRTs are going to be mounted above and between MWR and FCRs.

Moreover, once more I don't understand why you're keep trying to come up with a strawman argument. "Okay. And after KAPS was a ready product, was its development continued to keep it up to date?" - I've never said it is kept up to date. In fact, if you recall, I have mentioned exactly the opposite. Nonetheless, if it's up to date or not, only one fact stands : KAPS was developed, tested and evaluated to a ROKA RoC, was matching planned milestones and was qualified. Whatever argument you come up with, that fact doesn't changes. As you can see in the videos, the actual system was mounted on K2 and was tested with live warheads.

Talking about next-gen, underlying technology research are already being funded. It's a very recent development.

Edited August 9, 2022 by Maro.kyo

[Perun]

On 1/29/2022 at 3:33 PM, Helmutkohl said:

a lot of nice pics of the Korean K2NO vs the Leopard 2A7 in the Norway competition

https://bemil.chosun.com/nbrd/bbs/view.html?b_bbs_id=10168&branch=20&pn=1&num=2096

 

 

Is there any published results 

[Mighty_Zuk]

1 hour ago, Maro.kyo said:

I don't know how you could just casually glance over those very apparent differences. I've never said "rear radar modules", instead I've said side-facing FCRs "behind" the MWRs

Okay. So it doesn't have 360° coverage. But it does beg the question - why are FCRs located in a different place than the mmW radars? And what function do the mmW radars even fulfill if the fire control is done by another set of radars? 

Seems like a beamforming capability deficit to me, since they're using different antennas.

And maybe you should be mindful to the possibility, even if very unlikely, that other people in this forum perhaps don't understand Korean, and that the text is very hard to translate when it's in image format.

One last thing on that - not having radar coverage in the rear means the rear is unreliably covered, and thus the KAPS in that configuration has blind spots in its rear. Optics are great, but they're an augmentation. They are not reliable alternative in any form.

1 hour ago, Maro.kyo said:

It's the gray looking thing on the second schematic I've posted

Isn't that the electrical box? I see electrical connections, I don't see anything else on it though. 

And where is it on the tank itself? It doesn't appear to be outside even. It seems to be an internal module.

1 hour ago, Maro.kyo said:

IRTs are going to be mounted above and between MWR and FCRs

Going to be... So it's not a tested and certified version then?

1 hour ago, Maro.kyo said:

Also, once more I don't understand why you're keep trying to come up with a strawman argument. "Okay. And after KAPS was a ready product, was its development continued to keep it up to date?" - I've never said it is kept up to date. In fact, if you recall, I have mentioned exactly the opposite.

That's not a strawman. Here's an example of a strawman:

Person 1 - "Hey John, how's the harvest this year?"

Person 2 - "It's great! I even made a strawman."

What this is, is a valid argument. If the system was not kept up to date, then it would need to get further investment and some labor time before it's ready for Poland to field. And if that's the case, what usually happens is the customer pays. But even if South Korea pays the hard money, Poland pays with time.

1 hour ago, Maro.kyo said:

Talking about next-gen, underlying technology research are already being funded. It's a very recent development.

There is no major breakthrough to be made that would make the KAPS somehow a league ahead. The only breakthrough that can be made in the KAPS is bringing it to modern standards, and create a parity in reaction times, hardware redundancy, production efficiency, etc, to make it a worthy competitor to other systems on the market. So until that happens, the KAPS might well be at a disadvantage.

Being certified by the RoK is great. It means there's a solid foundation on which to build a ready product. But it doesn't cancel the fact that whatever ADD have to do to bring it up to Polish demands will require a lot of new tests and re-certification, and will invalidate at least some of the data gathered during the Korean trials.

 

[Maro.kyo]

3 hours ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

Okay. So it doesn't have 360° coverage. But it does beg the question - why are FCRs located in a different place than the mmW radars? And what function do the mmW radars even fulfill if the fire control is done by another set of radars? 

Seems like a beamforming capability deficit to me, since they're using different antennas.

3 hours ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

One last thing on that - not having radar coverage in the rear means the rear is unreliably covered, and thus the KAPS in that configuration has blind spots in its rear. Optics are great, but they're an augmentation. They are not reliable alternative in any form.

Like I've mentioned above, those are not mmW but L-band. Huge difference. The function of the L-band MWR is long-range warning of incoming projectiles from the frontal 180°. The FCRs once more as I've mentioned before, are K-band and therefore have higher resolution but shorter detection and tracking range. Hence these two radars have very different range and functions. And for the last time, yes those K-band FCRs have 360° coverage. It is exactly for that reason they are placed on each sides and have 3 transmitter assembly instead of just 1. Hopefully we can agree that a difference between a L-band and a K-band antennas are more than just a "beamforming capability deficit".

 

3 hours ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

And maybe you should be mindful to the possibility, even if very unlikely, that other people in this forum perhaps don't understand Korean, and that the text is very hard to translate when it's in image format.

I've thought that is not a matter of language proficiency but keen observation. Just the 3D model alone gives you an idea how the HK KAPS equipped K2 looks different to a production K2. You don't need to be able to read Korean to spot that. Even so, on a second though it maybe is too hard to spot without knowing the underlying information, so I've translated one of the schematics and added annotations :

So I hope that solves your questions regarding it.

 

3 hours ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

Isn't that the electrical box? I see electrical connections, I don't see anything else on it though. 

And where is it on the tank itself? It doesn't appear to be outside even. It seems to be an internal module.

5 hours ago, Maro.kyo said:

IRTs are going to be mounted above and between MWR and FCRs

Going to be... So it's not a tested and certified version then?

Same as above. Also, by "going to be" I've meant "going to be mounted(on a production vehicle, if implemented)", not that it has not been developed yet. All the key components of KAPS HK are developed and tested.

 

3 hours ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

One last thing on that - not having radar coverage in the rear means the rear is unreliably covered, and thus the KAPS in that configuration has blind spots in its rear. Optics are great, but they're an augmentation. They are not reliable alternative in any form.

This part I should agree with, although for different reasons. The rearside blind spot has more to do with the FCR placement rather than if the FCR has 180° coverage; the radar antenna itself has that angular coverage but the placing means that the vicinity of turret rearside is not covered. Not ideal, but still it's far-fetched to imply that it has no rearward coverage at all. Similar problem as to Ticonderoga class radar antenna arrangement.

 

3 hours ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

That's not a strawman. Here's an example of a strawman:

Person 1 - "Hey John, how's the harvest this year?"

Person 2 - "It's great! I even made a strawman."

What this is, is a valid argument. If the system was not kept up to date, then it would need to get further investment and some labor time before it's ready for Poland to field. And if that's the case, what usually happens is the customer pays. But even if South Korea pays the hard money, Poland pays with time.

I should agree to disagree. Then we're talking about different points. The thing is KAPS HK could still defeat a wide range of AT guided or unguided munitions in use. Moreover, If there is to be a military conflict between Poland and Russia, it would still be heavily in open space as seen in Ukraine. In those environments and engagement distances, KAPS HK  capabilities are enough. Korean concerns rather comes from the mountainous geography of Korea coupled with needs to use their tank in urban environments.

 

3 hours ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

There is no major breakthrough to be made that would make the KAPS somehow a league ahead. The only breakthrough that can be made in the KAPS is bringing it to modern standards, and create a parity in reaction times, hardware redundancy, production efficiency, etc, to make it a worthy competitor to other systems on the market. So until that happens, the KAPS might well be at a disadvantage.

Being certified by the RoK is great. It means there's a solid foundation on which to build a ready product. But it doesn't cancel the fact that whatever ADD have to do to bring it up to Polish demands will require a lot of new tests and re-certification, and will invalidate at least some of the data gathered during the Korean trials.

That I agree with, and frankly I haven't argued otherwise. A notable improvement I can think of are AESA, warhead and processing. Though the second point I can't really agree with, since the geographical differences between Korea and Poland are not that huge, say for example unlike in the middle east, that it would need significant alteration to the design. Korea is very cold and hot in a same year, is also reasonably damp. Most of Korean peninsula consists of mountain ranges but there are also strategically important plains. It is also heavily urbanized and there are lots of forests, but needs to take into account the deforested terrains of the North. Not to mention, there's plenty of time until the Polish K2PLs with an APS are to be produced, if they are to choose to equip it with KAPS. 

[Mighty_Zuk]

Aye. Now we agree. And the pic with the visual aids and translation does help a lot. Thanks.

 

[Maro.kyo]

17 hours ago, Mighty_Zuk said:

Aye. Now we agree. And the pic with the visual aids and translation does help a lot. Thanks.

 

Great. You're welcome

[Cajer]

Are there too attack protection provisions in the Korean aps for over flight or drive warheads like tow2b or javalin?

Edited August 10, 2022 by Cajer

[Maro.kyo]

On 1/2/2022 at 5:55 PM, Dawes said:

Is South Korea still trying to come up with a domestic powerplant for their AFV's?

I've glanced over this post the last time I've visited this thread, so I'll give some updates now. Better later than never I guess?

 

Before heading in, there are currently 3 comapnies involved in tracked vehicle powerplant production in Korea. These are two engine companies:

STX Engine (currently owned bu UAMCO, an asset management company, after STX group went insolvent)

Hyundai-Doosan Infracore (acquired by HD Hyundai Group, which in turn was formerly known as HHI Group. Doosan Infracore itself was formerly Daewoo-MAN, which was acquired by Doosan after Daewoo Group went insolvent)

and a transmission company:

SNT Dynamics (former S&T Heavy Industries) which have license produced and developed all transmissions that are locally produced and equipped in every ROKA armored vehicles currently in service

 

As for wheeled vehicles, Hyundai sources all of its engine and transmission on their own from their heavy-duty vehicles division. It is hereby important to note that there are two Hyundais, separate from one another:

The first is Hyundai Motor Group, or HMG in short. This is the Hyundai you are probably familiar of with Hyundai, Kia and Genesis consumer vehicles on the road as well possibly some of their buses and trucks. HMG is also the company which owns Hyundai Rotem, the biggest rolling stock manufacturer in Korea. They are the ones who manufacture Korean highspeed rail rollingstocks, the KTX rollingstocks. As a military enthusiast you would probably know by now that Hyundar Rotem is the one that have manufactured K1 and manufactures K2.

The second Hyundai is HD Hyundai Group, which was formerly known as Hyundai Heavy Industries Group, HHI in short. You should know them if you're in shipping/shipbuilding industries. As the name suggests, they are industrial conglomerate specialised in heavy industries sector, their cornerstone business being shipbuilding and ship equipment manufacturing alongside construction equipment manufacturing. They are also in other heavy industries sector like aerospace, construction, etc. HD Hyundai owns Hyundai-Doosan Infracore, whom you'd know as the developer and manufacturer of Korean DV27K V12 1500ps Diesel engine for the K2.

These two Hyundais were formerly under one umbrella, but were split up, alongside various other, so-called "Pan-Hyundai family" conglomerates, when its founder Chung Ju-Yung died and its kids started a serious inheritance dispute, often named "War of the Princes" from historical context in which how royal decendants fighted over their inheirtance for throne. Anyways, this is not the topic for this thread so I can elaborate further when I have the chance. It's just good to know that those two are separate companies in understanding Korean defence industry structure.

 

1/6

Edited July 30, 2023 by Maro.kyo

[Maro.kyo]

Now coming back to contemporary local engine programmes, there are several to mention:

As for STX Engines, they were the ones who have license produced MTU engines for ROKA tracked vehicles, such as for K1, K2 and K9, as well as for the ROKN for their surface and submarine combatants (they also have their foot in naval sensor business, supplying ROKN with naval radars and sonars). One of the exception was Detroit Diesel 8V71T that they've license produced for use in K55 SPH. As such, their current engine programmes are largely based on MTU designs they've previously licensed produced. Though since their current engine programmes are not a MTU-STX joint programme, they have significantly altered internal strucutures, including engine block and piston dimensions, to meet increased requirements and avoid IP infringement disputes.

1) First example of such MTU engine based STX model was SMV1360, an engine based on MTU MB871 Ka-501 engine. It is a 1360ps engine as the name suggests, and accomodates improvements ranging from CRDI, new HP fuel pump and pipe for CRDI, crankshaft, piston, turbocharger, etc. It has become heavier and is now 2460kg, a 110kg increase from from MB871. The block is also now square instead of the long-stroke dimension of MB871. Development started in 2016 and is funded by DAPA. It was undergoing reliability tests as of last year and should've been completed by the year's end, although not much information has emerged since then. From what is known, STX Engine is offering SMV1360 for the planned K1E2 and K1A3 upgrade programmes.

2) Their next engine programme under development is SMV1000, an engine based on MT881 Ka-500 engine in use for K9 SPH family of vehicles. This programme was awarded in 2021 and is funded by Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy. Programme end is planned for 2026. They're hoping that this would boost export opportunities in the ME region which has already seen 2 separate instances in which the German governemnt blocked the export of powertrain components of K9 and K2.

3) Apart from these programmes, they have been known to have been competing against Hyundai-Doosan Infracore for the KAAV-II programme, a Korean EFV equivalent amphibious assault vehicle programme. KAAV-II engine will be a sea water-cooled engine having maritime output of over 2000ps and under 1000ps on land. More on it below.

4) Apart from those 3 official programmes mentioned above, their next focus lies on replacing K21, K30, K31, etc engines with STX developed local engine dubbed the SMV750, also called SMV-MK. This engine currently has no official government support.

 

2/6

Edited July 30, 2023 by Maro.kyo

[Maro.kyo]

https://imgur.com/a/42jfCoM

STX Engine military heavy engine development business plan

3/6

Edited July 30, 2023 by Maro.kyo

[Maro.kyo]

Hyundai-Doosan Infracore on the otherhand has traditionally been a license producer of MAN engines, as its legacy of Daewoo-MAN would hint. Daewoo-Man produced number of MAN engines for use in their Buses and Trucks as well as some earlier Korean tracked vehicles like K200 and after Daewoo-MAN was taken over by Doosan Doosan Infracore they have continued to produce license produced MAN engines for newer AFVs like the K21.

1) Their first endevour into indigenous design was DV27K engine for the K2. If you know some programme history regarding XK-2 programme, you'd know there were various problems regarding the development of both the engine and the transmission. They've mostly sorted out the problems concerning the engine and have been using it for production K2s for a while since. Turkey has also signed a deal to import the DV27K engine alongside SNT transmission after failing to secure alternative supplier for the Altay engines for several years after Germany embargoed the export of Europowerpack. Korean powerpack is a stopgap until their own local powerpack developed by BMC is ready, but there's an option for more engines and transmission in case there's a delay with the local product

2) DV27K is also known to be the basis of Hyundai-Doosan Infracore's proposal for the KAAV-II programme. Although the prototype is meant to be handed over to ROKMC by next year for IOT&E, not much information has been revealed regarding the current programme status, including which company(STX or HDI) has been chosen as the programme supplier. I personally bet that HDI would've bagged the deal but that we'll see.

 

4/6

Edited July 30, 2023 by Maro.kyo

[Maro.kyo]

Talking about SNT Dynamics and their transmission business:

After meeting significant hurdles in the development of EST15K with numerous design and manufacturing defects, EST15K was not included in K2 powerpack up until now. During the 2015~21 period SNT furthuer developed major transmission components that were imported from Germany before, which consists of range pack, HSU, TCU, retarder and brake.

After localisation of major components, their current focus is getting EST15K back on test evaluation pipeline so that it's certified for Korean military standard and cleared for 4th batch of K2 production for ROKA. The programme approval was given for the production of around 150 new K2s earlier this year in May, but it is still undecided if the SNT transmission will be included or not. Currently EST15K is under test and evaluation under two separate entities of Turkish SSB-Turkish Army and Korean DAPA-ROKA. The former is for the aforementioned Korean powerpack export deal for Altay and the latter for  4th batch production of K2.

 

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Edited July 30, 2023 by Maro.kyo

[Maro.kyo]

As you can see, company with the most active and to an extent, interesting development activities is the STX Engine. One thing to note is that the restructuring of Korean military engine manufacturing industry is for the healthier industry structures, since Doosan and STX corporate practices and management were... questionable, to put it lightly. One of the biggest drawback the Korean military and defence sector faced when they were starting to develop their own engines was that two companies with most expertise in the powertrain industries in Korea, namely Hyundai-Kia Motor Group and HHI were not interested in military powertrain business. This meant they had to go with a sub-standard option that was Doosan. Recently, it seems like the mood has changed a bit with growing export success.

 

Regarding SMV1000, I'll be posting updates regarding programme status whenever there's any news available in the respective thread : 

 

 

6/6

[Maro.kyo]

Also, since this thread is a general Korean AFV thread, I think it is worth reminding members that there are separate threads for some well-known, individual Korean AFVs.

K2 Black Panther :

 

K21 NIFV:

 

K9 Thunder:

 

AS21 Redback :

 

So as a collective effort of keeping where stuff belongs, I hope that we could post in corresponding threads. Thank you.

Edited July 31, 2023 by Maro.kyo

[sunday]

Thanks for the review, @Maro.kyo