A51 Grand Chariot

Key: Class 3, CPU T4, heavy battle tank, 3 - 9 layers front sathium armor, rocket artillery, moderate firepower, shield, role-play Role: bunker buster, armored warfare, close fire support

Description

A year 2470 heavy battle tank of the Azazel ordnance department design and an armored fighting vehicle of Kinnator Marine Corps (KMC). Despite sharing the name with its distant predecessor, Grand Chariot is based on a new chassis design which grants the ability to carry 203mm artillery and arrays of 70mm missiles. The tank development put an emphasis on offensive strategy, particularly that which involves long range assault.

Aside from the characteristically large main gun, Grand Chariot is the first tank in KMC to feature a toilet and a shower, albeit having restrictive internal space by UCH standard. It is also favored by tea and coffee loving marines thanks to the luxury of universal brewing machine. Unlike other tank-brewed coffee, there is no risk of mistakening the drink for biofuel and vice versa.

These morale-boosting elements are indicative of the nature of missions involving Grand Chariot. The tank can be found more commonly among specialized KMC companies, often enduring several months deep inside hostile territories. This frequently entails the large scale armored warfare towards Legacy Epicenter and Zirax industrial and military complexes.

Specification

• Length: 18m
• Width: 11.5m
• Height: 6m
• Armament:
• [list][*]1 x 203mm/50 Harosal Mod 1 gun
• or
• 1 x 203mm/34 Harosal Hwz
• (41 rounds)
• 2 x 120mm/40 O4 smoothbore guns (32 rounds each)
• 2 x 6 70mm MLS (48 missiles total)
• 4 x 50mm PAc
• 4 x 12mm LAc[/list]
• Defense:
• [list][*]Dusk type RIFT shield mod 2
• 3-9 layers DVA sathium steel front glacis
• 2-3 layers DVA sathium steel hull
• 2 Decoy signal generators[/list]
• Propulsion:
• [list][*]4 Huka HP80 Radial reactor[/list]
• Top speed: 180 km/hr
• Fire control system:
• [list][*]Ballistic artillery plotting computers
• Type 56PW active guidance radar
• Integrated local target acquisition systems[/list]
• Crew: 3 (driver, gunner, commander)
• Carrying capacity:
• [list][*]Magazine: 27,000 SU
• Trunk: 20,000 SU
• 5 small storages[/list][/list]
• Combat characteristics
• Grand Chariot's primary weapons consist of a large caliber artillery and multiple launch systems. The 203mm gun is a high accuracy weapon effective against fortified bunkers and small planetary warships, while the microcluster missiles are well suited for area saturation. Depending on the mission, ammunitions may be switched to armor piercing missiles or 203mm minelaying or HE shells instead.
• The MLS have a special mechanism which raises the launch platform to gain direct LoS ahead. When activated, both the turrets and missiles are forced to be fired in a narrow angle forward.
• Both main weapons can achieve high arc trajectory and long range at over 15km. When the fight is limited to close range such as in the city, a howitzer barrel and enhanced tracking missiles are favored.
• Various secondary weapons covers a wide target types including armored, airborne, and infantry units. These include 2 120mm/40 smoothbore guns, 4 50mm dual purpose plasma cannons, and 4 12mm coaxial laser autocannons. 2 anti-missile systems on the rooftop can be modified into micromissile launcher for AA or anti-personnel role.
• Grand Chariot is considered a fast heavy tank with respectable armor and moderate agility for a fighting vehicle.
• The sathium steel armor is covered by polarizing shield and is built angled, further enhanced in thickness at the front when tilting the hover tank slightly upward. In practice, Grand Chariot's front armor is consistently resistant to hits up to 180mm caliber at 100m, and the entire hull except for the unarmored underside is impervious to most known infantry weapons and anti-aircraft cannons.
• The maneuverability is ideal for repositioning the tank and reducing vulnerable side profiles than for evasive maneuver, with exceptions to slow unguided projectiles.
• Internal systems
• Great emphasis was put on developing more reliable and robust combat assisting systems such that almost two-third of the development time was spent, particularly in regards to navigation and damage control. A plan was made to further enhance internal systems with ASCA - Advanced Sentient Core AI equiped on recent KN battleships - to augment each crew's combat interface. However, the accommodation of this physically massive technology is limited by great technical difficulty and delayed production schedule.
• There are three cockpits for a driver, a gunner, and a commander, but due to perpetual manpower shortage of Kinnator military only a single crew is needed to operate the tank with limited AI assistant.
• UCH replica
• While Grand Chariot may appear similar to the old generation Terran tanks, only the 203mm gun cannot be made compatible to the UCH military. Such caliber of the artillery shell is not supported by existing production lines, and the peculiar gun mechanism hamper the replication attempt. Three UCH replicas of the tank were tested in 2471 with non-native equipments; the result of which became available to UCH personnels as a blueprint with substantial loss of unique firepower.
• On the unrelated note, the previous statement on the workshop item KNS Kaiser has been changed for those who remember its content.