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Specific Information

The M3A1, M3A2, and M90 Scorpion are fairly similar to the Abrams in material composition, engine design, electronics and safety system, except for the following.


General Information
The Armor of the vehicle is similar in function and capabilities when compared to the M1 Abrams tank, although the tank is much smaller, designed as a smaller, two-man tank killer. The turret, unlike the M1 abrams, is unmanned, which gives it a lower profile and makes it lighter weight, and possess an autoloading primary cannon; there is also no driver's window, as the vehicle is operated almost entirely with cameras. The Tank is designed, specifically, provide support to infantry or serve as an extremely effective anti-armor system. Although designed to be used initially as the primary spearhead of the ground assault forces, it will eventually be replaced by larger vehicles, and turn into a support role. In addition to this, three can be transported by a C-5 galaxy, and six can be transported in a C-17, making it significantly more deployable than the M1 abrams. In addition, a single one can be carried by an MV-64. The vehicle can be operated by as little as two people.

There is still a troop hatch however, on top of the vehicle, as with most tanks. Also unlike most tanks, the top armor of the vehicle is just as thick as the rest of the armor, and provides even more protection to the crew who are generally placed far below the turret. All of the weapons can be controlled electronically and remotely, although in extreme situations they can be fired manually. There is troop hatch is on the side of the vehicle, which utilizes several chains and multiple hydraulic lifts, powered by the tanks battery, to open or close. The door folds down, to reveal a ramp, which also allows for the door to be opened even if the power is down, or to escape the vehicle quickly. Due to the thickness of the door, it provides similar protection as the rest of the armor of the vehicle, however entering the vehicle takes some time, and the fastest the door can be closed is some 30 seconds, generally taking roughly 2 minutes to open or close, although it can be opened faster if necessary.

Food and water can be accessed in storage containers, and the vehicle can store up to 2000 gallons of water, and 4 tons worth of food, or approximately 6 months worth of supplies; however, it most often utilizes approximately 3 months. It is also possible to link these things through the helmet and into the mouth, for easy access. The seating arrangement for the crew is more spacious in the M3A2 due to a lack of a need for room in the turret and for a driver's seat, however like all tanks it is still relatively cramped. Larger chairs, which can be both rested in and use to operate the vehicle, are common. The crew typically carries a number of firearms and body armor, in case of a need to abandon the vehicle of if the vehicle is infiltrated.

The tank, despite using similar armor of the M1 abrams, is 27.6 tons, compared to the nearly 68 tons of the M1 abrams. This is in large part due the low profile of the tank, the lack of human interaction due to the automation and electronic control, and it's generally streamlined nature as a lack of a need for windows or other visible areas, as the vehicle operates almost entirely based on images received by cameras. Despite being made lighter than it would otherwise by the streamlining of the vehicle, the vehicle still has to account for the fixed weight of ammunition, food, fuel, and people which can not be removed or reduced,. The vehicle also uses cameras, some fixed point panoramic 32 ALON covered cameras, to provide a 360 degree view for the drivers and gunners, in addition to 8 movable cameras and several cameras on individual weapons, including four for the cannon.

The track design of the vehicle is awkward and broken up into several pieces. Because it is powered electrically, this is realistically possible without too many parts, and individual motors exist in addition to the primary crankshaft which moves the vehicle. While this slows the vehicle down somewhat, it's hybrid design allows it temporary bursts of speed when necessary. The vehicle does however gain better all terrain performance, especially with having such a low profile, and can scale many strange obstacles.Despite this, the vehicle is capable of utilizing traditional, connected tracks, with relatively little changes to it's overall design.

Hybrid Electric Engine

The vehicle was, in large part, designed around the engine, and the concept of the engine. As a result of being significantly more efficient in general and a hybrid, the vehicle has a significantly farther range than most tanks of comparable size, and the lessened fuel usage decreases the number of support vehicles needed in the field, and in addition increases their range from the battlefield (by the tank being able to travel further from them when necessary). This engine as an MTU MB 873 Ka-501 liquid-cooled V-12 Twin-turbo diesel engine, with 1,500 PS (1,479 hp, 1,103 kW), and taken, largely, from the Leopard 2. With a far more efficient engine than the M1 abrams, with about the same power and durability, it makes a great base for a hybrid electric engine. The engine is nearly twice as efficient as the engine in the Abrams, with roughly the same power output. It utilizes an advanced hybrid electric design, which provides roughly a 70% increase in efficiency, over the standard model, by itself. In addition to this, the vehicle possess roughly 750 gallons of fuel, or 1.5 times more than the M1 Abrams. As a result, the vehicle has roughly 6 times the effiency of a standard M1 abrams.

In it's most fundamental aspect, the engine is essentially a generator, used to power a very large battery and several capacitors, which in turn is used to propel the vehicle forward, and power the rest of the vehicles system. Producing electrical energy from the motor, rather than converting it straight to mechanical energy, so as the engine can run at maximum efficiency without concerns of speed or acceleration issues, as in most Hybrid vehicles, vastly increases it's efficiency, and therefore total energy output per unit of fuel. The engine, essentially a generator, allows the vehicle to potentially consume 70% less fuel, or allow it to be over 3 times more efficient. However, a small portion of this (about 6-7%) is used to power the vehicles extensive electrical network, including communication applications, computers, wireless transmitters, and drone pods, in addition to the vehicle's "MAC" cannon.

The Tank uses it's generator to power it's main weapon and it's capacitor, which is a Magnetic Assisted Cannon. The capacitor in the tank is capable of storing enough energy for roughly 6 shots, and takes about 10-30 minutes to recharge. It can only fire this in a period of a minute (or over a period of a few minutes), however, due to overheating problems and problems with the magnetic coils carry latent electrical and magnetic energy (which interferes with the primary charge) this is rarely done. The Cannon is capable of using conventional ammunition and even nonmagnetic assisted depleted uranium rounds.

Regenerative Braking
The electric motor applies resistance to the drivetrain causing the wheels to slow down. In return, the energy from the wheels turns the motor, which functions as a generator, converting energy normally wasted during coasting and braking into electricity, which is stored in a battery until needed by the electric motor.

Electric Motor Drive/Assist
The electric motor provides additional power to assist the engine in accelerating, passing, or hill climbing. This allows a smaller, more efficient engine to be used. In some vehicles, the motor alone provides power for low-speed driving conditions where internal combustion engines are least efficient.

Idling
As the Tank is idling, is it essentially taking this energy that its usually wasted and transforming it into electrical energy, in which it is stored more efficiently. The Battery is roughly capable of storing 10% of the energy of the motor. Obviously, if the battery is "Full" then idling still wastes energy that could otherwise have been generated by the motor.

Stealth
Although most tanks primarily focus on the ability to deflect or absorb enemy projectiles, erring on the side of raw, defensive protection, as mobile armor, it is impossible, or unrealistic to expect a tank to absorb all forms of enemy attacks. While defensive against other forms of mobile armor is generally perceived as the role or duty of a tank, to provide adequate protection to these threats, it is still possible for larger weapons, such as missile, or aircraft to destroy tanks, despite their impressive armor capabilities. A cruise missile, or 2000 pound bomb could likely get through most tanks' armor, and trying to prepare against all these threats would be impractical. As a result, sometimes not being targeted at all is a more ideal form of protection, as the enemy cannot even see or does not notice your craft moving towards them. While on the large scale, this can provide incredibly important strategic benefits, on the smaller, more direct scale, this can provide perhaps even greater tactical advantages. The ability to deflect or disrupt a guided missile, and cause the weapon to veer off target is an invaluable asset, as it allows a vehicle to avoid direct impact from some of the more powerful weapons.

As a result, the vehicle has limited stealth capabilities. While being close to the ground provides inherent advantages to radar systems, due to the natural clutter of the ground (compared to to aircraft, which are largely in the open sky), and the ground itself reflecting and disrupting radiation (being a hard surface which can reflect or absorb radar), additional radar measures can be useful. In addition to this, due to a general lack of an need to be aerodynamic to remain in flight, the far tougher armor of the tank, and it's smaller size and lower profile, ground vehicles actually possess numerous advantages when becoming stealthy, compared to aircraft. Like most stealth aircraft, the vehicle possess wide angles on it, which help to reflect radar and scramble it, without giving the radar a good surface to bounce off of. The very shape of a vehicle can help to disrupt and reflect radar waves in such a way to provide an imperfect recovery by radar, which helps reduce it's radar signature, and thus make it harder to target or detect. Radar absorbant materials, or RAM, helps to prevent the radar from ever being reflecting off of the vehicle in the first place, simply absorbing the radar before it can ever make it back to the receiver. While no radar absorbent material can absorb all of the radar of a radar scanner, it can disrupt it significantly enough to make targeting or detection nearly impossible. The radar cross section of the vehicle is made smaller by these factors, which are similar to stealth aircraft, such as the B-2 Bomber, F-117, F-35 or F-22.

Infrared counter measures are more easily utilized on most tanks than radar counter measures. Largely based on the Adaptiv active camouflage technology, developed by BAE Systems AB, the basis is to protect military vehicles from detection by near infrared night vision devices. It consists of an array of hexagonal Peltier plates which can be rapidly heated and cooled to form any desired image, such as of the natural background or of a non-target object. The Adaptiv infrared military camouflage technology, virtually simulates the "a thermal TV screen". It uses about 1000 hexagonal panels to cover the sides of an armoured vehicle such as a tank or personnel carrier. Infrared cameras continuously gather thermal images of the vehicle's surroundings. The Peltier plate panels are rapidly heated and cooled to match either the temperature of the background, such as a forest, or one of the objects in the thermal cloaking system's "library" such as a truck, car or large rock. The system is able to gather and display thermal images while the vehicle is moving. The result is to "cloak" the vehicle from detection by heat-detecting night vision devices (thermographic camera systems).

For crypsis, the panels can display an infrared image of the vehicle's background; this can be updated as the vehicle moves. For mimesis, an image of a chosen object, such as a car, can be retrieved from Adaptiv's library and superimposed on the background. The technology is said to reduce the range at which a vehicle would be detected to less than 500 metres. The panels forming Adaptiv's pixels are hexagons approximately 5.5 inches (14 cm) wide. They are robust, contributing to the armour of the vehicle that carries them. The system allows its operator to "grab" a thermal image from a vehicle or other object for display.



Radar Countermeasures
To avoid radar detection of guidance all together, it can be at times beneficial to employ Radar Counter measures most notably Radar Jammers. To disrupt radar signals all together cannot necessarily hide or conceal soldiers as effectively as radar systems which absorb or redirect radar waves, as it's very presence indicates the movement of enemy troops. However, like a smokescreen, it can effectively conceal the vehicle from radar systems. In addition to this, it is particularly more effective against guided missiles; due to their smaller size and onboard radar systems, disrupting their ability to home in on the target can remove their guidance capabilities, and thus make them more likely to miss the target. Weapons that tank armor ordinarily could not defeat can be employed by using such systems.


Directed EMP
The vehicle possesses a directed energy weapon, utilizing microwaves, similar to the Bofors HPM Blackout and Vigilant Eagle. The system, just under 500 pounds, sends incredibly powerful microwaves, developed from a magnetron not too dissimilar from those in microwaves, to scramble the electronics of oncoming missiles or small aircraft (such as drones), by discharging electrons from the metallic and semi-conductor components as a result of vibrations from the microwaves. This discharging of electrons overloads the circuits of electronics, and essentially fries them, much as lightning or an overload charge would. The microwaves use a guided tracker and an adjustable parabolic reflector to focus the beams of the microwave emitter on to a much smaller portion of the aircraft, and prevent backlash from the microwaves from getting on to the vehicle and messing up it's own electronics. While not completely effective, in unison with other missile engagement systems, it's capability to down oncoming missiles is invaluable, as it provides protection to the vehicle from some of the most powerful weapons available.



Detection System and Radar
The primary core basis of the vehicles long range detection system is a heavily modified AN/APG-78 Longbow millimeter-wave fire-control radar (FCR) target acquisition system and the Radar Frequency Interferometer (RFI), housed within the - Source - Source

The radar provides high performance with very low probability of intercept. Longbow’s radar rapidly and automatically searches, detects, locates, classifies, and prioritizes multiple moving and stationary targets on land, air, and water in all weather and battlefield conditions to the maximum range of the Longbow missile. Target coordinates are automatically available to all sensors and weapons-enabling target confirmation, reducing fratricide, and permitting rapid launch. Target data is also digitally available through the improved data modem for real-time transfer to other platforms and command posts. The self-contained Radio Frequency Interferometer (RFI) ensures rapid identification and accurate azimuth to enemy air defense units. High system reliability and two-level maintenance provide high operational availability with low support costs. The radar is fielded with the Apache AH-64D Attack Helicopter system in the US Army.

The Longbow system incorporates a fire-and-forget RF missile, allowing the Apache to launch from defilade, increasing battlefield survivability. The missile is capable of locking on before or after launch and has been extensively tested in multiple countermeasures. It has a range of approximately 5 miles (8km), weighs 108 lb (49 kg), and is 69 in (175 cm) in length and 7 in (17.8 cm) in diameter. It can target over 256 targets at a single time, and is incorporated with the various Friend-or-Foe identification systems, which helps to avoid friendly fire.

While adapted for use in the mech, the largest change to the design has been the upgrade to the
Quantum enhanced Radar, compared to the original unfiltered radar system. The radar system utilizes a much more finite and accurate system, which is more resistant to jamming methods. A team of physicists at the University of Rochester has discovered how to defeat the latest active radar jamming methods by taking advantage of the quantum properties of photons. While this new anti-jamming technology cannot remove the false information, it provides an immediate alert that false information is being received.

The new jamming method on the block is Digital Radio Frequency Memory (DRFM) jamming. DRFM works by intercepting the radar signal, modifying the signal by introducing false information about the target, than retransmitting the modified signal toward the radar. In theory, the radar cannot distinguish the altered signal from a legitimate target signal because the altered signal contains all the signatures and fingerprints of the original radar beam. The class of DRFM jamming methods is sufficiently broad and flexible that constructing effective countermeasures to the jamming using conventional technology is extremely difficult. The key is to use polarization of the radar signal as a quantum signature. A radio or light wave is described by a polarization angle, defined as the direction along which the electric field of the wave is oriented. A polarizer is an optical element that allows only radiation sharing its polarization direction to pass through unscathed. If the same wave is directed through a polarizer misaligned by 90 degrees, no signal passes through.

The process isn't completely reliable, mainly because radar is not a collection of single-photon processes. There are lots of photons in the radar beam, which in a simple protocol all have the same polarization. Bob in principle can use part of the radar signal to determine its polarization (which can be done using a large number of photons), and then use that knowledge when retransmitting the spoofed signal. However, this is difficult to do because of the time delays in determining the radar beam polarization, and can easily be countered by, for example, changing the radar polarization rapidly, sending out the radar beam on a number of frequencies, and having different polarizations on each, or a combination of both. While not completely unjammable, the radar system is much less susceptible to doing so, and thus places the difficulty of the jamming signals back on the jammer itself, making it so much smaller, and generally weaker decoys or jammers cannot fool or overload the system. This makes standard or cheap and readily deployable decoys less of a nuisance, and thus makes it substantially more difficult to actually prevent the radar system from working.