Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

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Lord Jim
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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

Post by Lord Jim »

So why don't they simply come out and say that using the Boxer APC variant is a situation that cannot be seen as a replacement for Warrior, rather that what they have said that gives the impression Boxer could not become a viable IFV replacing Warrior. They may be trying to be careful with their words but they are giving the wrong impression as a result in my opinion. Instead they should be sating that the current situation can only be seen as a stop gap until an improved lethality package that is cost effective can be brought on line, and emphasis how the modularity of the vehicle will make such a programme more efficient, with only Mission Modules requiring modification not the Drive Modules.

The MRAVs were purchased for a totally different requirement that for what Boxer was. Boxer could have done the job the MRAVs were bought for under UORs but the same cannot be said for the other way around. The fact that the programme has resulted in the MRAVs being replaced by Boxer in a number of Units is more a historical coincidence than a planned situation. As for the £Bns spent, if the Army had got its procurement plans better organised we could have had Boxer and teir would have been little need for most of the MRAVs.

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

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Lord Jim wrote: 18 Apr 2022, 06:51 Instead they should be sating that the current situation can only be seen as a stop gap until an improved lethality package that is cost effective can be brought on line, and emphasis how the modularity of the vehicle will make such a programme more efficient, with only Mission Modules requiring modification not the Drive Modules.
You've clearly not been around long enough to understand how these sorts of statements are digested in political terms. Not forgetting that the MRAP were intended for a very specific job and conditions in Afghanistan and Iraq and we're subsequently forced in conventional roles that they're not suitable for. We've even ploughed money into bringing them into core.

Just like Warrior is now being used in the Armoured Recce role due to AJAX delays. If AJAX was cancelled, it would be a difficult battle to reverse this position.
Lord Jim wrote: 18 Apr 2022, 06:51 The MRAVs were purchased for a totally different requirement that for what Boxer was.
That's the obvious statement of the century. But again diverges from the conversation on Warrior.

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Tempest414
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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

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Stepping back a bit if Dannaatt was right and we did revisit the Warrior upgrade how close was it to going ahead i.e was it a case of signing it off and starting the upgrade of 250 vehicles or was there a number of things that still needed to be done

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

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Tempest414 wrote: 18 Apr 2022, 09:54 Stepping back a bit if Dannaatt was right and we did revisit the Warrior upgrade how close was it to going ahead i.e was it a case of signing it off and starting the upgrade of 250 vehicles or was there a number of things that still needed to be done
Regardless of where it was, there would be a number of things to do now, since the programme has been closed for a year and the people working on it moved to different tasks or companies.

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Tempest414
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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

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mr.fred wrote: 18 Apr 2022, 10:27
Tempest414 wrote: 18 Apr 2022, 09:54 Stepping back a bit if Dannaatt was right and we did revisit the Warrior upgrade how close was it to going ahead i.e was it a case of signing it off and starting the upgrade of 250 vehicles or was there a number of things that still needed to be done
Regardless of where it was, there would be a number of things to do now, since the programme has been closed for a year and the people working on it moved to different tasks or companies.
Ok yes but was the design work complete i.e did the prototype work

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

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Tempest414 wrote: 18 Apr 2022, 10:32 Ok yes but was the design work complete i.e did the prototype work
As of February it was “more than 80%”
https://www.overtdefense.com/2021/03/23 ... -of-boxer/

so it’s likely that there was some left to do but fundamentally the Prototypes worked.

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Lord Jim
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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

Post by Lord Jim »

Pot, kettle, black is all I can think of. You cannot disagree and then use the same arguments to make your point. We are actually agreeing in the main, but I have kept politics out of it. Mind you the political implications of what I suggested would probably wake up a few people to the realities of the situation the Army is in and will still be, even after its ten year "Holiday", from being able to attempt to fight a peer level conflict.

As for Warrior, the platform is living on borrowed time and we have to pray we do not get involved in any conflicts whilst it remains in service, either as an IFV or a Recce platform.

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Tempest414
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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

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Lord Jim wrote: 18 Apr 2022, 23:02 Pot, kettle, black is all I can think of. You cannot disagree and then use the same arguments to make your point. We are actually agreeing in the main, but I have kept politics out of it. Mind you the political implications of what I suggested would probably wake up a few people to the realities of the situation the Army is in and will still be, even after its ten year "Holiday", from being able to attempt to fight a peer level conflict.

As for Warrior, the platform is living on borrowed time and we have to pray we do not get involved in any conflicts whilst it remains in service, either as an IFV or a Recce platform.
Given what we have seen of the Russian's lack of ability to maneuver and the piss poor use combined arms. I think we would get away with using Warrior and bulldog

This does not mean we don't need to push on with new kit and as for Boxer at this time if the Battalions were to have 80 vehicles then there RWS's should be fitted with 20 x 12.7 mm , 40 x 30mm Venom LR & 20 40mm GMG and all 30mm carriers should carry 1 x Javelin missile

Maybe we should fit half the Warriors with RWS's fitted with 12.7mm and a javelin missile
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ArmChairCivvy
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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

Post by ArmChairCivvy »

mr.fred wrote: 15 Apr 2022, 12:15 The remaining tracked IFVs aren’t being replaced.
Heavy Cavalry taking IFVs... so they become HCFVs (talking about the remaining...). Or will there be IFVs, too? The remaining fleet must have been thoroughly assessed, especially for hull condition/ tiredness. I wonder what that would make the OSD to be?
sol wrote: 15 Apr 2022, 16:16 Only 116 CR3 will be in two tank regiments. so only 58 per brigade, 100 to 120 Boxers and 48 Ajax with number of other variants, which is less than US ABCT.
Yes, yardsticks must be specific,to be used as "common coinage"
sol wrote: 15 Apr 2022, 16:16 at any time as there would be enough APS and add-armour packages for only one tank regiment.
First things first: let's get the upgraded tanks ALL (of them) ready for APS
RunningStrong wrote: 16 Apr 2022, 14:34 BOXER was intended to be a more permanent replacement for the MRAP UOR vehicles and better prepared for peer conflict, as well as some other ancient legacy platforms. Hence there's no requirement at this time for a cannon.
To keep the verb tenses congruent, I would be guessing(?) that you meant "at that time"
- if not, then I'm afraid I can't agree
Ever-lasting truths: Multi-year budgets/ planning by necessity have to address the painful questions; more often than not the Either-Or prevails over Both-And.
If everyone is thinking the same, then someone is not thinking (attributed to Patton)

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

Post by RunningStrong »

ArmChairCivvy wrote: 23 May 2022, 10:32 To keep the verb tenses congruent, I would be guessing(?) that you meant "at that time"
- if not, then I'm afraid I can't agree
I'm still not aware that BOXER has been given the approval to be an IFV.

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

Post by Lord Jim »

The question in my mind is how is the training for the five Mechanised Infantry going to be altered when mounted in Boxer or will they still train as they have done with Warrior. I would no like to be an ex Armoured Infantry person who is told we are rolling back the clock nearly forty years and you will have to engage the Enemy and run the remaining hundred yards to an objective, hoping a Challenger 3 is around or the Recce Regiment has a reserve unit available to support you rather than doing its actual job, that of recce.

We might like to think ew can fight a battle as we want to keeping the Enemy at arms length and engaging him with precision indirect fire, only sending in the troops when the Enemy is just about ready to giver up. I am sure the Enemy will be very considerate at do exactly what we assume he will.

The Challenger 3s will need to be operating with Infantry mounted in an IFV for mutual support, though in our case it is definitely the Infantry operating with Challenger 3 support, screened by the Ajax of the Recce Regiment, Announcing turning Boxer into an IFV just after canning the WCSP and announcing plans to retire the Warrior IFV may have been seen as a bad PR subject and raise awkward questions about the Interim Review and Command Paper only recently published. For all we know the MoD could be intending to create a number of IFVs based on Boxer but are waiting for its entry into service before announcing such a programme.

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

Post by sol »

And while waiting for Ajax and Boxer to arrive, Warrior will continue to serve beyond 2025


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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

Post by RunningStrong »

New armour on Warrior?


mr.fred
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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

Post by mr.fred »

RunningStrong wrote: 05 May 2023, 11:09 New armour on Warrior?
Looks like TES fit, but without the ERA fitted

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

Post by RunningStrong »

mr.fred wrote: 05 May 2023, 11:31
RunningStrong wrote: 05 May 2023, 11:09 New armour on Warrior?
Looks like TES fit, but without the ERA fitted
I wasn't aware Warrior ever had ERA. Found a Janes article from a little while back.

https://www.janes.com/defence-news/news ... to-estonia

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

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RunningStrong wrote: 05 May 2023, 12:40 I wasn't aware Warrior ever had ERA. Found a Janes article from a little while back.
Referred to as WRAP 2
https://defense-update.com/20080918_bri ... FVWqS_MKgQ

The ERA was fitted in Iraq but taken off for Afghanistan;
Image

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

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sol wrote: 01 Dec 2022, 13:28 And while waiting for Ajax and Boxer to arrive, Warrior will continue to serve beyond 2025

I bet we end up with "Warrior 2000" by default

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

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SD67 wrote: 09 May 2023, 09:46 I bet we end up with "Warrior 2000" by default
Taken literally, with the redesigned hull, more powerful engine and dual-axis stabilised turret mounting a Mk44 chaingun, that would be a pretty good option.
Doubt it will happen though.

With hindsight, it would have been the better option, with the RARDEN armed vehicles converted into turretless support vehicles to replace the FV430-series. Could also have served as Recce instead of the Fres shenanigans, or we could have had stormer light tank with the same turret as Warrior 2000.

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

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mr.fred wrote: 09 May 2023, 10:48
SD67 wrote: 09 May 2023, 09:46 I bet we end up with "Warrior 2000" by default
Taken literally, with the redesigned hull, more powerful engine and dual-axis stabilised turret mounting a Mk44 chaingun, that would be a pretty good option.
Doubt it will happen though.

With hindsight, it would have been the better option, with the RARDEN armed vehicles converted into turretless support vehicles to replace the FV430-series. Could also have served as Recce instead of the Fres shenanigans, or we could have had stormer light tank with the same turret as Warrior 2000.
Yes, but would that have been “transformational”?

(Sorry getting grumpy in my old age)

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

Post by Tempest414 »

When will the Warriors go out of service I can't see it until 2030 or even 2032

would there be anything in sending a Warrior to John Cockerill to see if they could fit a 3030 turret to it and if so how easily it could be done. If we take there 3105 upgrade of Leopard 1 they made a new turret ring adaptor and power lead once these were made it a few hours to change the turret and upgrade done

If it could be done maybe do 100 Warriors

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

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SD67 wrote: 09 May 2023, 10:55 Yes, but would that have been “transformational”?
Compared to where we are now? Very much so. More even than that if we'd kept up with the upgrade path.
Tempest414 wrote: 09 May 2023, 11:13 would there be anything in sending a Warrior to John Cockerill to see if they could fit a 3030 turret to it and if so how easily it could be done. If we take there 3105 upgrade of Leopard 1 they made a new turret ring adaptor and power lead once these were made it a few hours to change the turret and upgrade done
Given the abandonment of a turret upgrade already, it seems unlikely, for cost and embarrassment reasons.
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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

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mr.fred wrote: 09 May 2023, 11:34
SD67 wrote: 09 May 2023, 10:55 Yes, but would that have been “transformational”?
Compared to where we are now? Very much so. More even than that if we'd kept up with the upgrade path.
Tempest414 wrote: 09 May 2023, 11:13 would there be anything in sending a Warrior to John Cockerill to see if they could fit a 3030 turret to it and if so how easily it could be done. If we take there 3105 upgrade of Leopard 1 they made a new turret ring adaptor and power lead once these were made it a few hours to change the turret and upgrade done
Given the abandonment of a turret upgrade already, it seems unlikely, for cost and embarrassment reasons.
Firstly the money for Warrior & Challenger upgrades was spent on the UOR fleets from 2003 to 2012 thankfully Bulldog was given an upgrade with active armour option in this time to take the load off Warrior

Next I agree that a turret upgrade is off the table in real terms however the turret upgrade was stopped before the war in Ukraine started also JC will have a 3030 turret ready to go so the cost would be sending them a hull and there time to work out if it can be done quick and cheap i.e the same as Leopard 1's ring and power lead

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

Post by sol »

Tempest414 wrote: 09 May 2023, 13:21 Next I agree that a turret upgrade is off the table in real terms however the turret upgrade was stopped before the war in Ukraine started also JC will have a 3030 turret ready to go so the cost would be sending them a hull and there time to work out if it can be done quick and cheap i.e the same as Leopard 1's ring and power lead
It is a pointless and wasting of money. It is not like JC has hundreds of turrets laying around just waiting to be installed. All those turret would still need to be built, everything would need to be integrated and after that, vehicles would still need to pass to the various test to prove they are satisfying. This will all take time, years in fact, and all that just to keep it operational till the end of the decade. And it would not be cheap. It would not be easy to find additional money for that will all things the Army needs.

WCSP already had working turret but upgrade was not only limited on it. Whole vehicle was supposed to be upgraded, and just adding a new turret would be to little to late.

It would be much better if all that effort and money would be spent on up arming Boxer with 30mm or 40mm gun, getting more tanks or AA systems or ... you pick it.

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Tempest414
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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

Post by Tempest414 »

All of this is quite right but JC will have one or two 3030 turrets in hand and the Leopard 1 3105 ( part of the 3030 range) upgrade was just a turret , turret ring adaptor and power cable adaptor

This is just a back up if Ajax falls down again and Warrior needs to carry on in the armoured Recce role for a bit longer

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Re: Warrior Armoured Vehicles (British Army)

Post by RunningStrong »

Tempest414 wrote: 09 May 2023, 19:27 All of this is quite right but JC will have one or two 3030 turrets in hand and the Leopard 1 3105 ( part of the 3030 range) upgrade was just a turret , turret ring adaptor and power cable adaptor

This is just a back up if Ajax falls down again and Warrior needs to carry on in the armoured Recce role for a bit longer
So where are the Bowman radios going in the 3030 Warrior?

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