Pros and cons of armor on small vehicles

mdvaden

mdvaden

Active member
I know that plating and armor has it's good side - stopping some bullets.

What may be some drawbacks to armor? Or good things that are not obvious sometimes?
 
how about weight. everytime i see those secret service shows on the Discovery Channel and they show the big ole heavily armored SUV or limo, or car doing some type of manuevering you can see the body roll. there is so much roll in the vehicle it isn't hard to get it onto three wheels, two if you're in an SUV. ask anyone who races how much roll sucks when trying to drive fast. even with beefed up shocks, brakes, and engine it doesn't offset the fact that you just added thousands of pounds of weight to the vehicle. it'll effect everything, acceleration, braking, and turning. which is exactly why race teams do everything possible to remove weight from their vehicles. ok, so my example pertains to armored vehicles that require a bit of manueverability. it's different when it comes to combat vehicles, but either way they all must obey the laws of physics. but i must say, i am quite impressed with the stopping distance of an M1 Abrams on concrete from full speed. i didn't think they could stop that fast or that short.
 
Add to that lousy fuel economy which limits range. It could limit the option of airlifting them if they get too heavy as well.
 
Yeah... that's what I meant by deployability... but certainly there is no such thing as a free lunch. It's always one thing or the other. So you'll have to outfit your machines based on the mission criteria.
 
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