Tanks, by design, are meant to travel over rough terrain. They're built with phenomenal suspensions, to ensure they can keep moving over and through any obstacle in combat. But though the machines can keep going when the going gets tough, anything you can do to smooth the ride is an improvement.
That's why British defense contractor BAE Systems, creator of the CV90 family of tanks, has created a new active damping suspension system to dramatically improve the ride of tracked vehicles moving over rough terrain. Active suspension allows vehicles to manage the ride height and stiffness of the suspension while driving, either by driver activation or automatically controlled via a computer. In this case, the extra flexibility will allow the CV90 to increase its top speed to over 40 mph, a 40 percent increase.
It's inspired by a technology developed for Formula One, designed to absorb bumps in the road. In racing, keeping as much of the rubber as possible on the tarmac lets cars accelerate and brake faster, and helps neutralize imperfections in the road surface. Active suspensions were banned from the sport in 1994, along with technological "driver aids" like traction control and anti-lock brakes, to put emphasis on the driver rather than the car. It has since found a home in assorted high-end sports cars, and now it's taken on a military role.
Though the theory is the same, the active damping in the CV90 tank is functionally very different from that in F1, largely because massive tracked vehicles and ultra-light race cars have very different suspension requirements.
BAE is keeping quiet on how, exactly, its tech works, but says the system measures body movement and calculates how each corner of the vehicle is accelerating (that is, leaving the ground). Once the movement exceeds predetermined thresholds, the system starts stiffening the suspension.
When the vehicle comes back down, the stiffened dampers absorb the shock much better than a passive system would. It can handle three times the rigid body movement of the original system, with impacts from bumps both small and large reduced in real time. It also allows for the use of anti-lock brakes.
More than keeping those inside from bouncing around, this suspension holds the vehicle steady when it's firing a heavy gun or mortar system. "That means you can go faster over rough terrain and still keep track on the target," says Dan Lindell, platform manager for combat vehicles at BAE Systems.. "It is a lot easier for the gunner to find and identify targets in a calm system."
If the system fails, Lindell says the torsion bars would still be there to hold the weight of the vehicle. "You'd still have mobility, although you wouldn't be able to go as fast on rough terrain." That's important for a vehicle made to take men and women into combat.
The active damping system can be retrofitted to current CV90 systems with just a few weeks of downtime, likely during routine maintenance, says Lindell. If you want to ride in a tank without the risk of bumping your head, you'll have to enlist in the armies of Sweden, Norway, Finland, Switzerland, or one of several other countries that use this tank.
