In 2041, among the major arms projects of countries around the world, the most popular one was the "future ground warfare platform" of the Chinese Army. The reason is very simple. This is the first ground comprehensive platform project in the world that has truly entered the military order catalog. It is also the first comprehensive arms project launched by the Chinese Army in nearly 30 years, and it can even be said to be the first large-scale arms project.

If the project is fully realized, the total cost will be more than 15 trillion yuan.

There is no doubt that this was China and even the world's largest arms project at that time. In comparison, the total budget of the j-j-33 project was only 12 trillion yuan, while the total budget of the US yf-yf-53 project was US$240 billion. Even the total budget of the project to build ten C3 aircraft carriers was only 6 trillion yuan, while the total budget of the US "American"-class super aircraft carrier was only 220 billion US dollars.

It is undeniable that j-j-33 is also very attractive, especially against the backdrop of the yf-yf-53 project, which has brought the Sino-US arms race to a new height. In terms of the army, the United States has no comprehensive project that can match the "future ground warfare platform". To be precise, the US Army's comprehensive combat platform project is slow to progress, and the development costs are seriously exceeding the standard, and it is once facing the threat of being dismissed.

Of course, the smooth advancement of the "Future Ground War Platform" has also benefited a lot from the US Army.

In a sense, it was the Chinese Army's "Future Ground Warfare Platform" project that stimulated the United States and prevented the US Congress from cutting off similar projects of the US Army.

At the end of 2041, the "Future Ground War Platform" made the first major progress: the basic platform was finalized.

As mentioned earlier, the Army clearly required the bidding to adopt a comprehensive power system as much as possible, and the chassis should be driven by pure electric power.

This is definitely a huge challenge for the three companies participating in the bidding, namely China Northern Heavy Industry Group, China Southern Machinery Industry Group and Hengtai Heavy Industry Machinery Group. The key is not the lack of a suitable motor, but the energy reserve problem brought by pure electric drives.

You know, this means that there is no internal combustion engine in the chassis, but the electric motor is powered by the battery.

Among the three companies, the first two are state-owned enterprises and the two largest heavy industrial groups in China, and Hengtai Group is the largest private heavy industrial group in China.

Because the Army did not set deadlines and had room for negotiation, both Northern Heavy Industry and Southern Machinery adopted a fuel-electric hybrid system in the initial plan, namely, a generator driven by a gas turbine, and a separate power storage system for powering the electromagnetic gun was installed.

In a sense, this is a more reasonable solution.

There is only a serious problem, that is, the chassis weight is seriously exceeding the standard.

Without armor installed, the design plan of Northern Heavy Industry weighs 28 tons, while Southern Machinery has an astonishing 32 tons. This means that if armor is installed, the weight of both will exceed 45 tons. With the combat module, the combat weight of the anti-armor type is likely to exceed 60 tons. If the protection standards need to be improved, it is not impossible to exceed 70 tons.

Obviously, the Army will definitely not accept a main battle tank weighing 70 tons.

You should know that the ultimate carrying capacity of the main air force transport aircraft is only over 70 tons, while the combat weight of the main army battle tank can only reach up to 65 tons, and it is best to be controlled within 55 tons to ensure that a transport aircraft is used to transport all the equipment of a tank.

In fact, even fifty-five tons exceeded the Army's requirements.

The reason is very simple. Now it is just the basic model. When equipping the troops, a supporting draped reactive armor will definitely be provided. Therefore, a margin of four to five tons must be left to ensure that the maneuverability of the main battle tank will not be seriously reduced after draped reactive armor.

According to the indicators proposed by the Army, fifty-five tons is the upper limit, and it is best to be controlled within fifty tons.

Obviously, the plans of Northern Heavy Industry and Southern Machinery cannot be controlled within fifty-five tons.

Compared with the two state-owned enterprises, Hengtai Group focuses on power systems, or power reserve systems, that is, to overcome the technical difficulties of pure electric drives.

Affected by this, Hengtai Group's development progress was the slowest, but it was also the most concerned by the Army.

You should know that Hengtai Group is the largest manufacturer of power equipment and power storage equipment in China. The high-performance storage batteries it produces have been widely used in electric vehicles, electric aircraft, and electric yachts. It has also developed high-performance storage modules for submarines for the Navy.

When the Army issued the bid, Hengtai Group had already manufactured high-performance fuel cells with a mass-energy density of up to 400 voltam per kilogram, which was equivalent to 33% of the gasoline fuel value. The energy conversion efficiency of the motor is much higher than that of the internal combustion engine and has the ability to replace the internal combustion engine.

At that time, the biggest problem was: it did not have mass production capabilities.

In any case, the samples made in the laboratory are not representative.

It can be admitted that the achievements made by Hengtai Group have great application potential, which has attracted the attention of the Army and received full support from the military.

If such high-performance fuel cells can be mass-produced, it will only be a matter of time before the electric motor replaces the internal combustion engine.

The first thing to benefit is definitely the army.

In addition to the Army, the Navy and the Air Force also benefit a lot. For example, replacing batteries on submarines with high-performance fuel cells may even replace nuclear reactors to create electric submarines with performance as much as nuclear submarines, while the Air Force can create long-term aircraft with more advanced performance. From the perspective of logistics support, if the problem of miniaturization of power generation equipment can be solved, such as manufacturing small fusion nuclear reactors, there is no longer the need to transport fuel to the front line, and a small reactor can replenish thousands of tanks and vehicles.

Ideals are beautiful, but reality is really cruel.

By 2041, Hengtai Group had not been able to find a large-scale mass production method. It only produced a fuel cell that could assemble a chassis through laboratory trial production, and submitted an overall design plan to the Army based on the trial production data.

According to the plan submitted by Hengtai Group, the total mass of the chassis that does not contain armor can be controlled within 14 tons.

There is no doubt that this is a very remarkable result and is enough to make the Army determined.

You should know that if Hengtai Group's plan did not have much deviation, the total mass of the anti-armor model would definitely not exceed fifty tons. At that time, Hengtai Group did not submit a detailed design plan, but the Army used the chassis design plan to estimate various combat platforms.

It can be said that the greatest success of Hengtai Group's plan is the adoption of an integrated power system.

By the end of the year, Hengtai Group delivered the first chassis to the Army for performance testing.

It must be admitted that this chassis is advanced enough.

At that time, with a counterweight of 50 tons and a crawler walking mechanism, the maximum road speed reached 85 kilometers per hour, the maximum off-road speed was 55 kilometers per hour, the maximum marching mileage of the highway was 840 kilometers, the maximum off-road marching mileage of 460 kilometers, and the climbing capacity reached 42%. More importantly, after exhausting power, using a dedicated charging device can replenish 80% of the electricity in 15 minutes, and the full charging time is only two hours. If you use a civil power grid, it only takes 45 minutes to replenish 80% of the electricity. As for reliability, there are no major failures in continuous marching 36,000 kilometers.

If mass production can be achieved, this is definitely an ideal chassis for the Army combat platform.

In fact, as long as the chassis problem is solved, other combat modules are not a problem at all.

In early 2041, the Gun Cannon Group under Northern Heavy Industry developed a 35mm coil electromagnetic gun. The muzzle energy during the test reached 36 megajoules, an increase of 80% compared to the 140mm electrothermal chemical gun, and there is still about 20% room for improvement. If there is a suitable type of bullet, the armor-piercing ability of this electromagnetic gun can reach an astonishing 1,800 mm at 2,000 meters. In other words, any fifth-generation main battle tank cannot stop the armor-piercing projectile fired by this electromagnetic gun when it is fully worn.

Of course, the coil electromagnetic cannon is definitely an "electric tiger".

The energy conversion efficiency of the trial sample gun is only 14%. In other words, if the fuel cells of Hengtai Group provide electricity, each full-power armor-piercing bomb fired will consume all the electricity in the battery. According to a base of 48 shells, the battery used to fire these shells alone requires 8,600 kilograms, and the total mass of the forty-eight armor-piercing bombs is only more than 2,000 kilograms. In other words, the mass of the weapon ammunition system is three times higher than that of the fifth-generation main battle tank.

The only solution is to improve the energy conversion efficiency of the coil electromagnetic gun.

To put it simply, if the energy conversion efficiency is doubled and the total mass of the weapon energy system can be doubled when the mass of the shell can be ignored. If it reaches 40% of the orbital electromagnetic gun, the total mass of the weapon energy system can be reduced to about 3,000 kilograms.

Of course, orbital electromagnetic guns can also be used when necessary.

However, from the perspective of development trends, coil electromagnetic guns have greater potential, and coil electromagnetic guns are the only way to achieve small-caliber and high-energy. If orbital electromagnetic guns are used, the caliber will exceed 100 mm when the muzzle energy remains unchanged, and the total system mass will not be reduced much.

By the end of 2041, the biggest good news was that Hengtai Group finally overcomes the manufacturing problems of high-performance fuel cells.

Although according to the report submitted by Hengtai Group, the initial production efficiency will not be very high and the yield rate will not be very high, it will definitely be able to mass produce. Moreover, when the production scale is large enough, there will be enough funds to improve production efficiency and yield.

Only then did the Army make up its mind to hand over the contract to Hengtai Group.

Of course, Northern Heavy Industry and Southern Machinery were not excluded. Among them, Northern Heavy Industry is responsible for the development of anti-armor, multi-purpose and fire support modules, Southern Machinery is responsible for the development of air defense modules, composite armor, and active defense systems, Hengtai Group is responsible for the chassis, walking mechanisms, weapon energy systems, electronic systems and sighting systems. The three companies submit trial samples at the latest at the end of 2042.
Chapter completed!