Laser Range Finding: What everyone gets wrong

[@mensch1066]

"Baptizing" and "Naming" the terrain both make sense linguistically. Another word for baptizing a child in English is "christening". This word is often used for the ceremony naming a new ship (though in practice it involves all of the superstitious activities such as breaking a bottle of champagne when the ship is launched). EDIT: Now that I think about it, "christening" is used in military accounts in English for when soldiers rename a landmark with a generic name like "Hill 372" into something more evocative like "Bloody Hill" (e.g. "After fighting for the hill for so many weeks, the weary soldiers christened it as 'Hamburger Hill'").

[@herptek]

When setting up a defensive firing position it is traditional military doctrine at least here in Finland to "name" the terrain in the field of fire and to draw a "fire position card" out of it, so that everyone manning the position can refer to the landmarks visible to the position by the same name. Also the ranges to the landmarks are determined beforehand while preparing the position and in an old school anti-tank squad we did it with a laser rangefinder in a fashion not dissimilar to what was explained by the guest and host of this video. Sounds very familiar actually.

[@Roborob12345]

“Christening the ground” is the Commonwealth English translation.

[@LafayetteCCurtis]

These days it's just called "marking TRPs" (target reference points) in English. I guess I've heard some older NCOs use "christening" and younger ones understand what they mean but rarely use the word themselves. And the TRPs are obviously marked on the range card that would be passed to the next watch manning the same position.

[@Reverenz88-14]

​@@herptek I remember one Finnish song from the Continuation War, and there, a reference is made to three hills the Maavoimat occupied, and they're named something like Egg, Sausage etc😂

[@NSGrendel]

@@herptek Exactly this. 30 years ago it was common doctrine for British troops to assay the lay of the land and describe all the landmarks so everyone would have common references. You'd also work out the distance to all of those and by extension - the rough range of any patches of land between them. "50 Metres between the big bastard building and 3 trees." etc. Additionally, we used to use (and I imagine people still do) use the "fingerspacing" method. So rather than saying, "x degrees/east/bearing..." it would simply be, "three fingers to the right of the little shed" - where if you held three fingers at arm's length, and looked to the right, you'd be roughly on target.

[@9thbloodandfire508]

Former OR 8 German platoon leader here. Sorry, I have to correct the gunner Tobias here. It is absolutely not depending of the TC to name to landmarks in the "Geländetaufe." That is up to the platoon leader in most of the cases! Every soldier of the platoon needs to know those names! This is to accelerate spotting, respectively firing times of the whole platoon. Example: 4 tanks appear left side at "Kugelbaum" (ball tree). The TC of the tank immediatly airs that on radio: "Left side 4 tanks at Kugelbaum." If properly (which usually is done) tasked beforehand, the gunners of the other tanks leave their observation areas even without specific orders and (if permitted) can engage the targets, while the TC's with the periscope overtake the whole observation areas of their tanks. That is only possible if the whole platoon knows those landmarks. Imagine if that would be different for every tank ...

[@sniperkit8]

Deshalb wird versucht leicht an zu sprechende dings zu vermeiden 😊😅

[@9thbloodandfire508]

@@sniperkit8 Von dem was man so sieht, denkst Du, dass potentielle Gegner das machen respektive, dass sie was ansprechen? Aber ja, hast Du freilich recht.

[@LafayetteCCurtis]

The Chieftain made a video on this a couple of years ago and he mentioned that the Abrams' FCS allows the gunner to pick the average in addition the the first or last return. And there's always the option of manual typing/dialling as you brought up in the video.

[@neurofiedyamato8763]

Yep instantly thought about that video. But a lot of tanks seem to only have first and last return, not average

[@wdk_gmw]

sadly mid echo is barely reliable

[@worldoftancraft]

The same with 1a33 FCS of t-64/80. The first return, the second and the third. There's a knob for selecting the one

[@kenbb99]

Tobias is a great resource, we are lucky to have him on these videos. Thank you Tobias!

[@UncleJoeLITE]

Yeah, thanks Tobias.

[@MBkufel]

In the M60 TTS, there was an option to choose between the first, the second and the last. This is however nothing in comparison to the Polish Merida FCS which stored first TEN returns. It also had gating (you guesstimate a range, the returns that are more than 100 metres short of that or more than 200 metres long are discarded) and some ways to input lead without rotating the turret. It wasn't a very good system XD

[@emersonmsd]

I was a Chieftain gunner. Yes we had options first/last and soke or fog could put it off, but let me ask how many targets did you ever miss because of bad rangefinding? I bet not many. Better than estimation and bracketing any way.

[@sbreheny]

Even modern civilian laser rangefinders for rifle shooting offer the ability to select from different echos. I have a relatively inexpensive one and it allows first, last, or strongest.

[@markus1351]

yeah but this is 30 year old stuff

[@Mr79dream]

@@markus1351 almost 50 actually, however, the option to select the echo came with the A5, up to A4 you had only one function. If I remember well, 1st echo, the engement butto was movebale in both ways already, though. In the edn it is al made after keep it simple stupid, so that you can use all in the heat of battle.

[@michaelguerin56]

@@markus1351It can take a while to scale down technology. Piezoelectric transducers were available to measure breech pressure in guns, back in the 1940s BUT it was not until the mid-1960s that the Remington Arms Company and Winchester started measuring breech pressures in small arms with piezoelectric pressure testing equipment. Remington quickly reduced the pressure specifications for the 7mm Remington Magnum and Winchester did the same with the .243 Winchester as the respective companies recorded higher than acceptable peak pressures for those chamberings. The old copper slug technology for high pressure rounds only provides a single data point i.e., a measurement of slug compression, for each shot. Interestingly, Barnes Cartridges of the World continued to show the old data for both cartridges, in successive editions, possibly endangering readers of that publication.

[@kukipett]

Yes they are actually talking about very old technology, modern laser rangefinder don't have such a poor focus.

[@sbreheny]

@@kukipett the ones on tanks probably do have a tighter focus but the "cone" on my cheap commercial one is still definitely an issue. It can range out to almost 2 miles and the spot size seems to be about 50 meters wide at that distance. Even at much closer distances, since it is used for hunting, there is often the issue of foliage getting in the way so the ability to select the specific echo is very useful.

[@ERIK-457]

I think we need optical rangefinders once again (as a secondary rangefinder), just of course with nowadays technology would be almost just like a slower but more precise and hidden laser rangefinder

[@davidgoodnow269]

It's very important, these days, because laser warning detectors exist, however, optical rangefinding installations now are far less capable than those used in the 1960s!

[@brennus57]

Thanks! I feel like a portion of my ignorance has been diminished.

[@toshisan200]

war thunder mentioned yaaaaaaaaayyyy 1:10

[@stalkingtiger777]

In the U.S. Army the terrain, range and major feature map was called a range card. You also draw assigned fields of fire for the whole platoon/company.

[@depleteduraniumcowboy3516]

In the US Army armored crewman training I went to we called them range cards.

[@davehopkin9502]

Same in the British Army

[@dukeofwar1003]

Terraintaufe has a really long and rich history. If you look at german documents of Stalingrad from WW2 for example, you may find names such as "Das Gelbe Haus" = "The yellow house" or "L-förmiges Haus" = "L-shaped house" or "Pavlov's Haus" And yes, rather unserious names are often picked as they are way more easily memorized and can be way more distinctive than broad discriptors. For example: "Kleiner Schuppen mit grauem Wellblechdach" vs "Nilpferdgrill" transl.: "Small shed with grey currogated iron roof" vs "Rhino-bbq" These nicknames are also often far shorter and thus easier and faster recognizable, espescially on comms. This practice has also found its way into fast-pace shooters like Counter Strike, where players named specific parts of maps such as "Ramp" or "boiler"

[@djd8305]

Excellent insight into gunner skills

[@Thane36425]

I was just reading "Into the Storm" by Tom Clancy, about the 1991 Persian Gulf War. A few times they mentioned problems with the laser rangefinders. Much of the time during the ground war it was raining heavily and windy, yet still there was much dust in the air. Thermals could see through it, but the lasers were either cut short at longer ranges or the results were so scattered they were often not directly useful. It said that they often had to take many rangings and use an average to enter into the computer, or make a guess based on the size of the target on thermal and enter that range. Even so, they were making hits over 2000 meters and a few at over 3000. It didn't directly note how many shots per hit, but based on ammo consumption later it wasn't always one shot one kill.

[@johnm9002]

I was an M1A1 gunner during ODS. I was assigned to a tank battalion in the First Armored Division. The statement about the laser range finders having problems was not true. The issues were more with the thermal sights acquiring targets through the heavy rains particularly in the late morning and early afternoon of 27 February during the battle of Medina Ridge. The 2nd Brigade of 1AD, depending on the battalion, had engagements from 1200 out to 3000 meters. As far as not being one shot one kill, it was more of a case of two or even three rounds being fired at the same Iraqi tanks or armored vehicles. I personally witnessed this happening several times through my gunner’s primary sight.

[@robertkalinic335]

Doesn't Tom Clancy write cliche action stories for videogames?

[@Thane36425]

@@robertkalinic335 He used to write good military fiction and non-fiction. A lot of that later stuff was witten by other people under his brand.

[@KJAkk]

@@robertkalinic335 "Into the Storm" is one of his nonfiction books written with Fred Franks the CO of VII Corp during ODS.

[@AllisterCaine]

​@@robertkalinic335he wrote some of the best and accurate scenarios ever. Some things he wrote about were top secret at the time his book came out.

[@JUNIsLuke]

This was very interesting thank you!!

[@xxxlonewolf49]

Yep. It made ranging things weird at times, never mind if you are ranging through trees. LRFs, even hand helds, have settings for First/Last return.

[@Huwbacca]

Yeah that tree is called spread legs.... But yeah same for infantry. If you're in terrain, squad leader will set reference points. Then we have things like "3 knuckles left of spread legs"

[@neurofiedyamato8763]

LMAO spread legs.

[@michaelguerin56]

Thank you Bernhard and Tobias.

[@xxxlonewolf49]

Most modern tanks have LRF warning systems & good ones can auto slue the turret & aim with the press of a button. Hence why ATGM sights have both laser & the bracket sight options still.

[@ThePlayerOfGames]

👍🏼 but also *slew

[@MishaAmashukeli]

Very interesting. Some questions: 1. Why not use a tighter laser beam? I understand that there are physical limits but it should definitely be possible for the beam to be much smaller than a tank(at distances where shooting at the tank is possible). 2. There are time-fused shells that are supposed to explode in the air over trenches(by measuring the distance and programming the shells to explode at just the right time). If the range-finder beams are so wide, how would you measure the distance that precisely? I guess it's accepted that the first round may not hit directly over the trench?

[@neiloflongbeck5705]

1. Light spreads outing an inverse square relationship - doubling the distance means the beam covers four times the area. 2. Practice.

[@seanmalloy7249]

The inverse-square law only applies for spherical emitters. Lasers, like all EM beam emitters, are subject to divergence, typically measured in milliradians, and for optimized designs have a theoretical minimum divergence proportional to its frequency and inversely proportional to the beam's minimum diameter. Both of these parameters face physical restrictions limiting how much they can be altered. For example, shorter wavelengths of light are more strongly scattered by the atmosphere (this is why the sky appears blue during the day) so longer-wavelength lasers are less affected by atmospheric conditions, but will have a larger dispersion.

[@neiloflongbeck5705]

@seanmalloy7249 citation needed, because so far I can't see one source supporting this.

[@LafayetteCCurtis]

Tightening the beam doesn't always work since weather conditions can always mess with it downrange. It would also require more complicated optics that would be more expensive, more difficult to harden against the shocks of travel and firing, and absorbs more of the laser's energy as heat within the system (thus requiring the laser itself to be more powerful and to have a bigger heat sink). At some point it's no longer compact enough to have an advantage over an optical rangefinder.

[@ThePlayerOfGames]

​@@neiloflongbeck5705 inverse square law affects the beam *strength* not divergence because if inverse square affected divergence then the beam edges would curve towards the target with distance. A beam is affected by power loss, divergence, scatter, emitter ramp, power jitter, and collimation to name a few The static effects are divergence and scatter (dependent on what is in the air for scatter) Divergence is countered by a longer lens chain including a longer laser chamber, thicker and more chained lenses can greatly reduce the cone to a line but the trade-off is size, weight, maintainability, and manufacturing. Fresnel lenses can reduce the length and weight but the trade-off is manufacturing and lens life. Scatter is affected by anything suspended in the air such as smoke, dust, and water As the beam leaves the laser chamber it is a small range of wavelengths, it's not perfect but it's pretty damn good, ramp up is the effect of the laser still normalising in the nominal zone where some lower frequency emissions begin to leave, if the lens chain isn't sufficient you'll encounter wider divergence that narrows as the beam stabilises. longer ramp up is a cheaper laser, normally it's miniscule but it does exist. Power jitter is electrical fluctuations to the anode and cathode due to power delivery, this affects intensity and can spread the emitted wavelengths a little which affects divergence and strength. This can be countered with more expensive power delivery systems or chemical lasers which have a finite number of uses. Suffice to say, this is the whistle stop tour of a much more complex subject

[@UncleJoeLITE]

Tbh I didn't know enough about it to get it wrong Bernhard! Thanks for the info. 🇦🇺

[@wernerviehhauser94]

Pen and Paper are still deadly tools :-)

[@antonisashitteragain6993]

The laser warning thingy could go wild if the tank is near a techno festival?

[@neurofiedyamato8763]

They look for specific signatures I believe. And can be turned off or ignored.

[@Laotzu.Goldbug]

They are almost always tuned to detect infrared lasers and not visible ones, since almost no modern battlefield equipment uses visible lasers. they also distinguish between intensity frequency and so on, and even though the kinds of lasers you see at a techno festival may look similar, those characteristics are going to be greatly different on military lasers.

[@klobiforpresident2254]

Think about it this way, if you have an LWS that can automatically turn the turret in the appropriate direction your tank will essentially head bang automatically.

[@antonisashitteragain6993]

@@klobiforpresident2254 kek

[@nuhuhbruhbruh]

I wonder if it would it be a viable tactic to use the rangefinder on a spot close enough to the target but keeping it outside of the laser "cone" so that it doesn't trigger their warning systems. Or are these systems so sensitive that they could still pick up "echoes" even if the beam isn't directly on them?

[@jintsuubest9331]

Probably not. Lws didn't sound off when the vehicle doing the ranging received the return. It follows that if the come did not hit the lws receiver, the alarm will not be sound.

[@LafayetteCCurtis]

At the kind of ranges where one really needs to use a rangefinder, the laser cone is big enough that offsetting it far enough from the target to avoid detection probably means getting an inaccurate reading to begin with. It's possible in more specific situations like when there's a building roughly the same distance away -- one can conceivably lase the building, slew to the target, then fire. But that relies on the gunner's intuitive guess (that the building and the target are at the same range) being right, and there's no guarantee of that.

[@LafayetteCCurtis]

(Note that the video also mentions lasing terrain features _beforehand_ -- while the enemy isn't around -- to get TRPs while preparing a defensive position. This is extremely common and the infantry also does this if they have any rangefinders at all. Also less likely to lead to a spurious reading since there'd be patrols ground-truthing the range readings by getting reciprocal ones to the friendly position if there's time and spare personnel for it.)

[@neurofiedyamato8763]

@@LafayetteCCurtis You can aim the cone right below the target tank and use last return. Since the top of the cone is where the target's tracks/wheel is on top of, the last return will be where the target is. APFSDS have very little drop, so even just 100m error is enough to hit.

[@LafayetteCCurtis]

@@neurofiedyamato8763 In that situation there might still be enough scattered reflections from the ground ahead for the tank’s LWS system to catch them. Lasing the ground is generally not a good idea to begin with since most of the reflections are likely to scatter forwards rather than back towards the rangefinder, and the target tank is going to be a good deal closer to the origin of the reflection than the rangefinder (read: there might be enough energy going forwards for the LWS to detect but not enough returning backwards for the rangefinder to get a good reading).

[@radosaworman7628]

on the question of taking the avereage of two readings - that was moust important pet peev of polish crews of leo2a4 which lead to development of Leo2pl and next gen of polish FCS which we can find on IFV's with ZSSW-30 unmaned turret.

[@Lee-jy7jz]

A more realistic LRF would make War Thunder top tier more fun

[@HolyPire]

Gunner on a Leopard 2 A5 here: nobody talks about all the blind wild animals at all the military training grounds ..

[@9thbloodandfire508]

Doesn't really matter, because they can't really hear you if you talk about them. They are deaf as well ... ;)

[@SlinkyTWF]

"Gunner! HEP! Deer! Traverse left!" -- Sgt. Hightower, 1980, IIRC.

[@stupidburp]

Wouldn’t eye safe lasers be prudent?

[@JaCKal_646f67]

finally no more sikret dokuments needed

[@monostripezebras]

So, what you are saying is that sharks with laserbeams attached to their head are more usefull as a close in weapon system?

[@SilverStarHeggisist]

Meanwhile, at least my civilian laser range finder produces a tight narrow beam as far as my night vision can see it.

[@tedarcher9120]

T-72 fcs also has a 1-2-3 echo switch

[@carmatic]

so this got me thinking, what if you can draw a radial plot of the furthest terrain by going 360 degrees with your laser rangefinder... then upload this plot to some kind of combat intelligence network... if the positions of the tanks are known i.e. by GPS, these plots can be olverlaid on a map to give a 'fog of war' which can find blind spots, or maybe to triangulate enemy positions when more than one tank has a line of sight

[@whya2ndaccount]

Let me guess "first return" vs "last return", etc. "Everyone" obviously means people without a clue? Good call out for Steel Beasts Pro PE. Nothing wrong with using a map or LRF to develop a Range Card.

[@neurofiedyamato8763]

Can you laser rangefinder the ground directly in front of the target to get a close enough range and not trigger the laser warning receivers? Not sure how sensitive the receivers are. EDIT: I guess they do it before the enemy gets there.

[@giorginakashidze8797]

Would be very nice if you make video how tanks fire co trol system works, how to aim? How FCS puts values by itself and how gunner puts values manually, thanks.

[@TimGen738]

Look up The Chieftan's "Switchology" videos. Long form, but they have the info you're looking for and give you a chance to compare and contrast various (older) systems.

[@giorginakashidze8797]

@@TimGen738 thanks mate👍🏻

[@lieschenmuller2391]

Next Time: Hosenstall zu! ;)

[@madeingermany9445]

1:17 i thought about war thunder too. they lied to us with the thing

[@thiemokellner1893]

Thanks. Interesting. Funny, why is it called laser then? I mean, from what I remember at university, it is sort of all about preventing the cone in laser technology. But, nowadays everything is a laser if it emits some kind of em waves. I always was wondering how the laser warners could detect a beam of only some fraction of millimeters in diameter. But now it becomes clear. And now I am wondering why the laser range finders are not actual lasers? And now, I am wondering whether one could drive tanks crazy by using sort of wild live photo traps but instead of taking pics several distributed devices emit the "laser" triggering the detector.

[@thepirate6211]

Ok, that was new to me. I used a LRF when i was a platoon comander with 3 carl gustavs... Why is that rangefinder different? Closest one i gues i used was the GSV5.

[@RonJohn63]

7:20 Isn't this the same as defensive artillery "laying in" known distances to various terrain features?

[@anselmdanker9519]

😊

[@drmarkintexas-400]

🎖️🏆⭐🙏❤️‍🩹 Thank you for sharing this

[@littlehills739]

so fire count out to 5 laser atgm ?

Great. Now I need to buy gunner contros for steelbeast Pro :) Nice Video. I wonder if this is corretly simulated in steelbeast

[@MDFeingold]

Late reply, but, yes, on the M1 and Leo FCS (and undoubtedly many other modeled vehicles) you can choose between first and last return from the LRF.

@@MDFeingold thx

[@edi9892]

Speaking of not giving away your position, how far can you range targets with the old system that didn't have a laser? (WWII bunny ears looking optics)

[@SilverStarHeggisist]

With the right set up, they've used it to range find stars

[@A_barrel]

Can lws differentiate between a cellphone laser range finder or a golf/hunter range finder?

[@Rokaize]

Where would someone buy one of those gunner controllers at?

[@Gravitatis]

why is there so much debate about these types of things? you'd think that discussion about military hardware would be pretty cut and dry

[@tsufordman]

I see this hunting. "That rabbit is 600 yard away" no that clump of trees behind the rabbit is 600 yards.

[@Laotzu.Goldbug]

Is there a reason why the laser can't generate a coherent pencil beam? is it just a question of technology or something else. because I know that with small arms lasers they can keep a slim beam out to a pretty decent distance

[@SilverStarHeggisist]

No idea, because my laser range finder generates a pencil beam. I can see it with my night vision

[@moxie_ST]

Thanks man for info on laser I was wondering how to get distance when you have lots of clutter around target and knowing how real laser look (cone) how do you know what distance is one you want to use to shoot at. All in all great video and great explain how stuff works 👍❤🎉

[@jintsuubest9331]

As cheiftan puts it, the one that looks about right. When they say "first return" and " last return", they dont mean, they dont mwan the first and the last pulse. Depends on the system it might be the average of the first 4 return and the average of the last 2 retuen. There are also system that deal with first, second, last. Then there are system (most of them) allow crew to set a gate. Say they pick 1500m +500m -100m. Point being gunner are still trained to eyeball the size of the target and make a rought guess how far the target is.

[@micumatrix]

❤

[@Duraltia]

Considering the distances some shots are being taken - How good are the Optics of Tanks these days? Are they ( and the Cannon ) good enough to be able to decide where you want to hit a Tank at ranges upwards of 1'500m or is this more along the lines of "Let's throw shit into the general direction and see what part of who knows what we'll hit"? 🤔🤨

[@9thbloodandfire508]

Former German platoon leader speaking. Given all ballistical parameters are right, the tank and its ammo have a remarkable low deviation. Somebody correct me if I am wrong, though the last time I saw a spreadsheat of the then new DM 53 APDSFS, it was below 0.2 mils. That said, training of gunners does not teach you to aim on certain points of targets. Depending on the various operating systems of your own tank, you aim center mass of the visible part of a target.

[@paint4r]

Very different from in War Thunder where you just press R on the keyboard

[@SilverStarHeggisist]

Or a handheld range finder

[@501Mobius]

What if ground troops had golf rangefinders? Could they be used to fool a tanks protection system?

[@ollep9142]

It would probably make those troops a target for said tank, so who's the fool?

[@jintsuubest9331]

​@@ollep9142 Before you knew it, at crew will go to their local home improvement store and buy some 7 inch pvc tubing, paint it army green, and set it up as a decoy with a lrf. The laser is pre aimed at a kill box (a section of a path for example). The crew sit on the opposite of killbox where the laser will pass through. When a target appears and cross the kill box, the crew turn on the decoy lrf. Lws get triggered. Tank turn the turret to face the decoy. Crew now has free shot at the rear of the turret or This is a simplified example. There are lots of thing the afv can do in response, just like the at crew can generate new counter to the counter. And back and forth, and back and forth.

[@jenskruse1475]

I still do not understand, that having amazing dataprocessing that a modern form of optical distance meassurement.

[@jintsuubest9331]

Lrf is has a much smaller overall package size than any comparable optical rf. Lrf gives a constant error, optical rf gives am increasing uncertainty as the distance gets further out. Then there is the environmental element. Smoke, fog, mirage, you name it. Lrf don't care about it, optical will. Maintenance and logistic. It is much easier to handle a single self contained module as opposed to multiple semi self contained module that has exposed lenses on both end. Lrf also provide lots of flexibility in the sense you can range pretty much everything. That being said, it is not impossible to use camera instead. There is still the problem of needing to deal with lenses but using camera eliminate the need of complex lense path. Using multiple different type of sensor in conjunctions can potentially reduce the error bar. I'm not exactly sure how ir and uv interacts with aforementioned natural and unnatural phenomenon, maybe they can help?

[@Keckegenkai]

Hosenstall is offen

[@T.efpunkt]

Wo guckst du denn hin? 😂

[@Keckegenkai]

@@T.efpunkt fällt halt auf :D

[@50043211]

See boyz and girls, video games are important to acquire the necessary skills to use the gear properly!

[@exploringtheplanetsn]

Makes me wonder considering gps and that digital maps exist, that a computer could calculate the distance to a target just using this information. For example the computer has a map uploaded and it knows we’re the tank is, when a target is presented or target location is input it calculates the distance. Simple in theory though not sure if it would or should replace laser range finding, having both would be good. But I can see for example where there is no landmark near enough or object that this would not work. This wouldn’t work in a desert unless you know the exact coordinates of a military vehicle and for this it’s needs to be standing still. Unless of course you can in real time update the coordinates quickly enough using what would likely be a UAV so that you could hit a moving target. But then again I don’t think this is in the realm of technical feasibility or even practical enough to bother with when you have laser range finding.

[@GrimReaper-sn1yc]

The problem with that idea is 1. How do you know the exact direction to the target you would have to have a camera with which the gunner aims at the target or some automated system like automated target recognition The thing is, these tanks are so old that back then, you couldn't fit enough data processing capability into a big room to do the recognition. Try and find something green hiding in a forest. 2. Find the range to the target that could be done by recognising what specific target you are targeting, and then from the known size and the apparent size you could calculate the distance. But again, not enough processing power is available back then. Or you could use a laser, and from the time difference from sending until receiving the reflection, you can calculate the distance. From these information you would get a vector wich you would add to your gps location wich would give you the location of the enemy from wich to fire you would have to calculate a vector to your target to fire at your target so using gps is just a waste

[@GrimReaper-sn1yc]

If we where to use landmarks 1. Someone has to know the area you are operating extremly well. i mean i could barely do this in a 2km 1.2 miles circle around my home. 2. Use computers to do the recognition. Again you would run into processing power limitation .

[@GrimReaper-sn1yc]

Using UAVs to get target data either by geting a complet fire solution or by just geting the gps data certainly works but that is a very new innovation. These UAVs are also basicaly nothing but flying a tank laser range finder and a camera to find the targets.

[@Pystro]

If I understand the idea correctly, it is to use your know GPS position, measure the azimuth and elevation to the target, and map knowledge about which piece of terrain in that azimuth direction is at that elevation angle to determine the range? That should work _in theory._ However, there's 4 problems, all related to accuracy (list below). The Tl;Dr is that there's too many situations where the system is unusable, so you couldn't drop the laser rangefinder anyways. But it should work pretty well as a replacement for laser rangefinders in UAVs. As long as you're measuring an elevation angle that's steeper than 45° downwards you don't really need to worry about any of the below problems. All you really need (in addition to the drone GPS) is a compass and a sensor for "true" elevation angle on the drone camera. And the ground station (or the artillery crew's computer) can do the calculations. 1: You need to aim the crosshair at a point on the target that is a known height off the ground. If the system expects to be aimed at the bottom of the tracks/feet for the calculation, and you aim it at the top of the turret, then you'll hit the terrain that's just about obscured by the turret. If conversely, the system expects to be aimed at the top of the turret and you aim it at the bottom of the tracks, then you'll hit the point where a target would need to stand to just about obscure the bottom of the tracks. These differences will be horrific in flat plains (unless you can aim down onto the plain). 2: You actually _need_ the ability to calculate ranges from at all kinds of points on the target; From a prone soldier to the top of a Bradley that's just cresting over a hill. That would necessitate you to define what kind of point (specifically which elevation above ground) you're aiming at. Something like "top of tracks/ bottom of turret, T-55" or "bottom of track skirts, T-90/T-90A&T-90S" versus "bottom of track skirt, T-90M/T-90MS", or "top of wheel, unknown military grade truck". 0: (Not a problem) Your own elevation needs to be known quite accurately. Possibly even more accurately than the GPS can provide it. Luckily the system comes with a terrain elevation map, where you can look up your elevation if you know your GPS position accurately enough in 2d. 3: Terrain can shift over time. Luckily erosion tends to only be strong on the side of hills where the system would be less sensitive to errors in terrain elevation. But subsidence exists and may or may not affect the flat parts of the region you're operating in. And finally, war tends to come with quite heavy man-made terrain modifications. Both intentionally with the digging of fortifications, and as a side effect of artillery shelling and bombing. 4: You need to know the azimuth & elevation relative to the earth reference frame, not relative to your vehicle. Azimuth relies heavily on your compass being accurate, and it can be affected by large concentrations of iron, like in that tank right next to yours. And accurate elevation angle readings are only really possible while the vehicle is stationary. On the move you _could_ very well rely on gyroscopic sensors to "remember" the last stationary elevation angle measurement, but that's another component that needs to be included in the system.

[@robertkalinic335]

Dont u already have maps of pretty much everything? Cant those be used to give you immediate rough clue of how far is something without drawing your own map with range measurements?

[@Masada1911]

Not that specific and localised.

[@ethanmckinney203]

It's more like painting a picture of the scene in front of you and marking the range of things that you can see. Mentally translating a map or aerial photo to a ground-level view is _hard_.

[@JGCR59]

Today they probably use Drachenlord terms :P

[@kimjanek646]

It’s 2024. Can’t we have more accurate lasers than from the 80s? 😵‍💫

[@HibikiKano]

We have more accurate lazers, but you will still have a cone. This cone is wanted because you get so much more info in the return signal, and far more resistant to corruption than with a narrower beam. Imagine something disturbs the narrow beam like soke smoke, heat waving in the air and there is have no return signal or only a highly corrupted one. With a wider cone most of those can be filtered out and it still results in a fully accurate measurement. I guess that the reason they allow only first and last echo is so it does not overwork the crew. Fidling with a signal return like that on every shot would take more time and might overload the gunner in what is already a very complex operation. Also increasing the lazering time of the target, instead of a short "blip" it would be a spotloght. Maybe with newer machine learning algorithms the tank may allow it's own quick signal analysis giving the option to pick the targets it identified in the echos. But there are many buts there. A: how reliable is the system, is it more reliable than having just the most usefull two returns and a skilled gunner. B: how much more power will the system need in an already power hungry machine and can the tank supply enough electricity for a bank of GPUs on top of everything else. C: It is better than a skilled gunner in the current setup, and is that money, space and power consumption better spent on other systems.

[@neurofiedyamato8763]

@@HibikiKano No, we get a cone because that's just how physics work. You can never have a perfectly parallel beam of light due to diffraction. You can only try to get a narrower and narrower cone but never parallel. Besides that, first and last return is essentially the default options because it's easy to count for. You aim the target at the top edge of the cone and select last return. Bottom edge for first return. You pick between the two depending on what is around the target. It is easier to tell if the laze is accurate or not since you know the top edge(aimed at target) will always be last return as the lower edge would be targeted at the ground in front etc. Having something in between is harder for the operator to determine the reliability. Imagine if it's the 7th return. Like is that from the middle of the cone? upper 1/3rd? 2/3rds down? Like where is that return from? Hard to tell, but we have a much better idea where the first and last are (the edges usually but not always) Sometimes first and last are actually averaging the first/last 2 or 5 returns. When that isn't enough due to clutter, there might be an option for the average of all except outliers. etc. There is some with an option for the strongest return. Different systems have slightly different options and aren't as standardized but it is meant to cover the rare situations where first and last return isn't good for. If all else fails, stadiametric sights are still common as back up. When even that fails, while we don't use coincidence or stereoscopics any more, if you are really desperate, you can use the gunner's sight and commander's sight to triangulate. But at that point, guesstimating might be more effective or default to the battlesight zero.

[@HibikiKano]

@@neurofiedyamato8763 You may correct me if you think I'm wrong, but i feel certain enough about it to blurt this out. A good laser behaves like a Gaussian beam, whose divergence can be calculated by \theta=\frac{\lambda}{\pi w_0} with lambda being the wavelength and w_0 the beam width at it's narrowest. If we take a collimated beam of 1mm width at infrared 808nm, and then use that \lambda with some trigonometry to calculate the beam width at 8000km (as far as these things usually go), we get a beam width at the target of 2,06m. And we can push this further, lets say we spend more on optics because a tank could handle the weight and is worth the cost, lets make it a 1cm wide collimated beam, that would narrow the beam width at 8km to 0,2m. Yea sure you can argue that its a very basic equation and more factors ruin it, but as a test using it to calculate the lunar rangefinder project with the beam they use it gives a beam width on the lunar surface of just under 5km width, while the real beam width on the lunar surface is just a bit over 6km. So roughly 20% off, which is good enough to argue on the internet with. We CAN make a narrower beam, if we wanted it. But wider beams absorb air noise. I suggest you read up on the theory of measurement and noise cancellation.

[@seno5530]

I prefer the term "Laser Range Finder Finder" kappa

[@196cupcake]

I can only guess, but I'd assume it would be possible to have a different asset - like a drone - do the laser range finding, know where it is, know where the tank is, and then automatically do the math to give the tank the information it needs to take a shot.

[@shi01]

Actually if the drone knows exacly it's own position and has an accurate system to measure the angle the camera is looking, you wouldn't even need a laser anymore. It would be possible to calculate fairly accurately where the drone is looking at. That's actually already done with targeting pods attached to fighter planes. The aircraft knows where it is very accurately which also means the targeting pod knows its own position. Now many figher jets with the latest avionics can have a rolling map on a Display. If everything works you can see an indicator on the map when the targeting pod is active that shows the pilot at which area the targeting pod is looking at the moment. You can do exactly the same with drone.

[@philstaples8122]

Tankies don't get it wrong, they know how it works ( Tankies - British Army Tank Crew ) they know how ir works you get trained on that in your basic gunnery course.

[@outofturn331]

If everyone got wrong, noone hit anything 😉

[@BohumilKoutsky]

Maybe next time place the camera closer to the actual device you are talking about. Making it "Not Visualized" this much sucks.

[@myparceltape1169]

How about a mobile phone camera that can recognise which tank it is pointed at and has a database of views. Once launched it would not need any further instructions if the tank moved. It has a picture and will follow the real thing till they meet.. It had been launched away from the soldiers who had brought it to battle. They are safe to send off the next one when it sees a target.

[@itsmebatman]

This sounds like the laser used in the Leo2 is ancient and terrible. I'm sure more modern system have a beam tight enough to be able to be pointed on a large vehicle like a tank without giving erroneous echos from stuff in front of behind the the target.They had like 50+ years to refine it.

[@SilverStarHeggisist]

My civilian laser is a pin point range finder

[@importantname]

Everyone except the people who already know. And I cant believe that some things in computer games are not like real life, even though they advertise the game to be just like real life. Heading should be things people who play military based computer games dont know about in real life military knowledge. But you try to argue with a Gaming General :)

[@neurofiedyamato8763]

Anyone who play sim games know. As for those who play arcade games like WT and WoT, not all but quite a number of people do know. Everyone else outside of that who isn't in the military or used a LRF before likely wouldn't know. People who play games like WT are usually nerds so they are more likely to know than most.

[@TheEvil909295]

Then why isn't an optical rangefinder installed as a back-up in modern tanks?

[@fonesrphunny7242]

Laser is faster, generally more accurate and works at night. If you're dealing with backscatter, you can adjust which reflections the range finder uses. If everything fails, you still got scales inside the scope to estimate distance. Most importantly: if you get hit right in the laser range finder, you probably got other things to worry about.

[@jintsuubest9331]

Because thats 2 additional large optics complex to be installed on the vehicle with addition holes to cut and complex eye pieces path to be fitted for both the commander and gunner. Now, it is possible to develop a system that uses camera sensor and digitally present the relevent informarion to the crew. The german tried it in the 1970s. It works fairly well and emits no signsture when ranging. But they decided that lrf is simply less hassle for everyone involved.

[@unstoppabletigertalukan6710]

European pronouniciation of leopard is my pet peeve

[@thurbine2411]

Why do the Germans use a standard range if 1500m for their sight? Any former German leo 2 gunner?

[@ollep9142]

The APFSDS trajectory is flat enough to hit tank size targets within a deep bracket (at "close" range), so any tank within a couple of hundred meters of the pre-set range will be hit if you aim right at it. What range is set as "battlesight" varies between nations and tank models. Possibly also wit the expected engagement ranges. In the mentioned simulator Steel Beasts it used to be that Abrams (A1 and A2 version) tanks had a battlesight range of 1,200 m while Leopard 2 (various A4 and A5 versions) had a range of 1,000 m. The drill is that when you suddenly encounter an enemy that (by its size in the gun sight) is "close" you smash the Battlesight button, aim on center of mass and fire.

[@thurbine2411]

@@ollep9142 yeah I know why you have battlesights but I was wondering if someone could tell me why the Germans went for 1500. At 1500 they will miss targets at some ranges between 0 and 1500 so was wondering about what ranges it is made for as the 1500 is just what the computer will take aim for while you will hit both closer and beyond for at least a few hundred m depending on the battlesight

[@ollep9142]

@@thurbine2411 My guess is that it's a) only for the newer models with the longer gun barrel, and b) based on experience that the very short ranges (2 km. The latter will of course vary depending on the terrain in the area of conflict.

[@geodkyt]

​@@ollep9142Keep in mind that you can pretty much tell that an engagement is "super close" (and 500m is basically the equivalent of a handgun fight range to a modern Western tank. And not only do you know your kinetic rounds will be at pretty.mucj their max performance at such close range, it's fairly easy to manually hold a skosh low, just like you would with a rifle in CQB when your sights are zeroed for several hundred meters. That's what a battlesight is - the sight setting that will cover the widest range of *likely* engagement ranges with a center of mass hold, with the understanding that at the edges, you'll have to hold off if using battlesight.

[@thurbine2411]

@@ollep9142 yeah I also think the terrain part is the most probable. It isn’t only for the l55 guns. The 2a5 has the option and I think the 2a4 as well but spent much time in one so can’t remember

[@tedarcher9120]

Russian lwr are funny because they only work againt other soviet lasers, not nato lasers

[@osmacar5331]

This video highlights a note. Military tech is just overpriced, under built, and easy to make.

[@clarkbutler]

There is no room for political correctness in war ,unless you want to lose