The German defense giant Rheinmetall just revealed new footage of its Skyranger 35, a highly capable 35mm AAA turret mounted on a Leopard 1 chassis. Ukraine is expected to receive a number of these units, with significant interoperability with the country’s Leopard 1A5 fleet.
Those patriots will run out and are quite expensive and this system would be great to at least save some patriots.
The system was announced in mid 2024 and still haben heard of it being deployed… Rheinmetall vaporware ?
Great news
This is *very* interesting
This turns the fleet of 200 Leopard 1s into a potential fleet of 200 SPAAGs… as soon as the Skyranger Turrets arrive. Considering that drones are one the biggest threats to tanks and armored vehicles, such a fleet would maybe makes armored assaults viable again, even without air superiority
The gun…an SWIZZ Oerlikon 35. What about ammunition? Still an issue due to the SwiZZ-RuZZian connection? Never trust a traitor country…
Ukraine should demount all the old Leo1 turrets an replace them with this.
Hope it’s actually cheap and the can make lots of them but by knowing it’s German it’s probably gonna still be very expensive even if they put it on old leo chassis and they probably gonna make like 5 of them in one year…. But I hope I’m wrong
Only a very limited amount need a tracked vehicle. A truck would be just as good in de majority of the cases. But still: impressive
Give it to Ukraine as soon as possible. It will literally save lives
It uses shrapnel shells? I mean, ones that explode after certain programmable time.
It’s logical that we go back to AA guns and the Gerrard has proved it’s even more relevant than when it was made.
But for me the key solution we are lacking is this capability to be shrunk and light enough to add to existing tanks and other military vehicles and bunkers.
The Challenger 3 is comming with the Rafael Trophy solution but weighs nearly a ton. Although useful against other threats, drone defenses due to the nature of drones need to be spread out, numerous and therefore light.
Gepard has a twin 35mm canon that’s overkill for most of these threats, but useful for higher altitude targets and providing area cover.
So the missing part is portable local protection, a system with turret weighing well under 0.5T that can be added to most vehicles and maybe 1 to 2km effective range.
Firing individual rounds rather than bursts also cuts mass and reduces cost. In interviews with Leopard 2 commanders in Ukraine, they get over a dozen strikes from drones each, per mission.
So they all need these defenses.
Gepard guns could be updated to be lighter, such as using carbon wound barrels and other lightweight materials, electromechanical stabilisation, and perhaps programmed rounds along with penetrative rounds that it can switch between. Glide bombs have strong steel casings so knocking them out requires FSDS penetrator rounds.
Accuracy is improved by round velocity. Going up to and using discarding sabot allows very fast rounds, and these can be also be programmed to release tungsten penetrator rods or beads as this system uses.
The goal should be to get one shot one kill, so kill rates above 70% per shot. A fire control system only fires when the calculated aim is over the target. It’s basically a sniper rifle with gyro stabilisation.
This system can use smaller rounds at high velocity for accurately hitting targets inside the range of a Gepard, and at 1 to 2 km using programmed rounds it should be close to one shot per kill, but getting range out to 3km or to higher altitude, you need velocity and mass to get any accuracy and that’s a beefier system with a high rate of fire. That makes sense for a dedicated vehicle SPAAG. It should seek to cover what the smaller systems on your other vehicles can’t do. So 35mm may even be too small, and we might have to go up a lot. Naval guns could be adapted like the OTO Melara 76mm gun for AA purposes but also could be used to hit ground targets. Whilst rounds are much larger and heavier the idea would be to use less of them whilst being able to hit much higher targets to remove the eyes of the enemy. OTO Malara has looked at this with a concept vehicle DRACO that uses its naval gun for counter rocket-rtillery mortar role, but can use a round that airbursts and can fill a large area with shrapnel intended against soft naval targets but this looks ideal for drones at altitude as well.
Then I think the system still needs a line backer system, a more basic short range shot gun to clear anything that still sneaks through. Again the emphasis has to be on weight reduction so they can be added to existing vehicles. You also have to be able to hit vertically, as drones will attempt to exploit any gaps in coverage.
Ich bin uber gay for Rheinmetall
*slaps hood* You can fit so many Skyrangers on this baby
What I don’t get is when the target is a small and very delicate drone why not spray our with 9mm or 22 or something small, cheap and simple?
35mm to take down a tiny $1000 drone.. just dam
Well now I know what I need to go fuck hunting with.
This is the future of air defense with cheap interceptor drones that Ukraine makes
I’m afraid these are just homeopathic portions. The current production rate must be very, very low (there are no public figures). Series production will start in 2026+. Germany is not due to receive its 18 units until 2028(!). This is all much too slow!
Rheinmetall has been absolutely incredible throughout the war.
Looks great, even better if they come available in good quantities
They are not cheap though. Germany got them for 31 Mio € a piece.
And prosecution speed is slow.
However estimation is you’d need 200 to protect all of Germany.
In other words with, say, 50 you can protect a huge area against drone strikes.
Lol, if only US shipped the tech, they’d still lead arms production and earn shitton of money.. But no, they had to gauge the supply and now Europe ramps up it’s production.
Time to invest into Rheinmetall.
I mean… I know it says AAA, but I kinda wouldn’t want to be in front of it either…
Looks like an amazing piece of kit.
That Leopard is fire, Putin forces terrified.
Let’s help Ukraine buy hundreds and hundreds of these. We, you and I, don’t have to depend on the former United States, wait for the EU to take action, or anyone else. You and I can help directly fund Ukraine’s urgent defense by donating directly to Ukraine’s armed forces right now at [https://u24.gov.ua/](https://u24.gov.ua/)
Canada and Mexico should have some too
Rheinmetall sounds so metal!
Hell yeah.
Could you imagine that the US pulls all its 1980’s weapons but then Ukraine ends up getting Europe’s top of the line stuff instead? Would be a huge play that Putin would end up regretting dearly
Anything that can fuck Ruzzia up gets my vote, money, and support.
Hehe. Germans make the best armour. Rolled homogenous ++
31 comments
Cheap and accurate RuZ drone destroyer.
If only they could do the same for RuZ missiles.
The question is when ????
Those patriots will run out and are quite expensive and this system would be great to at least save some patriots.
The system was announced in mid 2024 and still haben heard of it being deployed… Rheinmetall vaporware ?
Great news
This is *very* interesting
This turns the fleet of 200 Leopard 1s into a potential fleet of 200 SPAAGs… as soon as the Skyranger Turrets arrive. Considering that drones are one the biggest threats to tanks and armored vehicles, such a fleet would maybe makes armored assaults viable again, even without air superiority
The gun…an SWIZZ Oerlikon 35. What about ammunition? Still an issue due to the SwiZZ-RuZZian connection? Never trust a traitor country…
Ukraine should demount all the old Leo1 turrets an replace them with this.
Hope it’s actually cheap and the can make lots of them but by knowing it’s German it’s probably gonna still be very expensive even if they put it on old leo chassis and they probably gonna make like 5 of them in one year…. But I hope I’m wrong
Only a very limited amount need a tracked vehicle. A truck would be just as good in de majority of the cases. But still: impressive
Give it to Ukraine as soon as possible. It will literally save lives
It uses shrapnel shells? I mean, ones that explode after certain programmable time.
It’s logical that we go back to AA guns and the Gerrard has proved it’s even more relevant than when it was made.
But for me the key solution we are lacking is this capability to be shrunk and light enough to add to existing tanks and other military vehicles and bunkers.
The Challenger 3 is comming with the Rafael Trophy solution but weighs nearly a ton. Although useful against other threats, drone defenses due to the nature of drones need to be spread out, numerous and therefore light.
Gepard has a twin 35mm canon that’s overkill for most of these threats, but useful for higher altitude targets and providing area cover.
So the missing part is portable local protection, a system with turret weighing well under 0.5T that can be added to most vehicles and maybe 1 to 2km effective range.
Firing individual rounds rather than bursts also cuts mass and reduces cost. In interviews with Leopard 2 commanders in Ukraine, they get over a dozen strikes from drones each, per mission.
So they all need these defenses.
Gepard guns could be updated to be lighter, such as using carbon wound barrels and other lightweight materials, electromechanical stabilisation, and perhaps programmed rounds along with penetrative rounds that it can switch between. Glide bombs have strong steel casings so knocking them out requires FSDS penetrator rounds.
Accuracy is improved by round velocity. Going up to and using discarding sabot allows very fast rounds, and these can be also be programmed to release tungsten penetrator rods or beads as this system uses.
The goal should be to get one shot one kill, so kill rates above 70% per shot. A fire control system only fires when the calculated aim is over the target. It’s basically a sniper rifle with gyro stabilisation.
This system can use smaller rounds at high velocity for accurately hitting targets inside the range of a Gepard, and at 1 to 2 km using programmed rounds it should be close to one shot per kill, but getting range out to 3km or to higher altitude, you need velocity and mass to get any accuracy and that’s a beefier system with a high rate of fire. That makes sense for a dedicated vehicle SPAAG. It should seek to cover what the smaller systems on your other vehicles can’t do. So 35mm may even be too small, and we might have to go up a lot. Naval guns could be adapted like the OTO Melara 76mm gun for AA purposes but also could be used to hit ground targets. Whilst rounds are much larger and heavier the idea would be to use less of them whilst being able to hit much higher targets to remove the eyes of the enemy. OTO Malara has looked at this with a concept vehicle DRACO that uses its naval gun for counter rocket-rtillery mortar role, but can use a round that airbursts and can fill a large area with shrapnel intended against soft naval targets but this looks ideal for drones at altitude as well.
Then I think the system still needs a line backer system, a more basic short range shot gun to clear anything that still sneaks through. Again the emphasis has to be on weight reduction so they can be added to existing vehicles. You also have to be able to hit vertically, as drones will attempt to exploit any gaps in coverage.
Ich bin uber gay for Rheinmetall
*slaps hood* You can fit so many Skyrangers on this baby
What I don’t get is when the target is a small and very delicate drone why not spray our with 9mm or 22 or something small, cheap and simple?
35mm to take down a tiny $1000 drone.. just dam
Well now I know what I need to go fuck hunting with.
This is the future of air defense with cheap interceptor drones that Ukraine makes
I’m afraid these are just homeopathic portions. The current production rate must be very, very low (there are no public figures). Series production will start in 2026+. Germany is not due to receive its 18 units until 2028(!). This is all much too slow!
Rheinmetall has been absolutely incredible throughout the war.
Looks great, even better if they come available in good quantities
They are not cheap though. Germany got them for 31 Mio € a piece.
And prosecution speed is slow.
However estimation is you’d need 200 to protect all of Germany.
In other words with, say, 50 you can protect a huge area against drone strikes.
Lol, if only US shipped the tech, they’d still lead arms production and earn shitton of money.. But no, they had to gauge the supply and now Europe ramps up it’s production.
Time to invest into Rheinmetall.
I mean… I know it says AAA, but I kinda wouldn’t want to be in front of it either…
Looks like an amazing piece of kit.
That Leopard is fire, Putin forces terrified.
Let’s help Ukraine buy hundreds and hundreds of these. We, you and I, don’t have to depend on the former United States, wait for the EU to take action, or anyone else. You and I can help directly fund Ukraine’s urgent defense by donating directly to Ukraine’s armed forces right now at [https://u24.gov.ua/](https://u24.gov.ua/)
Canada and Mexico should have some too
Rheinmetall sounds so metal!
Hell yeah.
Could you imagine that the US pulls all its 1980’s weapons but then Ukraine ends up getting Europe’s top of the line stuff instead? Would be a huge play that Putin would end up regretting dearly
Anything that can fuck Ruzzia up gets my vote, money, and support.
Hehe. Germans make the best armour. Rolled homogenous ++
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