The ongoing conflicts in Syria and Iraq have produced a number of unusual armored vehicles. These range from manufactured armor upgrades for main battle tanks to one of a kind homemade armored bulldozers. We scoured a few internet forums and gathered up some of the more interesting photos into the gallery below. Most of these photos came from here and here.
This first gallery is of tanks and AFVs with different types of add-on armor attached. Some of these are the result of actual government programs, some are obviously “in the field” expedients.
Slat and chain armor for T-72
T-72
T-72
T-72
Syrian T-72 tanks with slat armor
T-62 with sandbags
T-62
T-62
T-55
T-62 with unusual armor (old shell casings?)
T-55 protected by slat armor and poster of Assad
T-55
T-55
T-55 with shells stored under slat armor. This seems like a bad idea to us.
T-55
T-55
BMP with tire/sandbag “armor”
BMP-1
M113 APC with ZU-23-2 mounted on top
MT-LB with add-on armor
This next gallery of is of oddball vehicles converted into AFVs.
The German Army is to get a further 131 ARTEC Boxer 8×8 armoured personnel carriers (APCs) under a EUR476 million (USD516.4 million) contract placed on 18 December. The Bundeswehr already has 272 Boxer vehicles on order, with the new order bringing this total to 403. In a statement, the ARTEC consortium said that all 131 vehicles will be in a new configuration of the armoured personnel carrier (Gepanzertes Transportfahrzeug).
The Iraqi Ministry of Defence (MoD) announced on 16 December that it had received a consignment of tanks, armoured vehicles, and ammunition from Bulgaria. It provided no further details. The announcement came after photographs began circulating on social media showing a T-72 tank and as many as 12 BMP-1 infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs) that had purportedly been delivered to Iraq.
Denmark has ordered 309 Piranha 5 8×8 armoured personnel carriers (APCs) from General Dynamic European Land Systems (GDELS) – MOWAG, it has been announced. Signed on 11 December, the order is worth DKK4.5 billion (USD650 million) and comes after the selection of the 8×8 by Denmark in April.
Turkish armored vehicle manufacturer Otokar won a contract from the Turkish government to supply an unspecified number of vehicles to the Turkish military, the company announced Dec. 22. Otokar said the €47.5 million contract (approximately US $52 million) involves the sale of its Cobra II tactical wheeled armored vehicles, the company announced in a press release.
The modernization program will start in 2018 and will mostly be conducted by Polish companies, although one of key partners in the deal is German defense-technology company Rheinmetall. General Adam Duda, the head of the Polish military inspectorate said that the project is of essential strategic value for the Polish army and will significantly increase the tanks’ performance as well as the safety of Polish soldiers on the battlefield.
Thailand is considering buying an unknown number of Russian-made T-90S or MS main battle tanks (MBT). According to the website Defence Blog, a Thai delegation visited the Russian city of Nizhny Tagil, the site of the largest main battle tank manufacturer in the world.
Neda Taiyebi does not want to be typecast. Female artists in Muslim countries, she says, are all too often pigeonholed as role models for the kind of change westerners would like to see in those countries. But Taiyebi insists she is no activist, no voice of the oppressed, no torchbearer for female emancipation. Still, at first glance her work – giving old tanks and military vehicles a paint job that involves exuberant, playful patterns – seems thick with symbolism.
Saginaw is no longer home to a tracked armored vehicle that the department received nearly a decade ago from the military. Military representatives picked up the Armored Personnel Carrier (APC) from the Saginaw Police Department Monday, Dec. 7, Chief of Police Robert Ruth said. The move comes about three months after President Barack Obama ordered departments across the country to return tracked vehicles they received free of cost from the U.S. military, Ruth said. Ruth said the loss will not impact the department, though some Michigan lawmakers are not in favor of the change.
A religious organization in the African nation of Ghana has built its own armored car. Designed for military duties including peacekeeping, the Katanka Armored Car is, well, odd. The Katanka is the brainchild of Kwadwo Safo, also known as African Star. Safo is a Christian minister in Ghana and the owner of the Katanka group of companies. Safo is also the inventor of the Katantka sport utility vehicles.
It means 580 new Ajax tanks – costing £4billion of taxpayers’ cash – have to be partially dismantled before being moved. The new reconnaissance vehicles will spearhead a high readiness brigade and will be airlifted to support troops on operations anywhere in the world. But with its hi-tech ballistic armour, it weighs 42 tonnes – too heavy and too wide for the RAF’s current C-130 transport planes.
With Russia now officially admitting that it has troops in Ukraine, you might think that right now would be an awfully good time to be in the tank-selling business. And in fact, it is. Finland, Estonia, and Latvia are all buying armored personnel carriers (some used, cast off from more modern militaries) to ward off the Russian bear. Poland is buying honest-to-goodness main battle tanks. (And yet, while they buy many weapons here in the U.S., the Poles aren’t doing their tank-shopping here — but in neighboring Germany.) Meanwhile, things just got tougher for General Dynamics’ (NYSE:GD) defense business — and don’t say you weren’t warned.
Less is known about the status of the three M4 Sherman tanks. They are reported to be part of Paraguay’s Presidential Escort Regiment. These three vehicles are “
Today we present a British study from December of 1947 on ‘Motion Studies of German Tanks.” This report examines the ergonomics of late WW2 German tanks Tiger, Tiger II an Panther. The report focuses on crew comfort and efficiency, looking at each crew position and providing analysis. Detailed charts of gun loading times are included in the report, as are diagrams of the ammo storage layout. This report was photographed at a archive by a 
Numerous news sources are reporting that Iran intends to purchase T-90 main battle tanks from Russia. This acquisition would be a significant upgrade for Iranian armored forces which rely on a variety of outdated and heavily modified older AFVs.
Tank and AFV News 