Development of the suspension system and their potential in improving the tactical and technical characteristics of armored combat vehicles

This article analyzes the improvement of the main indicators of mobility and reduction of energy losses in the damping devices of armored fighting vehicles, and also presents the use of friction shock absorbers instead of hydro shock absorbers. Increasing the protection indicators with the help of traditional measures leads to an increase in the weight of the AFV, which reduces the average speed of the vehicle on the ground and increases the likelihood of its defeat on the battlefield. The issues of ensuring compliance and coordination of the characteristics of the recuperation system with the characteristics of the required damping in the suspension system, which exerts an impact, reducing the probability of hitting the striking elements by ensuring high mobility, maneuverability and evasion of the hull, are considered. The functional relationship between the improvement of the suspension system, the mutual agreement of its characteristics with the characteristics of the weapon complexes, power plant and transmission and the improvement of the indicators of the main groups of tactical and technical characteristics of armored fighting vehicles has been established. Based on the analysis of development trends, the potential was assessed and the main directions of the development of the suspension system were formulated, which will fundamentally affect the fulfillment of modern and promising operational and tactical requirements and will lead to a significant increase in the tactical and technical characteristics of armored fighting vehicles. These are: the use of hydropneumatic suspensions, the introduction of non-traditional control systems for the characteristics of suspension nodes based on the use of "intelligent" materials, in particular magnetorheological elastomers, the use of friction shock absorbers and new kinematic suspension schemes with significantly increased dynamic travel, as well as the use of energy recovery systems of suspension damping devices.