According to a Tweet published by Reza_Mad @maysam21901 on November 22, 2020, the Iranian army has received the latest version of the local-made Karrar MBT (Main Battle Tank). The tank has completed all the final trial tests and is now ready to be delivered.
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The production model of the Iranian-made Karra main battle tank. (Picture source The Dead District Twitter account)
The Karrar is the latest generation of Main Battle Tank (MBT) designed and developed by the Iranian defense industry. The first pictures of the Iranian tank Karrar were released in March 2017 by the official website of the Iranian Defense Ministry.
According to our previous analysis, the Karrar is based on the Soviet-made T-72 MBT featuring a new turret and armor. The design of the tanks seems very similar to the Russian-made T-90MS. It keeps the same armament that includes one 125 mm smoothbore gun fitted with a fume extractor and a thermal sleeve. According to the Iranian defense industry, the Karrar has the capability to fire anti-tank guided missiles. The turret is equipped with a carousel automatic loader mounted on the turret floor and also on the rear wall of the turret. The second armament of the Karrar includes a remotely-operated weapon station armed with a 7.62 mm machine gun mounted at the rear of the commander hatch.
The Karrar is protected with a new ERA (Explosive Reactive Armor) mounted at the front of the hull and around the turret that could be a copy of the Russian Relikt ERA, 3rd generation Russian ERA. The roof of the turret is also equipped with ERA armor to provide protection from top-attack weapons. The explosive reactive armor is a type of vehicle armor that reacts in some way to the impact of a weapon to reduce the damage done to the vehicle being protected. It is most effective in protecting against shaped charges and specially hardened kinetic energy penetrators.
The side of the hull is also equipped with additional armor plates as well as slat armor mounted at the rear of the hull and at the rear of the turret. This type of armor designed to protect against anti-tank rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) attacks.
The layout of the Karrar is very similar to the standard Soviet-made T-72 MBT with the driver's compartment at the front center of the hull, commander and gunner in the turret mounted in the center of the hull, and engine compartment at the rear.
Close-view of the roof of the turret fitted with Explosive Reactive Armor (Picture source The Dead District Twitter account)
