The AMX-30 is a main battle tank designed by GIAT, first delivered to the French Army in 1966. The first five tanks were issued to the 501st Régiment de Chars de Combat (Tank Regiment) in August of that year. The production version of the AMX-30 weighed 36 metric tons (40 short tons), and sacrificed protection for increased mobility. The French believed that it would have required too much armour to protect against the latest anti-tank threats, thereby reducing the tank's maneuverability. Protection, instead, was provided by the speed and the compact dimensions of the vehicle, including a height of 2.28 metres. It had a 105-millimetre (4.1 in) cannon, firing an advanced high explosive anti-tank warhead known as the Obus G. The Obus G used an outer shell, separated from the main charge by ball bearings, to allow the round to be spin stabilized by the gun without affecting the warhead inside. Mobility was provided by the 720 horsepower (540 kW) HS-110 diesel engine, although the troublesome transmission adversely affected the tank's performance.
| AMX-30 | |
|---|---|
| Type | Main battle tank |
| Place of origin |  France |
| Service history | |
| In service | 1966–present |
| Used by | Bosnia, Chile, Cyprus, France, Greece, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Spain, United Arab Emirates, Venezuela |
| Wars | Gulf War |
| Production history | |
| Designed | 1963 |
| Number built | 3,571 |
| Specifications | |
| Weight | 36 tonnes (40 short tons; 35 long tons) |
| Length | 9.48 m (31 ft 1 in) (gun forward) |
| Width | 3.1 m (10 ft 2 in) |
| Height | 2.28 m (7 ft 6 in) |
| Crew | 4 (commander, gunner, loader, driver) |
| | |
| Armour | 80 mm (3.1 in) maximum |
| Main armament | 105 mm Modèle F1 tank gun |
| Secondary armament | 20 mm autocannon, 7.62 mm machine gun machine gun |
| Engine | Hispano-Suiza HS-110 680 hp (510 kW) |
| Transmission | Manual on AMX30; Semi-automatic SESM ENC200 on AMX-30B2 |
| Suspension | torsion bar |
| Operational range | 600 km (370 mi) |
| Speed | 65 km/h (40 mph) |
Due to the issues caused by the transmission, in 1979 the French Army began to modernize its fleet of tanks to AMX-30B2 standards, which included a new transmission, an improved engine and the introduction of a new fin-stabilized kinetic energy penetrator, amongst other improvements. Production of the AMX-30 also extended to a number of variants, including the AMX-30D armored recovery vehicle, the AMX-30R anti-aircraft gun system, a bridge-layer, the Pluton tactical nuclear missile launcher and a surface to air missile launcher.
It was preceded by two prior post-war French medium tank designs, including the ARL 44. Although the ARL 44 was an interim tank, its replacement tank, the AMX 50, was cancelled in the mid-1950s in favor of adopting the M47 Patton tank. In 1956 the French government entered a cooperative development program with Germany and Italy in an effort to design a standardized tank. Although the three nations agreed to a series of specific characteristics that the new tank should have, and both France and Germany began work on distinctive prototypes with the intention of testing them and combining the best of both, the program failed as Germany decided not to adopt the new French 105-millimetre (4.1 in) tank gun and France declared that it would postpone production until 1965. As a result, both nations decided to adopt tanks based on their own prototypes. The German tank became known as the Leopard 1, while the French prototype became the AMX-30.
As early as 1969, the AMX-30 and variants were ordered by Greece, soon followed by Spain. In the coming years, the AMX-30 would be exported to Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Cyprus and Chile. By the end of production, 3,571 units of AMX-30s and its variants had been manufactured. Both Spain and Venezuela later began extensive modernization programs to extend the life of their vehicles and to bring their tanks up to more modern standards. In the 1991 Gulf War, AMX-30s were deployed by both the French and Qatari armies, and Qatari AMX-30s saw action against Iraqi forces at the Battle of Khafji. However, France and most other nations replaced their AMX-30s with more up-to-date equipment by the end of the 20th century.
During the production run many improvements were implemented. These included gun stabilization from 1971, and from 1972 replacing the original coaxial heavy machine gun by a dual purpose 20-millimeter (0.79 in) autocannon against light armour and helicopters, with the ability to depress to -8 degrees and elevate to 40 degrees. All French army vehicles were eventually brought to this newer standard; the designation remained AMX 30B.
Beginning as early as 1973, only seven years after the beginning of production, the French began a research program for a future modification of the tank. The project was to result in a AMX 30 Valorisé ("upgraded AMX-30"). In June 1979, the French Army decided to both build new and modernize existing AMX-30s with an improved fire control system and a new transmission, and designated them AMX-30B2s. The first new production vehicles were taken into service in January 1982. Improvements to the COTAC APX M-508 fire control system included the installation of a laser rangefinder and a low-light TV (LLTV). The main gun's lethality was improved with the introduction of a new armour piercing fin stabilized discarding sabot (APFSDS). The original engine was exchanged for an improved variant, known as the HS-110.2, producing 680 horsepower (510 kW). The poor transmission was replaced with the semi-automatic SESM ENC200 transmission, with a torque converter. The suspension was improved by adopting new torsion bars and shocks which increased the vertical deflection range of the road wheels, thereby improving the tank's off-road mobility. From 1998, the French army started to replace the engines of its remaining AMX-30 tanks and variants with 500 Renault Mack E9 750 hp engines.
In the nineties, a reactive armour package, named BRENUS or Brennus, was also developed for the AMX-30B2, but was issued only to two tank regiments, in peacetime combined into 1er/ 2e Chasseurs, in France's rapid reaction force; the other two regiments using the AMX-30, 2e/5e Dragons, only had their tanks adapted for a possible upgrade. The BRENUS system used 112 GIAT BS (Brique de Surblindage) G2 explosive reactive boxes with a total weight of 1.7 metric tons (1.9 short tons), offering a protection equivalent to 400 millimeters (16 in) of steel at 60°. Recently, the AMX-30 has also been used as a testbed for several stealth technologies, including air cooling of hull surfaces and the use of visual camouflage. This prototype is known as the Démonstrateur Furtif à Chenille. Its hull and turret are fully covered by a superstructure built of angled plates made of radar absorbent material.
