25T Borsuk (Badger) IFV
The new Floating Infantry Fighting Vehicle with the implemented 30 mm Remote Controlled Turret System (with an integrated SPIKE ATGM), was developed under the BORSUK program. The new infantry vehicle is to overcome wide water obstacles, and also to operate in various terrain and climatic conditions. In addition, the vehicle will be highly maneuverable and easy to transport. This vehicle, designed to protect the crew and landing troops against small arms and anti-tank grenade launchers, but also to protect the crew from mines and improvised explosives, will come in several versions - from the floating version to the heavy armored vehicle.
The BORSUK project is being created thanks to financing obtained from the funds of the National Center for Research and Development, with which HSW SA concluded an agreement as a consortium leader. When, in the middle of the 2010s, the program code named Borsuk was launched under the aegis of HSW, 1,300 old IFVs of Russian construction were still used in the mechanized troops of the Republic of Poland. Designed in the 1960s, equipped with poor cannons, archaic combat vehicles have long been incompatible with the threats of the modern battlefield. They should be replaced as soon as possible by more modern and better equipped transporters. This was the goal of the designers of the Polish Borsuk.
Work on the new transporter, especially the technical details of the vehicle and critical combat parameters, was kept secret from the very beginning. Subsequent approaches to the changing visions of the future, new-generation basic vehicle could only be followed and only in a fragmentary scope during subsequent defense industry shows in Kielce. To this day, it is not clear how much the new Badger will cost. Cautious estimates say that the starting price of a standard vehicle will exceed PLN 25 million. It is already known that almost half of Borsuk's value will be a fully automated unmanned turret. It is armed with a 30 mm Orbital ATK Mk 44S Bushmaster II cannon and a 7.62 UKM-2000 C machine gun. The turret was equipped with optoelectronic observation heads, sensors and a dual Spike anti-tank missile launcher. The system is the result of cooperation between designers from HSW and engineers and IT specialists from the private Ozarów Group of WB Electronics.
The project of the New Floating Infantry Fighting Vehicle, developed as part of the work under the code name Borsuk, in the variant presented at MSPO 2018, in fact, presents two simultaneously developed, complicated and pioneering projects in the Polish defense industry. The first is the IFV itself, the second is the ZSSW-30 Remote Tower System. Both are formed in consortia led by HSW SA. The first, responsible for the development of the infantry fighting vehicle, includes the leading domestic companies from the PGZ Group: HSW SA, Wojskowe Zaklady Motoryzacyjne SA, Wojskowe Zaklady Inzynieryjne SA, OBRUM sp. Z oo, Rosomak SA, Wojskowe Zaklady Elektroniczne SA, as well as scientific institutions -research: Military University of Technology, Military Institute of Armored and Automotive Technology, Academy of Martial Arts and Warsaw University of Technology.
The ZSSW-30 turrt system is created in a different organizational and financial system. The consortium of HSW SA and WB Electronics are responsible for the project, while the partner institution for this consortium and the project leader is the Ministry of National Defense. The work on this system began with the contract between HSW SA and the Ministry of National Defense of March 29, 2013, concluded two months after the final failure of attempts to develop a similar turrt system by the armored center in Gliwice.
HSW presented the first model of the turrt after slightly more than a year of work at MSPO 2014. At the next edition of the Exhibition, a second, much more mature, refined model was presented, which became a solution for creating a proper prototype of the ZSSW-30, used for the next phases of design and research . It differs from the first, initial version not only in the changed design of the ATK44 Bushmaster II gun mount, but also in the size, slightly adjusted placement of the Spike ATGM launchers, the changed arrangement of the OBRA sensors and observation and aiming devices, the architecture and construction of ballistic shields, etc. Still at MSPO 2015 ZSSW was honored with a special award of the President of the Republic of Poland "for the product best serving to increase the level of security of the soldiers of the Armed Forces of the Republic of Poland" as a product with a high degree of innovation.
Under the steel armor of the transporter, optionally reinforced with layered ceramic and composite plates, there will be room for a 3-person crew (commander, gunner, driver) and 6 landing soldiers in full combat gear. There will be Fonet digital communication devices and BMS battlefield management systems. In addition, sensors warning against laser radiation Obra-3, as well as a licensed American satellite navigation receiver TALIN 5000. The equipment is also complemented by the PIMCO Chardes II contamination detection devices. The new IFV is equipped with an integrated power-pack with a 720 HP MTU engine and Perkins x300 transmission. The vehicle will be able to use 2 types of tracks for driving. Quieter and lighter rubber-composite and twice as durable - steel.
It is no secret that at the very beginning the problems of the designers were related to the realization of the buoyancy condition of the vehicle. The military requirement was met more than satisfactorily. This is what experts say, who saw attempts to overcome water obstacles, displacement and control the movement of the cart in water bodies with the use of special propellers.
Work on the new IFV, equipped with an unmanned combat turret, is a priority. The proprietary design of HSW / PGZ and the WB Group (responsible for the integration of the remotely controlled turret) must obtain all approvals and certificates before the end of 2021. All this to ensure that in the next, 2022, the comprehensively tested and fully mature Borsuk New Floating Infantry Fighting Vehicle went into serial production.
