Armoured porcupine: Russia's unconventional defence against drones

Russians have major issues combating Ukrainian FPV drones, which hunt not only vehicles but even individual soldiers. One form of improvised protection that yielded positive results, although useless against modern anti-tank guided missiles, involved building a superstructure out of scrap metal on tanks to detonate, for example, a PG-7VL grenade at a distance of about a few dozen centimetres from the actual armour.

This bizarre form of protection increased safety but only against weapons with a single cumulative warhead. More advanced grenades with a precursor like the PG-7VR commonly used by Ukrainians or foreign volunteers in RPG-7 launchers easily handle such armour reinforcement.

A video of a BTR looking exactly like some kind of orcish war machine from Warhammer 40K has now appeared online. Here, in addition to a scrap metal superstructure, it also has long steel spikes attached to it, theoretically meant to detonate the precursor, while the scrap metal barrier would handle the main cumulative warhead.

The Russian spikes are a crude adaptation of an idea the Germans used in special rubber-ceramic mats called Igelpanzerung, which were deployed on PzH-2000 howitzers and Puma infantry fighting vehicles.

Theoretically, spikes attached to a layer of additional armour can protect such an armoured transporter against tandem warheads. However, the superstructure would have to withstand the explosion of a precursor triggered on the spikes to successfully pre-detonate the main cumulative warhead, which is not so obvious.

What is certain, however, is that this type of spiked armour will provide increased protection against FPV drones or payloads dropped by larger drones like the “Baba Yaga.” The downside is a massive deterioration in the crew’s situational awareness, as their visibility is almost entirely limited to straight ahead, along with a drastic increase in weight.

This type of armour weighs at least a few hundred kilogrammes, if not a couple of tonnes, drastically affecting the vehicle's mobility and increasing the likelihood of mechanical failures. The additional weight unanticipated by the manufacturer causes excessive wear on the suspension and drivetrain systems. It’s also evident that the only exit is at the rear, requiring disembarking soldiers to climb over the engine rather than using side exits.

It's also worth noting that this type of armour is effective only against cumulative warheads. Weaponry based on kinetic penetrators, like EFP warheads used in weapons such as the SMArt 155 shells or some drones and anti-tank ammunition used in automatic cannons, e.g., 25mm M2A2 Bradley, will penetrate this armour without any issues. The advantage of such a Bradley or another infantry fighting vehicle is that it will also be easier to target a vehicle moving slower than usual.