Fortified AFVs vital for future battles

VELLORE: The need for newer materials to produce Armoured Fight Vehicles (AFV), capable of surviving future battlefields, was stressed by Dr P Sivakumar, director of Combat Vehicle Research and Development Establishment (CVRDE) attached to the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) at Avadi, Chennai. He was speaking at the inauguration of the three-day international conference on recent trends in advanced materials at Vellore Institute of Technology (VIT) on Monday.The conference, organised by the School of Advanced Sciences, attached to VIT University, has attracted around 800 delegates and 40 key-note speakers from across  the world. Sivakumar stated that battlefields are becoming increasingly fragmented and multi-spectrum in nature and have created newer demands on the protection of combat vehicles to ensure their survival. “We need newer and better materials to make our combat vehicles lightweight, efficient, powerful and shock resistant,” he added.Sivakumar explained how new breeds of armoured vehicles were being developed using a complex variety of materials made of metal matrix composite that can withstand high pressure, temperature and shock.