Combat buses … The Type 63 (factory designation of the YW531 model) became the first Chinese armored personnel carrier that was developed independently without Soviet help and without regard to Soviet military equipment. The new combat vehicle was put into operation at the end of the 1960s and is still in service with the PLA. The car, which is a kind of Chinese analogue of the American tracked armored personnel carrier M113, turned out to be quite successful. On the basis of the Type 63 armored personnel carrier, many samples of special combat vehicles were created, up to self-propelled 120-mm mortars, 130-mm MLRS and 122-mm self-propelled howitzers.
It is believed that over the entire period of mass production, the large Chinese industrial corporation Norinco has produced about 8 thousand Type 63 armored personnel carriers of all modifications. The armored personnel carrier was actively exported. This combat vehicle was used by the armed forces of the DPRK, Albania, Iraq, Sudan, Vietnam and other states. In many countries, the Type 63 armored personnel carrier is still in service. Like many examples of military equipment of the second half of the XX century, the Chinese tracked amphibious armored personnel carrier Type 63 managed to take part in a number of wars and local conflicts, including the Vietnam War, the Sino-Vietnam War, the Iran-Iraq War, and the first Persian Gulf War.
The history of the creation of the Type 63 armored personnel carrier
Before developing its own armored personnel carrier, the Chinese military actively used Soviet combat vehicles, their licensed copies, as well as adaptations of Soviet equipment with minor modifications of their own. So since 1956, the PLA has been in service with a six-wheeled Type 56 armored personnel carrier, which was a licensed copy of the Soviet BTR-152. In addition, the Chinese military had at its disposal a tracked armored personnel carrier, created on the basis of a light amphibious tank, an exact copy of the Soviet PT-76. The armored personnel carrier itself, designated Type 66, repeated the Soviet tracked amphibious BTR-50P in almost everything.
It is worth noting that for a long time the Chinese have been doing what they can do very well today. Produced under license and copied other people's models of military equipment, and also made their own changes and modernized them during operation. In this regard, the creation of the Type 63 armored personnel carrier, which did not rely on Soviet developments, is a very interesting example from the history of the Chinese defense industry. The combat vehicle created in China in the 1960s received a simple design and was comparable to the armored vehicles of this class of other countries, for example, with the American main armored personnel carrier M113.
Back in July 1958, the Chinese government announced a new strategic national plan for scientific development, which provided for the creation of new types of armored vehicles, including tracked armored personnel carriers. Initially, work on the creation of such a machine was planned to be completed in 1960, but in fact, the development timeline was greatly delayed. The design bureau of the northern engineering plant, which later became part of the Norinco corporation, one of the largest manufacturers of Chinese weapons, was involved in the creation of a new armored personnel carrier.
Since the model of the new armored personnel carrier was created by Chinese designers practically from scratch, the creation process was delayed, work on the project continued until 1967. Despite the originality of the model, many elements had to be borrowed from Soviet counterparts. This was especially true of the undercarriage, in the design of which the Chinese engineers used elements of the Soviet amphibious tank PT-76 (Type 60) and the amphibious tracked BTR-50P (Type 66). The Chinese borrowed torsion bar suspension units, road roller technology and even track links from Soviet models. The power plant was also difficult to call original, since the well-proven V-shaped diesel engine - the famous V-2, which was also installed on the T-34-85 tanks and its Chinese counterpart - Type 58, was taken as a basis. received the designation 6150L, differed from the tank in a reduced number of cylinders - 8 instead of 12, as a result, the diesel had less power, which was quite enough for an armored personnel carrier.
In the process of creation, the concept and layout of the car changed several times, until in 1963 the Chinese designers settled on that version, which later went into mass production. At the same time, the car was first assigned the Type 63 index. The main changes concerned the layout. The Chinese have come to a decision that is typical for most manufacturers of such equipment. The engine compartment was moved closer to the middle of the armored personnel carrier on the right side. This was necessary to make the location of the power plant and transmission more rational and to provide the paratroopers with the ability to exit through the aft door. At the same time, it was decided to strengthen the armament of the armored personnel carrier, replacing the 7, 62-mm machine gun with a large-caliber one. The first prototypes in the new layout were presented in 1964, but their fine-tuning continued for quite a long time. Still, the lack of experience of Chinese designers affected. Serial production of the Type 63 tracked armored personnel carrier was only possible in the late 1960s, and the first demonstration to the public took place in 1967, when the armored personnel carrier took part in a military parade in Beijing.
Technical features of the BTR Type 63
The body of the new combat vehicle was made of rolled armor plates by welding. The maximum thickness of the armor plates in the bow of the hull reached 14 mm, the sides and stern were weaker protected - only 6 mm. The front of the armored personnel carrier had a wedge-shaped shape, while the upper armor plate was installed at a large angle of inclination, gradually passing into the roof of the hull, which was slightly raised closer to the stern for the convenience of finding the landing. The lower armor plate was installed at a much smaller angle of inclination. The sides of the hull of the Type 63 armored personnel carrier also could not boast of large angles of inclination, the aft armor plate was installed vertically at all. Such a reservation provided the vehicle with protection only from small arms fire of 7, 62-mm caliber and fragments of shells and mines of small calibers. The pluses of the combat vehicle, which were supposed to improve its survivability in battle, include its low altitude. The maximum height of the combat vehicle on the roof of the hull did not exceed 1.9 meters (excluding the machine gun), which made it possible to effectively hide in the folds of the terrain, bushes and use the relief.
The layout scheme was traditional for armored personnel carriers of that time with a number of nuances. In front of the hull there were seats for the driver (on the left side) and the vehicle commander (on the right side), each of them had its own hatch to get in or out of the combat vehicle, while the commander's seat was isolated from the vehicle's habitable space. Immediately behind the mechanic drive in the center of the hull, there was a shooter's place, which also had its own hatch. A large-caliber machine gun was located directly on the roof of the hull next to the gunner's hatch. An engine was installed behind the commander's seat, isolated from the vehicle's habitable space by armored partitions. At the same time, the transmission was located in the bow of the hull, access to it was provided through a removable armor plate located in the upper frontal part of the hull. The entire aft part of the combat vehicle was occupied by the troop compartment, designed to carry up to 10-13 infantrymen, including the gunner. In total, the car transported 12-15 people, including two crew members. For embarkation and disembarkation of motorized riflemen, there were two large hatches in the roof of the hull, but the aft door was the main means of exit. In the sides of the hull and doors there were loopholes for firing from personal weapons.
The power plant on the first models of armored personnel carriers, indexed A and B, was represented by a stripped-down version of the B-2 tank diesel engine, developing 260 hp. This was enough to accelerate an armored personnel carrier with a combat weight of 12.5 tons to a speed of 65 km / h when driving on a highway, off-road the car could accelerate to 45 km / h. Quite good performance for armored vehicles of those years. The diesel 8-cylinder engine was paired with a manual gearbox (4 + 1). The car was originally conceived to be floating, so it received a sealed body. Movement on the water was carried out by rewinding the tracks, the maximum speed on the water surface did not exceed 6 km / h. The cruising range on the highway was approximately 500 km. On armored personnel carriers, starting with version C, as well as on export vehicles, a more powerful German air-cooled diesel engine, KHD BF8L, was installed, producing 320 hp.
The undercarriage of the Type 63 armored personnel carrier was represented by four rubberized single-sided road wheels on each side, there were no support rollers. The drive wheel was installed at the front. The car received an individual torsion bar suspension, while only the first rollers were sprung. The upper branch of the armored personnel carrier track was covered with a bulwark, consisting of four sections. The bulwarks had a characteristic stamping, which is also one of the well-recognized elements of the armored personnel carrier.
The main armament of the combat vehicle was a large-caliber 12, 7-mm machine gun, which is a Chinese copy of the Soviet DShKM. The machine gun had 500 rounds of ammunition loaded in belts stored inside the troop compartment of the Type 63 armored personnel carrier. Initially, the place of the machine gunner was completely open, but already in the 1980s, when all the armored personnel carriers underwent another modernization, the arrow was protected by a turret with armored shields covering it on three sides. To fire at the enemy, motorized riflemen could use their personal weapons, firing from closing loopholes or large hatches located in the roof of the hull.
The first experience of creating its own armored personnel carrier turned out to be quite successful for China. The combat vehicle created in the 1960s, like the American M113 armored personnel carrier, is still in service. The exact production figures are unknown, but according to information from open sources in the PRC, at least 8 thousand of such tracked armored personnel carriers were collected, which were actively supplied for export, having gone through a large number of upgrades.
