The Worst Tank in The World - TR-85M1 

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Me a Romanian: " I have never been so offended by something I completely agree with"

So basically, it's a cooler looking T-55 tank

RedEffect: "TR-85M1 bad" Romanians so far: "we know"

Finally my Romanian tin can was reviewed.

if you consider the TR-85 a modern MBT, then yes, it is, but if you look at it as a T-55 upgrade, then no, it's incredible

RedEffect : TR-85M1 is one of the worse tanks ever made Slovenia with M-55S : There's another one

"No purchase necessary.." Oh You wish it is

Engeeners: So how old is the tank we need to modernize? Romanian Government: Yes.

I love how Romanians are actually chill that there tank is shit and perfectly understand it. I can’t say the same for the Arjun fans.

At least the TR-85M1 will win in a fashion contest against an Arjun

I have a friend who used to drive one of these, he called it THE MUSEUM

Arjunk MBT: *FINALLY A WORTHY OPPONENT!!!*

*“Appear weak when you are strong, and strong when you are weak.”* ― Sun Tzu, The Art of War

My brother in Christ, you forgot to mention one thing: there's only 58 of them :))))) the rest of about 550 tanks we have are the tr-85 and tr-780 variants. Some are just the plain t-55a.

After the 1968 czechoslovak invasion, Romania was phased out of Soviet affairs and stopped receiving industrial and military assistsnce. We had to come up with something ASAP and this is the best that we coule do at the time. It was originally meant to be a co-project between Romania and West Germany and was intended to use a Leopard 1 engine, which is the actual reason why the hull is longer. After 1989, talks between the countries resumed but grounded to a halt because Germany was not interested in the deal anymore. We were also meant to develop a new tank in the 2000s but russian-backed governments and crippling corruption prevented anything from moving forwards.

The TR-125 would've been a great replacement, but the revolution happened, economic turmoil, and bam, the project was dropped

romania should commission a tank from dacia .

Oh no ! I always feared that the roast day for our tank would come.

Romanian Government to tankers: It's either this or we put armor plates on our stock piles of used Yugo's! Tanker Crew's: Flips COIN to decide 🤔.

Me: Can we get a tank? The Romanian government: We have tank at home. The tank:

yeah, I'm so early that arjun asn't yet been developed

Well, considering that the scope of this tank was to be a match in the East and south east Europe, the Balkans, it was, and is still is, perfectly capable to do said mission. The age that gave it life was an age that everybody thought that a new Balkan war would begin and Romania would be carved up again, so comparing it and the numbers to the neighbors, well, I consider it a case of perspective.

You do know that there are APFSDS shells for soviet 100mm guns? T55A and T55AM can fire APFSDS. The TR85 is obsolete when compared to Nations with large defence industries like Russia,Germany,USA etc. No one denies that. The TR85 is basically the best a T55 variant can hope to be. The armor is borderline useless against any MBT kinetic penetrator. The gun can fire APDS and APFSDS. The penetration is therefore still weak but not as weak as presented here. Main problem of the gun is that it fires 100mm soviet/russian ammunition while Romania is a NATO Country. They should at least consider putting a 105mm L7 in there. The massive breech of a Rh 120 wont fit. Basically its more like a light tank/support tank at the moment. Thy gave up on tank vs tank combat ability as its to expensive to keep up. The TR-85 delivers fire support for infantry and can take out enemy IFVs and light armored vehicles. I put it on par with T55AM and T62M. A modernisation of what is basically 1950-1960 tech. The romanians do aknowledge that. Its purpose is not to keep up with modern MBTs as it has no hope in hell of achieving that. Its to provide some armor capability for infantry support at a cheap price. That it does very well. Basically M24 Chaffees in Vietnam deal. Romanian Goverment is looking to aquire Leopard2s of some variant as MBTs. Problem is they are damn expensive and foreign. TR85 while not being proper MBTs at this point are built locally except for the optics which are french. So most of the money spent on them is at least going back into the Romanian economy. Romania is a country that cant afford modern MBTs. So next best thing they can have, build and supply on their own is the TR85. And at the end of the day it is the better decision to supply more armored vehicles independently at a cheaper price than pay a fortune to foreign nations to field maybe a battalion worth of modern MBTs while depending on a foreign supplier in times of conflict. I take 100-200 or more TR85s with local industry and supply chain over 40-50 foreign bought Leopard2s with a questionable supply chain any day of the week. The former I can afford and supply on my own. The latter are extremely expensive and the resupply is dependent on the german supply chain(in times of conflict guess who gets priority shipment from KMW/Rheinmetall) and international shipping.

About the penetration, the APFSDS-T BM-421 Sg can penetrate 444 mm of armour at 500m, 425 mm of armour at 1000 m and 328mm at 4000m, so, probably it could penetrate 400mm of armour at two kilometres. There were no tests made at 2km. The round was developed alongside Israel in 1996. So, technically speaking it is similar to the 105mm British L7 gun, used on the Leopard 1 and on the early Abrams.

Arjun: "Our battle will be legendary!"

Thx for makeing this i can finaly show my dad that our tank he always thinks understands modern warfere but said that our tank has a chance and i knew it hasnt

Finally a true competitor to T-14 Armata

Well, at least it has a stabilizer. First time I saw it I wasn't even sure it had one

- TR85-M1 might be the worst tank. -ARJUNK: *NANI?!* *EXPLOSION*

I still think the Arjun is worse. The TR-85 was made by a country with no money, most problems derives by Romanian economy, while Arjun was designed by somebody who had no idea on how tanks work (they really put blowout panels with no blast door for God's sake)

Red Effect:"The worst tank in the world..." Bob Semple tank: "I'm gonna have to stop you right there."

I honestly thought this Tank was good, because it looked like an impressive improvement of the T-55.

("YOU GOT A HOLE IN YOUR LEFT WING!" Intensifies*)

As A Romanian, I confirm this. Make a video about TR-125 please, this tank was better then TR-85M1

From the perspective of a Romanian dude that knows a lot of stuff about his nation's military, I have to say that I do agree for the most part with what he said. The tank was mediocre at best even when it first appeared in the late 90s. However, now it's completely obsolete with no chance of winning in direct combat if it would fight against a modern MBT. Tho, you didn't say anything about the military exercise that took place in Germany back in 2014, when 8 TR-85M1s destroyed 8 out of 11 M1A2 Abrams tanks in a combat scenario and the Americans were visibly pissed off by that. This means better crews and better FCS (the best thing about the tank). The tank could have been a cheap and decent one if it would have had the 120 mm L/44 smoothbore gun and a 1200HP engine (that was tested and it could fit). Incompetence is what describes the people behind this project the best. In the end, you missed quite a lot of important details, some others being the maximum speed of the tank (60 km/h forward, 10 km/h in reverse), how many were made (54 units, that equip 1 battalion), how many hp/t (17,2), the accurate penetration of the projectile (Bm 412 Sg, 444mm at 500 meters), etc.

At least it looks kinda cool though

Still beat an abrams crew in a fire exercise tho 🎷🗿

Yeah this was supposed to be superseded by the TR-125 but shit happened.

Romania makes legend AK , so something had to give.

I´m a simple man: i see bad tank i click like

I mean at least they upgraded them... In lebanon our army still uses un upgraded t54/55 tanks which were donated by the syrians after the civil war (if i remember correctly) And some m48

I got an idea for you. A video about the Slovenian M55S tank, basically a modernized T-55.

Arjun: [heavy indian accent] Finally a worthy opponent, our battle will be legendary!

Finally, someone with a proven love of tanks is looking this way!

To be fair Red Effect, its a T-55 mod. It's never going to compare favorably to T-90, T-80, or M-1 General Abrams tank. This video is pure clickbait. You are better than this

TR-85M1 is basically a T-54/55 with the engine of a Leopard 1A5

when you have squadrons of flying thirsty vampires units, why bother with tanks?🧐

Well, in all fairness they've only been fignting T-55s in the middle east anyways and Romania has no angry neighbours to fight, so the tank is actually very suitable for the purpose it is used for. Even if compared to its neighbours, the TR would probably come up on top. A war between Romania and Serbia is unlikely. The Bulgarian tanks are pretty much the same but less in number and Romania would win against Hungary because the latter has almost no tanks to speak of, only around 24 Leopards. Ukraine is the only one who could stand up to Romania but it won't happen as they are strategic allies. Meanwhile, the Arjun is the MBT of a would-be superpower which has China to worry about. When looking at tne context, the TR is superior imho as it can play the numbers game. The Romanians have a lot of tanks even by western standards. If this sounds familiar to you, it should.

Everyone: TR-85 bad Me: At least they got a MF tank. What y'all got?

That's why recent ,Ro Army leadership said on 07.03.2023 that Romania will buy *54 up to 300 of M1A2 Abrams SEP V3* ... remain that USA government to approve this request sent official already by the romanian government , that cost us 1,1 Billion US dollars = for 54 Abrams+ 12 derivates, training simulators, maintenance etc)

People: their tanks look, fishy... Romania on the map: 🐟

This tank was meant as a stop gap solution till the new TR125 would be ready to enter service. The TR125 would be an T72 equivalent, done with romanian tech since the sovient didn't accord licenses after the romanians refusel to intervene in '68 in Cehoslovakia. And there's the TR2000, a project from the early '00 that would use german tech from the Leopard 2A4 such as a turret, the l44 gun and he hull from the STRV122 but the project was abandoned since the cost would be too much and we got stuck with the stop gap solution.

I dont care thats its bad, its our tank and im proud of it!...Still giving the video a like...

TR-85 M1 isn't a MBT, its an armored mobile antimaterial system capable of engaging trucks, static defenses, and the best infantry fighting vehicles in the world. There, fixed it on the cheap, just as it was made.

A N G E R Y romanian noises But hey at least its the best T55 in the world

I am looking forward to watch him reply to the videos from supporters of this tank like with the Arjun😅

i would rather still be in a TR-85M1 then inside a Arjun tank my friends and i call it the ''Mobile port-a-potty''

And now do the best tank in the world! *The Bob Semple*

Romanian nationalist: *NoooOOO ItS ThE BEsT TANk EVeR BuilT* Any other romanian seeing this as free promotion to a more expensive T-55: *its free real estate*

I bet you could buy 12 of these for the price of a single Leopard II. Which is something to consider.

*Everyone that knows Arjun* : There us another Smoothbore shots fired

Its not like its useless. Against other modern battle tanks...maybe. But against infantry, Siege, Armored carrier, Makeshift tanks, other "obsolete tanks" it is still capable.

keep up the great content man!

Tehe tehe, i did it XD Any way, as a Romanian, i'm agreeing with this video if we compare this tank with top notch MBT's but Romanian army took a more defensive nature in regard of modern warfare.. And yes, money and corruption stoped the integration of more capable tanks in the Romanian armed force. We had prototypes like TR-125 (wich was basicaly a T-72 but with a longer chassis and composite base armor instead of steel) or TR-2000 (wich it was a program to built leopard 2 mbt's in Romania equipt with 120/125mm gun) and other small projects of tanks that couldn't make it out. And right now Romanian army is focused on acquisition of modern wheeled apc's, f-16 fighters, patriot SAM's and 4 multirole corvets. Because of that we will not see a better mbt in the field Anyway, as a final statment, TR-85M1 is a capable tank for what the purpose it has. It's consideret an asymmetrical tank for asymmetrical warfare. His job is not to fight directly other mbt's but indirectly using asymmetrical tactis. Maybe I could be wrong but Romania still needs a much more modern and capable mbt If i made writing mistakes i'm sorry for that, english isn't my strong point. :)) Have a good day sir and keep the very good content going! :)

Aaaandd you just pissed off a lot of Romanians

This actually looks more like an upgrade path for countries still using T-55s than a truly modern vehicle used in Europe.

Well, atleast they have their own armor

Im Romanian and i agree with You. We need to get rid of this piece of junk

So we're not gonna talk about the fact that basically most of Chinese tanks to this day are just upgraded T-54/55?

Thanks for researching this tank, another great video.

love the vids man keep up the great work

Bruh i know romanian tank industry isn't the best this is clearly not the worst tank out there and i know it is quite poor comparing to other nato tanks but it does its job

Romanian tank expert: TR-85M1 IS THE BEST TANK IN THE WORLD

Thank you, RU-vid Recommendation. A worthy addition of a RU-vidr into my bell collection

Hey Red, I think the stat you're looking for when discussing horsepower and tank weights is the 'Power to Weight Ratio", I think it usually is expressed in how many HP per ton. Great Video!!!!

Crazy they squeezed this much tech onto a platform originally developed in the 50s. It isn't at all competitive against even a T-72 or a T-64 but they made whatever from what they had handed to. I feel bad for the Romanians, hope they really get some more modern tanks soon.

Incredibly we built around 600 of these.

Romanians playing the "how much upgrade can we cram into it?" game

How about the TR 125? It is a type of T72 that the army rejected for unknown reasons, same with the TR 2000

This tank is most effective in big numbers like the t34's. 230 mm turret armor xd. leopard 2a7+ HU Has 2000 mm Effective armor. So its like t34 VS a tiger 2. (This is my opinion)

Thanks for reviewing our re-re-modernised mobile hen house! Greetings from Romania!

425mm at 1km is actually able to kill quite a few tanks: Leopard 2A4 (A4s have roughly 380mm-420mm vs KE), T-72A without the 16mm add-on plate, M1A1 without DU and propably, Challenger 2's Hull Armor.

I really like the tank from an esthetic point of view.

Don't worry the Romanian has a special force units that is specially train to sneak behind enemy line to steal their tank

Considering Romania did not receive T-72's like the other Warsaw Pact countries, it did well enough with modernizing their ancient tanks. Of course, it's an old-ass tank for today's standards, but it's not a bad modernization.

The information is not 100% correct. The cannon is rifled but still capable of firing APFSDS projectiles. The armor on the turret is sufficient, above that level the angle and thickness make the armor to be about 400-500mm RHA. Yes, it's a small tank and it doesn't shoot far, but the local infrastructure cannot be used by heavy tanks like Abrams or Merkava and the geography allows you to engage targets at distances between 100 and 1000 meters. Then the TR85 M1 you could say is inspired by the T55, yet it has nothing of it; another gun, another turret, other tracks, another engine, other electronics, other weight, another longer body, more than that, this tank was modern at a time when most tankers were not yet born.

In fact, is not so bad. You can view a documentary made by BBC about it.

Now what RedEffect, Arjun or TR-85

Still better than Cow propelled Brahma tank.

FYI the challenger 2 you showed at the beginning of the video is the challenger 2e which was a private venture started by vickers defense systems (carried on by vickers when they bought out vickers) before competing at the Greek tank trials, its performance at said tank tank trials wasn’t the best but this wasn’t helped by both krauss maffei waggmann and Rheinmetall bribing the Greek defense officials into buying the leopard and the French using a gps jammer that inhibited the performance of the British and American teams. In the end no challenger 2e’s were bought and the project was cancelled around 2005-2007.

Finally some good fkn content

The Slovenian M-55S tank might be on the same level as the TR-85M1 or even worse. You should definetly make a video about it in the future. For the most part it is just another T-55 varient that got modernized. It would fail hard in combat with any modern tank, but I guess it would be good just for infantry support. You could compare it to the TR-85M1 to see which is trully worse in combat with modern tanks :)

I like your content. I may not agree with all of your points and views at times, but you have my subscription. Keep up the good work.

As a Romanian, and also as a military man, I'm afraid I have to totally agree with RedEffect, our MBT is very obsolete, on par with those from poor 3rd world countries. It has no place on a modern battlefield. As for my compatriots that felt offended, they should try to think beyond that - in the real world, in case of an armed conflict, patriotism alone cannot unfortunately make you win battles. Better focus your energy on our corrupt politicians that brought us here.

Really would love to see the a video about the M60TM (Turkey’s latest upgrade of the M60) it is an heavy upgrade of the M60 and I would love to see how it compete’s against upgraded T-72’s.

Arjun: finally a worthy opponent. Our battle will be legendary!

1:25 You say “the development of this tank started in the mid 90s” not true maybe just modernization. Based on the TR-77-580, the TR-85 tank was developed from 1978 to 1985 and produced from 1986 until 1990. The TR-77 (Romanian Tank model 1977), being designed between 1974 and 1980. A prototype and zero series (10 tanks) were made in this configuration which was to be equipped with an 800 horsepower engine, similar to that used by the German tank Leopard 1. To be delivered on time however, the tank was equipped finally with the V2 engine of the T-55 tank, assimilated by the local industry. The final variant was named TR-77-580 (Romanian tank model 1977 with 580 horsepower engine).TR-580 was the first tank manufactured in Romania. With no experience in the field, Romanian specialists visited a Chinese tank factory to study the manufacturing process. In fact TR-77 looks similar to the Chinese Type 80/88. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Type_80/88_main_battle_tank In 1980 the Romania modified T-72 into TR-125 tank. Only prototypes being built. Made between 1987 and 1988 and tested until 1991. Because of army budget cuts TR-125 was not put into production. Afterwards the TR-2000 project was made, which also was not followed or implemented. TR-125 and TR-2000 pictures. www.rumaniamilitary.ro/de-la-tancul-tr-125-la-tr-2000-proiecte-ingropate

Bob Semple Tank: Finally, a worthy opponent, our battle will be legendary!

Any t-55 upgrade is going to be a outdated tank no matter what u do to i facts....