Nothing groundbreaking on the airsoft front this weekend that would make us all amazed and start throwing our money at computer screens. The Airsoft season is now winding down, with just some of the final big events just about to be done and over with for this month of September and most them are trade shows.

So to start the week, let’s talk about military hardware, as in really big hardware --- tanks.

We all think of tanks as big armoured chunks of metal with a big bad tube on it and as petrol-hungry behemoths on and off the road these days. Now, DARPA would like to change on how we think of tanks. Rather than big, lumnbering metal, the skunkworks of the U.S. Miitary want very agile, nimble, and fast machines.

With their Ground X-Vehicle Technology (GXV-T) project, DARPA wants to create armoured vehicles which are light and fast. The prevailing philosophy in tank design is mainly about armour and creating anti-armour weapons that will protect them. The results are costlier and heavier tanks that may just be too much on today's roads and bridges, and are also logistical headaches when transporting them from hotspot to another. Also, it's a race between tank designers and weapons designers who always think of ways to pop some tanks and blow their turrets sky high.

The GXV-T concept of DARPA aims to have lighter armored vehicles that can traverse 95% of terrain, ability to survive in the battlefield by being agile, semi-autonomous, and stealthy. While armor is still part of the design, it is just but one of the tricks up the sleeve of the future tank. It's speed and agility will help it survive, by being able to dodge tank fire and anti-armour weapons such as  RPGs. It can duck, change direction, or make a quick dash in order to avoid hits with the armor being deployed as the last line of defense.

How will the GXV-T Tanks be able to do these? By being light and nimble enough to change profile and direction when its sensors detect and incoming projectile. It has also anti-armor weapons too, but if these fail, they have movable armor that are quickly deployed to the area of the vehicle where the projectile is predicted to impact.

With such a design, the costs and weight are reduced, and allow for the production of more of these types of vehicles that can be carried via airlifts which will be the fastest mode of bringing these to the battlefield. So far, the initial designs do away with tank tracks and will be using large wheels which we presume are puncture-proof. Making these vehicles semi-autonomous would also reduce the number of crew members as some of threats may just require quick decision making that human reflexes might just be too slow. Perhaps when damaged, the semi-autonomous system might take over driving the vehicle and without human guidance, can return to base to bring casualties or for repairs.

DARPA are still refining the concept and requirements for the GXV-T as they expect awarding the contract in 2015 to develop the technologies for the next 24 months. We may expect some initial vehicle designs by 2017.