CM25
Contents
Description
The CM25 is a rank VI Chinese tank destroyer
with a battle rating of 8.7 (AB/RB/SB). It was introduced in Update "Raining Fire".
General info
Survivability and armour
Describe armour protection. Note the most well protected and key weak areas. Appreciate the layout of modules as well as the number and location of crew members. Is the level of armour protection sufficient, is the placement of modules helpful for survival in combat? If necessary use a visual template to indicate the most secure and weak zones of the armour.
| Armour | Front (Slope angle) | Sides | Rear | Roof |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hull | ___ mm | ___ mm Top ___ mm Bottom |
___ mm | ___ - ___ mm |
| Turret | ___ - ___ mm Turret front ___ mm Gun mantlet |
___ - ___ mm | ___ - ___ mm | ___ - ___ mm |
| Cupola | ___ mm | ___ mm | ___ mm | ___ mm |
Notes:
Mobility
Write about the mobility of the ground vehicle. Estimate the specific power and manoeuvrability, as well as the maximum speed forwards and backwards.
| Game Mode | Max Speed (km/h) | Weight (tons) | Engine power (horsepower) | Power-to-weight ratio (hp/ton) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Forward | Reverse | Stock | Upgraded | Stock | Upgraded | ||
| Arcade | 70 | 17 | 12 | _,___ | 410 | __.__ | 34.17 |
| Realistic | 65 | 15 | _,___ | 215 | __.__ | 17.92 | |
Armaments
Main armament
Give the reader information about the characteristics of the main gun. Assess its effectiveness in a battle based on the reloading speed, ballistics and the power of shells. Do not forget about the flexibility of the fire, that is how quickly the cannon can be aimed at the target, open fire on it and aim at another enemy. Add a link to the main article on the gun: {{main|Name of the weapon}}. Describe in general terms the ammunition available for the main gun. Give advice on how to use them and how to fill the ammunition storage.
| BGM-71 TOW missile | Turret rotation speed (°/s) | Reloading rate (seconds) | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mode | Capacity | Vertical | Horizontal | Stabilizer | Stock | Upgraded | Full | Expert | Aced | Stock | Full | Expert | Aced |
| Arcade | 10 | -20°/+25° | ±45° | N/A | __.__ | __.__ | __.__ | __.__ | __.__ | _.__ | _.__ | _.__ | _.__ |
| Realistic | __.__ | __.__ | __.__ | __.__ | __.__ | ||||||||
Ammunition
| Penetration statistics | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ammunition | Type of warhead |
Penetration @ 0° Angle of Attack (mm) | |||||
| 10 m | 100 m | 500 m | 1,000 m | 1,500 m | 2,000 m | ||
| I-TOW | ATGM | __ | __ | __ | __ | __ | __ |
| TOW-2B | ATGM | __ | __ | __ | __ | __ | __ |
| Shell details | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ammunition | Type of warhead |
Velocity (m/s) |
Projectile Mass (kg) |
Fuse delay (m) |
Fuse sensitivity (mm) |
Explosive Mass (TNT equivalent) (g) |
Ricochet | ||
| 0% | 50% | 100% | |||||||
| I-TOW | ATGM | ___ | _.__ | __ | _._ | ___ | __° | __° | __° |
| TOW-2B | ATGM | ___ | _.__ | __ | _._ | ___ | __° | __° | __° |
Ammo racks
| Full ammo |
1st rack empty |
2nd rack empty |
3rd rack empty |
4th rack empty |
5th rack empty |
6th rack empty |
Visual discrepancy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 | __ (+__) | __ (+__) | __ (+__) | __ (+__) | __ (+__) | __ (+__) | __ |
Machine guns
Offensive and anti-aircraft machine guns not only allow you to fight some aircraft but also are effective against lightly armoured vehicles. Evaluate machine guns and give recommendations on its use.
| 12.7 mm M2HB | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mount | Capacity (Belt) | Fire rate | Vertical | Horizontal |
| ___ (___) | ___ | __° | __° | |
Usage in battles
Describe the tactics of playing in the vehicle, the features of using vehicles in the team and advice on tactics. Refrain from creating a "guide" - do not impose a single point of view but instead give the reader food for thought. Describe the most dangerous enemies and give recommendations on fighting them. If necessary, note the specifics of the game in different modes (AB, RB, SB).
The best way one should use this vehicle would be to stay away from the active combat areas, hide, and use the exposed gunner and TOW launcher to your advantage. The exposed launcher allows the vehicle to hide behind solid cover while still being able to fire from over it, giving the enemy a much harder time in spotting and shooting you. Staying away from the combat zones maximises your survivability, in addition to taking advantage of the TOW missiles' extremely long range, allowing you to pick off targets from beyond the range of conventional rounds.
It is also worth noting the -20 degrees launcher depression as, even though it may not be as impressive as the -30 degrees launcher depression of the M901, it is still very capable in adapting to uneven terrain and firing from behind hills. However, note that the depression angles are severely limited when the launcher is facing the pintle-mounted machine gun, to roughly only -3 degrees. Therefore, you should try to always have the front of the hull facing the direction of the battlefield, to avoid the launcher suddenly jerking up when the machine gun gets into the way, which will also guide the missile upwards (if launched), and therefore miss the target. Horizontal guidance is also limited, and the launcher will stop rotating at ±45 degrees. The best way to counter this drawback will be to play it like other turret-less tank destroyers, like the ISU-122 and the ISU-152, which must rotate the hull to assist with aiming at extreme angles.
Even though the CM25 is mounted with a heavy machine gun, attempting to combat helicopters and planes is not recommended unless the situation is desperate, as doing so will only grab unwanted attention from both the air and ground. Aircraft at this rank are often equipped with HE rockets, only one of which is necessary to destroy your vehicle thanks to the hull-break mechanic, and if not, the vast majority of aircraft-mounted guns will be able to penetrate from any angle.
If you find yourself in a close quarters situation, the best method of survival will be to use the machine gun to cause some levels of distraction, while attempting to retreat to the nearest cover. Do note that your machine gun does have a relatively impressive penetration of 31 mm at close range, which can allow you to take out lightly armoured targets like the M3 Bradley (in the turret with some luck), AUBL/74, Falcon etc., yet should still be avoided if possible due to these vehicles possessing much better close quarters capabilities and will have no problem in shredding the CM25.
Enemies worth noting:
- Helicopters eg. AH-1, UH-1, etc: helicopters are always a great threat to you. Although at the start of the match they cannot equip ATGMs, they are still able to carry lots of deadly rockets, posing a great threat to the CM25's weak hull. When an enemy helicopter is roaming nearby and showering the ground with rockets, the safest option is to stay in cover or be stationary, to make it harder for the helicopter to see you. Your only effective defensive weapon against them is the 12.7 mm MG (unless you are very skilled and can manually guide the ATGM to hit them). Only open fire when the helicopter is extremely near, for example within 400 m. Your MG can only damage light helicopters like the UH-1 but not armoured ones. Continuously spray bullets at it until it starts to turn towards you, and quickly retreat back into cover as any helicopter can easily destroy you with a few rockets.
- M60A1 RISE (P), M60A3 TTS: these tanks are covered with ERA which are pretty much designed to counter chemical warheads like your TOW missiles. When the CM25's TOW missile hits them, their ERA always detonate, leaving the tanks themselves unharmed, so it is not recommended to shoot them when their ERA are still present. If they are quite far away, you can choose to break their gun barrels or tracks to make them defenceless or immobile. If they are close enough, you can use your 12.7 mm MG to destroy their ERA first. Do not spray, fire in quick bursts and focus on a few blocks of ERA, as the bullets seem to spread out a lot in a continuous fire which will decrease the damage to the ERA you want to destroy. The MG is rather effective at destroying these modules. Once those ERA are gone use the TOW to hit the uncovered areas. The most straightforward method is to just fire a missile at them, destroying a bunch of ERA and fire another one at the uncovered area. However this method will give them more than 10 seconds of reaction time so make sure that you are well concealed and will not get spotted before the next missile is loaded.
- M901: this is a similar vehicle based on the M113 hull, with an interesting and unique TOW launcher. The launcher has 360 degrees horizontal rotation and 30 degrees gun depression meaning it adapts terrains better than the CM25. Furthermore, its gunner is not exposed which increases its fighting capacity, so you must deal with the M901 carefully. In a battle, your CM25 and the M901 might be at similar spots which is kind of a sniper vs sniper scenario. Do not get hit by it, as your gunner/launcher will detonate its missile and the shrapnel will splash down, knocking out all the crew or causing a hull break. Try to fire first or hide until his attention shifts.
Modules
| Tier | Mobility | Protection | Firepower | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| I | Tracks | Parts | Horizontal drive | ||
| II | Suspension | Brake System | FPE | TOW-2B | |
| III | Filters | Crew Replenishment | Elevation Mechanism | ||
| IV | Transmission | Engine | NVD | Smoke grenade | |
Pros and cons
Summarise and briefly evaluate the vehicle in terms of its characteristics and combat effectiveness. Mark its pros and cons in a bulleted list. Try not to use more than 6 points for each of the characteristics. Avoid using categorical definitions such as "bad", "good" and the like - use substitutions with softer forms such as "inadequate" and "effective".
Pros:
Cons:
History
Describe the history of the creation and combat usage of the vehicle in more detail than in the introduction. If the historical reference turns out to be too long, take it to a separate article, taking a link to the article about the vehicle and adding a block "/History" (example: https://wiki.warthunder.com/(Vehicle-name)/History) and add a link to it here using the main template. Be sure to reference text and sources by using <ref></ref>, as well as adding them at the end of the article with <references />. This section may also include the vehicle's dev blog entry (if applicable) and the in-game encyclopedia description (under === In-game description ===, also if applicable).
Media
Excellent additions to the article would be video guides, screenshots from the game, and photos.
See also
Links to the articles on the War Thunder Wiki that you think will be useful for the reader, for example:
- reference to the series of the vehicles;
- links to approximate analogues of other nations and research trees.
External links
| China tank destroyers | |
|---|---|
| PLA | |
| Gun vehicles | PLZ83 · PTZ89 |
| Missile vehicles | AFT09 |
| ROC | |
| Missile vehicles | CM25 |
| USA | |
| Gun vehicles | ␗M8 HMC · LVT(A)(4) (ZiS-2) · ␗M10 GMC · ␗M36 GMC |
| Missile vehicles | ␗M113A1 (TOW) |
| USSR | |
| Gun vehicles | ␗SU-76M · ␗ISU-152 · ␗ISU-122 · ␗SU-100 |
