2007.12.25 LeoC2GV 005

As a replacement for the Centurion Tank, Canada acquired 127 Leopard C1 tanks (equivalent to Leopard 1A3 with laser rangefinder) in 1978–79 for its Land Forces, with 114 being put into service. Most of these tanks were stationed in Germany during the Cold War, with a few retained at Canadian Forces Base Gagetown, New Brunswick for training. In 1976, prior to delivery of these new Leopards, the Canadian government leased 35 Leopard 1A2 tanks from the contractor in order to begin training crews from the 4 Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group (4CMBG) based in West Germany. These tanks equipped the Royal Canadian Dragoons (RCD) that competed against other NATO tank crews and won the Canadian Army Tank competition in 1977.

While investigating the possibilities of increasing the Leopards' armour prior to a refit, turret armour on close-up inspection was 1.5" + turret wall cast .75" steel, 'belly' armour was approx. 2.25" + cast frame steel 0.75" steel, skirt covering treads (tracks) was 1" rubber – not steel, but additional armour was applied on the forward half of the skirt during the refit as well as increased 0.6" steel on the upper hull sides and 1.1" steel on the upper Glacis – although only a small handful of C1s received a complete refit. The refit also included adding thermal night-vision equipment, five or six Leopard C1 tanks had an extremely thick MEXAS appliqué armour kit applied, made by German firm IBD Deisenroth Engineering. These tanks, designated Leopard C1 MEXAS, served with Lord Strathcona's Horse (Royal Canadians) in the 1999 KFOR mission in Kosovo. They were later upgraded with the same sights and fire-control system as the Leopard C2.

Starting in 2000, the 114 Leopard C1 tanks in service were upgraded to C2 standard at a cost of CAD $139 million. The turrets of 123 surplus Leopard 1A5 tanks purchased from the German Defence Ministry were fitted into the existing hulls (nine turrets were reserved for spare parts and training), and the German tank hulls sold back to the upgrade contractor. The Leopard C2 is also equipped with thermal sights and EMES 18 fire-control system. Eighteen Leopard Crew Gunnery Trainers were purchased at the same time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leopard_1

...BravoZulu, are any of these tanks part of the 100 Leopards that we put up for sale that nobody wanted and what happend to them? Very good stuff by the way!

Cheers mate, I believe these C2's are still rotting in storage and are proving almost impossible to shift to another user. They are neither one thing or another, more than a Leo 1 but not up to Leo 2 standard. It seems they will be slated to be scrapped eventually