Tank origin

Originally, Romania had planned to fit its indigenous main battle tanks with an 800-hp engine similar to that of the Leopard 1. Trade restrictions between Warsaw Pact nations and NATO, however, prevented Romania from importing one for use in the TR-580. As a result, Romania pursued an aggressive reverse engineering program to produce its own engine, which it used along with such components as a 100mm gun with a fume extractor and thermal sleeve, to create the TR-85.