Swedish pbv 401 or 407/Russian MTLB
 

Somewhere in the 90's Swedish Goverment bought around 700 MTLB/MTLBu's from united Germany (former East German stock of armor).

Couple of years ago I was involved with half of a leg in a study where the aim was to upgrade the pbv 401 to something with more teeths.
Enter the pbv 407 concept.

The study pointed out for instance
- change of the engine (more fuel efficient diesel)
- new gearbox
- broader tracks (better performance in marches and snow)
- similar turret as the AAVP7 (Mk-19/M2Hb-combo one man turret)
and some more changes that I don't remember any longer.

Swedish armed forces has for many decades upgraded their old stuff to fit a new game of warfare (centurion tank, AJS 37 "Viggen" etc...)
So what do you think guys, is this the future also for say old M113/M113A1 etc... to be upgraded thru the war or say weeks or months before the T2k war begins.

Antti

One of the keys to the M113s long service life-span has been its ability to be modified for just about every possible combination of weapons.

That and the fact that as armored vehicles go, its just about as dirt cheap as they come!

And it's worth what you pay for it, which is next to nothing, since it takes very little to kill the thing -- and the poor troops inside. Makes for a half-decent rain shelter, though.

I don't know about other countries, Antti, but I think the U.S. would have been working on adding extra stand-off armor, much like the Israeli "Toga" steel mesh perforated screens or even lighweight reactive armor packages like those fitted to the Israeli "Classical" variant of the M113, instead of adding turrets and heavier armaments. This would have upped the M113's battlefield survivability, allowing it to survive hits from up to 14.5mm AP rounds and possibly RPGs. Aside from its crap armor, the M113 is a relatively reliable, innexpensive, and easy to operate APC and the U.S. had thousands of them in stock in the late '80s and early '90s. No sense in letting them all sit when there's a world war on.

I think that turrets fitting autocannon would have been added after the war started and the U.S. found that it couldn't produce enough M2s to meet the demands. This is the justification given in the U.S. Army Vehicle Guide for the [IRL hypothetical] M115A1 (see Jame's Langham's thread on that particular variant). Of course, IIRC, the Dutch and possibly the Belgians operated modified M113s fitted with light turrets and 20mm guns. So, it certainly can be done.

The BRG-15 tends to get forgotten alot by many T2Kers. I think this is because we are all so knowledgeable about RL weapon systems we tend to overlook weapons that were included in T2K canon but were not fielded or widely used IRL.

The BRG-15 is an excellent weapon. Like the 14.5mm KPV (which WAS widely used IRL) the 15mm BRG-15 kind of straddles the line between HMG and AC. When taking into consideration factors such as weapon and ammo weight and volume the BRG-15 would do rather nicely as a turret or cupola-mounted weapon for up-gunned M-113 variants.

According to T2K canon (specifically the RDF Sourcebook) the BRG-15 "uses the NATO Heavy Tripod and partially replaced the M2HB in the US Marine Corps and the Israeli Defence Force". Obviously once Belgium gets swallowed up by the FBU there will be no sales of that weapon system from there but isn't it standard for any weapon system widely issued to US forces to be manufactured under license in the CONUS?

Following along on a similar line of thought the ASP 30 autocannon might be another possibility for an up-gunned M-113 variant. It fires the same round as the AH-64 Apache's chaingun but is gas powered and fits on the NHT. And once there are few Apaches flying there will be lots of ammo that won't otherwise be being used.

I always loved the idea of the ASP and the BRG-15. I reckon in a T2K world they would be widespread enough. A couple of ASP's could ruin a marauder bands day :-) Would HMMWV's be able to mount an ASP or would the recoil be too much?

I very much agree.

Should be able to. I don't think recoil would be the problem (it specifically states it can be fired from a NATO Heavy Tripod) but I do wonder whether the weapon's dimensions would be incompatible with the ring mount/gunshield you see on many Hummers. If I had to guess I would say it could be fitted to and fired from a HMMWV with no problems.

NM - 135 - " Chaaarge!!!"
 

Reading about the M-113 is a bit nostalgic. Up here in Norway we used them in all possible configurations - ambulances, TOW carries,Mortar wagons, plain old configuration, command vehicles, ammo carrier and more - but also ..tadaddaaaa!

THE NM-135
enclosed link

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NM135

http://stormesk3.com/index.php?page=setermoen

I served 2 years riding one of these babies. Admittedly it had a few drawbacks. The sights were from the 1960s..no stabilization..mediocre performance in snowy terrain..armour could be penetrated by small arms fire.. but it did get us about, it seldom broke down ( relatively speaking), it packed a punch if you could bring the tube to bear and of course it was filled to the brim with MG-3 machineguntoting, 84 MM Carl Gustav wieldingstormtroopers...

Luckily the operational use was limited. But still - it was mech infantry with an IFV - on a budget.. Now we have the Cv90-30. It is solid and bad ass.

Yes it can, and quite easily too. When the Humvee was being developed the ASP30 was being developed as well, with the intention of having it be the primary heavy weapon for it. The ring mount was specifically designed to deal with the recoil forces, and remember, the 30mm round fired by the AH64's 30mm cannon isn't all that huge: When I was a kid I stole my dads dummy round to show my friends at school, and got it in by placing it in a pencil tin. It was that short.