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Old 03-01-2011, 10:23 AM
dragoon500ly dragoon500ly is offline
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Location: East Tennessee, USA
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Quote:
Originally Posted by HorseSoldier View Post
113A3s can hang pretty well.

M901s were underpowered and pokey things even compared to pre-A3 113s, though.

I still suspect that late in the Twilight War, a lot of them would have the 901 components just scrapped or cannibalized for used elsewhere and basically be converted back to M113s, or as close as DISCOM maintenance assets could manage by 1999-2000.
The M-901 is certainly underpowered for its weight class, but then hang about 1,800kg of hammerhead turret and don't change out the engine....

The biggest drawbacks of the M-901 is that it is top-heavy, even with the hammerhead in the down position; under-powered due to the above mentioned failure to up-engine the thang when the funny-looking thang was added on top. Another major failure is that the hydralic system, well SUCKS!!! I've seen hammerheads fail to extend/retract, fail to spin, fail to stop spinning and flat out say to hell with it all and blow thier lines.

To its advantage...a M-901 in a down postion with the hammerhead just barely exposed is a nightmare to spot before it fires. It has a decent thermal sight and is a vast improvement over the old M-150...

Still, given the choice of crewing a Hammerhead or crewing a M-1A1....give me the Abrams, hands down!
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