Where has all the Power Gone

[rcaf_777]

Here a good website that I found

http://www.combatreform.org/batterychargesolution.htm

It deals with battery charging solutions

[Schone23666]

I couldn't help but notice something...my inner warning klaxon went off when I noticed this was under the "Combat Reform.org" website.

Sparks? As in, that crazy nutjob who's had an obsession with using the M113 for just about every role imagined and otherwise, and has a tendency to go off on various rants? Isn't this one of his sites?

[StainlessSteelCynic]

Yep, that's the nutjob's site all right and it looks like he's still giving misleading information to push his own agenda.

For example, he's written "We have an incredible array of batteries to power our night vision devices yet NO WAY TO RECHARGE THEM". Now I am not certain about the latest NVDs because I haven't used them (and I haven't bothered to do a google search) but all the personal NVDs I'd used in the 1980s-1990s were US made and powered by the very common AA battery - certainly not "an incredible array" by any stretch of the imagination.**

And although some of the other things in that article show how little attention Spark's pays to the practical side of a soldier's job (e.g. how often does Sparks think soldiers have the time on operations to use a hand crank to recharge some batteries?) a lot of the material is certainly suitable for T2k use.

** I'm talking specifically about smallarms weapon scopes and goggles, the larger devices typically had (no surprise!) much larger batteries/battery packs.

[raketenjagdpanzer]

Mike S**rks is a lunatic.

Ignore ignore ignore anything on his webpage. Anything. If he says water is wet and dust is dry, best check your faucets and sandbox before you pass the word. If he says the sun rises in the east and sets in the west ask him to show you a map and compass and tell you what he thinks east and west are.

Things he believes are true:

Glide-droppable (that is, M113s with stubby wings) M113s are do-able because the Russians had that glide tank they dicked around with in the late 1930s.

M113s can shrug off main tank gun rounds because the Israelis used the M113 as a test-bed for some long-rod defeating armor experiments.

The eeeeeevol M2 mafia snuck in at night like the Grinch in Whoville and stole the M113s amphibious capability and won't give it back (it was actually the process of making the M113 7.62mm-proof that did it).

The Martin P6M Seamaster is viable today.

He regularly circulates jihadi videos of M1s, M2s, Bradleys and Strykers being blown up by IEDs proclaiming that the glorious m113 "G&vin" would have miraculously survived (and will also use shocking images of burned out AAV-7s and so forth stating that the commanders who used them in combat instead of M113s are guilty of war crimes because they got the troops in them killed by using the "wrong" vehicles).

He has confabulated multiple lies about his military service to try and bolster his "M113 uber alles" position including stating he's an Airborne commander, officer in charge of procurement for the Army, and so on when all anyone can determine is that he was some desk jockey holding none of the titles he's given himself.

Fuck him.

[The Rifleman]

Holy crap that is totally insane. Any of us that know a darn thing about armor know that an M113 can't handle much in the way of a hit. All you have to do is crack a book about armor in Vietnam and see that RPG2s and 7s were quite lethal against their thin sides.

Back in the 90s, I drove the M577 variant when I was with a tank battalion HQ, our scouts used the M901 ITV with the "hammerhead" tow launcher, and I borrowed a straight up M109 mortar carrier for one training problem as an OPFOR scout carrier.

Don't get me wrong, the old girls got the job done, but they had some serious limitations. They were just too slow and they didn't handle off road as well M1s and M2s. They pitched and rolled too much and the gun system was pretty basic. In Iraq, I had a platoon of M113s attached to me. I used them a few times at NTC, but once we got into theater, they never left the base. Too slow and couldn't hold up to an IED.

All that being said, in the world of T2k, the M113 is like a mobile foxhole. It will bring your .50 or Mk19 up to shoot without a hassel and you're infantry can ride as opposed to walking, in a vehicle with a couple big hatches and get out quickly.