Comments on: GCV — Tracked, Auto Guns, 40 Tons?

By: Scott

Scott — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 09:41:44 +0000

My idea: procure an Americanized version of the cv90 family. I believe there are versions in production or developed that fill all of the armys roles for the gcv. Additionally, this vehicle could leverage tech developed for FCS like band tracks, active protection, and hybrid drive to give us a family of vehicles that is able to be quickly developed, deployed, and affordable. To keep costs down further, the US and UK could also share development costs as the fres program is very similar. Imagine the costs that could be saved by having a family of vehicles that have a high parts commonality and easy interoperability with our closest ally.

By: macman1138

macman1138 — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 02:07:04 +0000

Put an auto loader in it and run it!

By: DStarseer

DStarseer — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 16:47:59 +0000

I’ve been reading about this on various sites and was directed here.
Something I haven’t seen anyone commenting on yet was, “… Chief of Staff Gen. Gorge Casey said it’s still too early in the process to know what it will look like, though he did leave people guessing if he was right about its weight being 25,000 pounds.…”

25,000 pounds?
(where did this guy do his career again, exactly?)

The FCS platforms couldn’t do as promised in their orignial hoped-for 20 tons weight, to the point it was anticipated production vehicles could exceed 27 tons.
And yet here someone has the audacity (stupidity?) to suggest 25,000 pounds?
That’s a mere 12&1/2 tons…might as well buy those Stormer AFVs, the ones developed by improving on the 9-ton Scorpion CVR(T) family.

And to think they were worried about adequate protection at 20 tons?
Was this originally drawn up on April 1st, or am I the only one who isn’t getting the joke?

By: FormerDirtDart

FormerDirtDart — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 21:43:08 +0000

The vehicle exits on paper only thus far, awful hard to test it against anything more deadly than a stapler.

By: Meltzer

Meltzer — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 14:39:02 +0000

Has this vehicle been tested by an IED and a shaped charge?

By: Eddy

Eddy — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 22:37:26 +0000

The potential of the vehicle will only upgrade the potential of the IED, such a heavy vehicle once stuck, stays stuck. Not the way to go!
Eddy

By: Colonial-Marine

Colonial-Marine — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 20:32:44 +0000

With a weight of 40–50 tons I presume it is a tracked vehicle. With a 9–10 troop capacity I like the potential of this vehicle.

A 40–50 ton vehicle would have plenty of armor protection, possibly comparable to some MBTs. Add an unmanned turret with 30mm or 35mm autocannon, coax MG, and ATGM launcher, and you have one hell of an IFV to replace the Bradley.

By: Guest

Guest — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 19:39:35 +0000

Apart from the dismount numbers to be carried you have described the German Puma almost exactly!

By: cardiff kid

cardiff kid — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 17:54:55 +0000

A 40 ton APC? Just where are you going to drive that thing? Basically only on roads and flat terrain. They seem to design systems based on the war we just fought, instead of thinking outside the box. Say we had the thing right now. Would it be any good in Afghanistan? No, all it would be is a bomb magnet on the one highway in the country. Also, what is with this trend of putting big cannons on APC’s? That is not the role of such vehicles, they are not tanks and they are not mobile artillary. I hope they haven’t spent so much money on it that they can’t turn back, because they need to get back to the drawing board.

By: mike j

mike j — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 16:54:16 +0000

Gary & Jeff– good points. I think it’s useful to point out that we’re dealing with IEDs now because we got behind the power curve with these COIN/ Nation-building ops and the insurgencies got too organized. Maybe we ought to deal with the strategic/ tactical/ operational issues we’re having rather than (or in addition to) trying to fix our screw-ups with new hardware.

By: Jeff

Jeff — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 14:13:57 +0000

A decent amount of money is already being spent on finding IED’s. This is one contributing reason that there have been fewer fatalities, more and more are disarmed. Its just that spotting them is not full proof. Survivability requires layers of protection, spotting and detection is only the first layer to that defense. If IED’s get “bigger” it only makes them easier to detect, allowing the sum of the two layers of defense to be more than the sum of its parts.

Maybe the best way to avoid mission creep on the GCV is to reduce requirments for the turret and weapon systems and have a number of dedicated gun platforms. What necessitates larger weapons on these types of troop combat vehicles is a lack of light tanks that traditionally provided this sort of close infatry fire support. Multiple roles in one, will always sacrifice something or increase the weight.

By: Daniel Russ

Daniel Russ — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 13:57:08 +0000

Doesn’t seem like too much of a variation on the old MBT designs.

Daniel Russ
Civilianmilitaryintelligencegroup.com

By: Gary

Gary — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 13:06:50 +0000

Maybe we should spend some of that money on R & D to find the IED’s

By: Gary

Gary — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 13:05:20 +0000

If you build it to withsatnd an IED, the IED will get bigger and better too

By: MRT

MRT — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 04:35:53 +0000

BAE has a Bradley tech demonstrator with an unmanned turret. The VC and Gunner sit in the crew compartment and look at flat-screens to see through the viewports. It frees up alot of space inside , since you don’t have to rotate people around. I think the TD fit 8 or 9 dismounts versus 6 in the current M2A3 Bradley.

By: Zach

Zach — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 01:07:16 +0000

“As for weapons systems, to fit both a turret bustle, such as that on BAE’s Bradley fighting vehicle, and a squad into a vehicle, would require a very large vehicle. That may push industry into going with an unmanned turret”

That’s good, the enemy loves seeing soldiers sitting ontop of a big bullet magnet. Especially snipers.

As the ETA on a fielding date is 2017, that gives multiple defense secretaries, and a couple new administrations the chance to screw with the requirements. (As TMB posted)

By: TMB

TMB — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 20:01:17 +0000

I sincerely hope they don’t fatten this thing up so that it sucks at everything like they did the Bradley and the EFV. Mission creep and adding more toys is the death of any acquisition program.