Posted on 11/19/2003 5:11:35 AM PST by Cannoneer No. 4
CAMP UDAIRI, Kuwait - Pfc. Gerard Minnitto normally packs a light machine gun, but these days the Stryker brigade infantryman from Tacoma is turning a wrench.
He's among the soldiers and General Dynamics contractors working around the clock to bolt slat armor onto the brigade's fleet of more than 300 Strykers before they move up into Iraq.
The armor - each looking like a great green cage - is meant to protect the $2 million vehicles and the soldiers inside from rocket-propelled grenades. The inexpensive shoulder-fired RPGs are ubiquitous in Iraq and have killed dozens of U.S. troops.
Naturally, Minnitto and his buddies hope the awkward-looking steel contraptions will do the trick, absorbing the worst of the RPGs like a catcher's mask does a baseball. They're optimistic, although a bit skeptical.
And when you get right down to it, there's only one way to find out for sure.
"When I see the first time an RPG hits it," the Mount Tahoma High School graduate said, "then I'll know whether it works."
The idea behind the cage armor goes back at least to his days in Vietnam, said John Funk, the General Dynamics logistics support manager. Troops in that war improvised with chicken wire and other means to counter the RPG threat.
The idea is to detonate the grenade away from the vehicle and prevent its hot chemical reaction from boring through and causing burns, shock and shrapnel wounds.
The Army is working with General Dynamics, the Stryker manufacturer, on a kind of plate armor that will defeat RPGs. But that's not due until the Army develops the third of its six planned Stryker brigades in 2005.
The Army and the contractor have been working on the interim slat armor solution for about nine months, said Maj. Todd Thomas from the Stryker program management office at the U.S. Army Tank and Automotive Command in Warren, Mich.
Thomas has deployed to Kuwait with the brigade and will go north with it to Iraq, where he will work out of a repair and maintenance yard.
So will about 50 of the 100 or so General Dynamics mechanics who are working with about 50 Stryker soldiers to prepare the vehicles for combat duty. For now, they're set up in two new "sprung shelters" - big bubble hangars with room to comfortably fit eight Strykers each.
The work, which began last week, ought to take about 14 days, Thomas said. He doesn't know how much the additional armor cost to develop and install.
The soldiers are mostly infantrymen like Minnitto, temporarily assigned to the slat armor detail.
"It sounds good to me," said Pfc. Gabriel Deroo, a light machine gunner from Paw Paw, Mich. "I mean, any extra armor is good."
Spc. Rod "Buster" Potter, a Stryker vehicle commander from Caldwell, Idaho, said he gets the concept behind the armor. But he said he'd feel better if he'd seen a live test demonstration or a video of the slats in action.
Thomas said the armor has been tested.
"They did test it, and it did very well in testing," he said. "We have a high sense of confidence."
The extra armor weighs about 5,200 pounds, [emphasis Cannoneer No. 4's] about 3,000 pounds lighter than the add-on anti-RPG armor that's under development for later Stryker brigades, said Howard Warner, another official with the General Dynamics logistics support team.
Soldiers said they figure the heavy armor cages, sticking a foot and a half off the front, rear and sides, may cut into the Stryker's speed and maneuverability.
But they recounted an incident from their last training exercise before they left Fort Lewis in which a Stryker hit a ditch and was saved from rolling over by the bulky slat cage.
And while some think the cage is ugly, Potter said he thinks it might help discourage adversaries in Iraq.
"I think it looks intimidating," he said.
Ugly. Intimidating. Whatever.
"I don't care what it looks like," said Pvt. Joshua Blankenship, "as long as it keeps us safe."
Michael Gilbert: mjgilbert41@yahoo.com
(Published 12:01AM, November 19th, 2003)
I have a question for all you military knowledgeable: what about using reactive armor?
Yes. I'm a former Army ordnance technician and engineer demolition specialist, and worked for both the Army and Navy as an Ordnance technician in the ammunition field, though I'm short an engineering degree. But see the details in my post #13 as for why it's a problem.
-archy-/-
Thank you for the reality update, it just made my day.
G-d Bless America and G-d Bless American Soldiers.
They're way ahead of you, the dual-charge PG7VR should handle that task just fine. Intended to blast through reactive applique armor, the first smaller explosive charge clears the way for the second. But that shouldn't be much of a problem; the primary threat we're faced with is the ammunition and rockets already distributed in-country and in the hands of those who would attach Americans.
I find it unforgivable that the Government failed to consult you during the concept phase.
Spall, HEAT jet, and overpressure. Let's hope the crew is riding on top.
The good news is that with .50 ammunition aboard, the chances of a secondary explosion are pretty minimal. The bad news is that those vehicles with 40mm Mark 19 grenade launchers fitted and High Explosive HEDP rounds carried aboard may have some problems.
-archy-/-
Sure. The M2 and M3 Bradley are full-tracked, seriously armored infantry fighting vehicles, armed with a 25mm [usually] automatic cannon and TOW missile antitank launcher. Loaded with troops, they're an Infantry tool; fitted with extra weapons and recon scout teams with Antitank launchers and radios, they're a scouting vehicle with a little less profile than a 60-ton tank. Still, the Bradley approaches the weight and bulk of a WWII Sherman tank. Bradleys:
Stryker was meant to be a much lighter wheeled vehicle, also capable of transporting an infantry unit, but not for them to fight from. At around half the weight of the Bradley, it would have been capable of being moveed around in-theater [in Iraq, for example] if not necessarily transported from the US to the theatre that way. But the add-ons have kicked Stryker's weight up to between 23 and 25 tons, far beyond it's design weight, and degrading performance, on road and off. The high center of gravity required by the design [both sets of front wheels steer] makes it very suceptable to rolling over, particularly if the wheels on one side go off-road into soft sand or mud. And mines are a major threat. Still,, the Russians have successfully used their BTR 8-wheeled vehicles for four generations of development...but took horrible levels of casualties among BTR crews in Afghanistan and Chechnya.
Stryker is more lightly armed than a Bradley, with only a .50 machinegun or a short-range 40mm grenade launcher, though a tank-killing gun version is under consideration. Stryker:
Coyote is a Canadian scout vehicle that performs pretty much the role of their old Lynx M113-type vehicle. It is a little like the LAV 25 wheeled light armored vehicle used by US Marines, with a 25mm cannon, except that it also has a very sophisticated suite of sensors. It has an extendable mast, a dismountable control console, digital commo links, ground surveillance radar, laser range finder, and a laser target designator for Copperhead 155 guided projectiles. It has the same size problem as other armored vehicles, but comes closer to being a practicle vehicle that does its job well than the *one size fits all* Strykers. The Canadians also use specialized wheeled fighting vehicles arranged for other specific battlefield tasks, though they share common automotive parts and armament packages: Cougar, the Grizzly, and the Husky make up the CVLAP program, along with the recon vehicle, the Coyote:
Certainly. If crew survivability and practicality and utility had been the most important criteria during the vehicles' acquisition phase.
You're supposed to develop weapons with some aprreciation of the threat they will face. RPGs have been around since Viet Nam--so it's not as though they are a new surprise.
Not a problem if the Stryker is used primarily in a couple of its originally intended purposes: to replace the German-built Fox 8-wheeled armored car that's used as a chemical and radiological weapons sensor vehicle. And as an armored utility vehicle for combat engineers, or for the MPs at roadbliock checkpoints and convoy excorts, since the superior MP ASV developed for that purpose has been cancelled. But Stryker, like the Bradly, can't be air-dropped or LAPES-delivered, nor easily moved around by C130. And it's not amphibious, though the Marine LAV and Canadian Coyotr are.
? I have no faith in the Pentagon's ability to develop weapons without enriching the contractors in stead of protecting the troops.
Like I said, other priorities come first before crew survivability or practical utility.
-archy-/-
Mix in a couple of V-100's 150's, and you had a pretty secure package, as long as everybody else in the convoy understood their jobs.
Quote of The Week material
If anybody would have a pic of such, I expect it would be you.
Mix in a couple of V-100's 150's, and you had a pretty secure package, as long as everybody else in the convoy understood their jobs.
We frequently had a Sheridan or two along too, sometimes M48s. If necessary, they can be towed on lowboy flatbeds, having been loaded by being backed on so they can drive straight off in the event they're suddenly open for business.
A couple of 81mm or 4.2" mortar vehicles were sometimes along as well. Nowadays, that'd be a 120mm mortar, even better unless it's the Stryker version, from which the tube can't be fired from inside the vehicle, but hast to be dragged outside and set up on a baseplate outside.
There are, however some pretty neat breechloading 120s available for the M113 chassis. And even a 160mm mortar version or two....
The General Electric turret with multiple stingers and a Gatling gun would seem a nice addition to a Stryker for such use. Of course it'd weigh in at nearly 30 tons, a bit much on the already overstressed axles.
-archy-/-
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