M113A2 RCWS-30. Rafael's good turret on bad chassis

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i would like to suggest a tank whose chassis would be obsolete for the BR his turret allows, the M113A2 RCWS-30

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By the name, it might easily be mistaken for another variant of the M113 with RCWS-30, only this one is very different, it does not include the upgraded chassis to M113A3 standard, and does not include ERA armor or APS. you can support the M113A3 RCWS-30 which can be seen as more advanced variant of the M113A2 RCWS-30 in this suggestion following this link

the M113A2 RCWS 30 was a prototype and technology demonstrator of the RCWS 30. it was a proof of concept of the turret aiming for export. built by Rafael, a military corporation of Israel, the tank was an M113A2 on which was mounted an RCWS-30 turret. this design was built around mid-2010 and tested. it was used for gathering technical data of the turret and the capacity to upgrade light vehicles. this do not specifically aim to upgrade the M113, it aims to export the turret to light vehicles in general such as BMP, FV432, Boxer, Bradley, and M113. if a country happen to want the turret for their M113, that was proven to be possible. this tank (or an identical version) was presented publicly in 2017. the concept was a success as the turret was exported to a couple country, but not for the M113.

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Firepower

the main armament is dual. the primary armament is the 30mm Mk.44 Bushmaster II which is a powerful auto-cannon capable of saving you from difficult situations. the 2nd main armament is the Spike Missiles which can deal with armoured targets. those missiles are a type of “fire-and-forget” but require to first lock on the targets. once the target is locked, you fire the missiles and it would hit the targets or at least will if everything go well. after you fire the missiles, you can drive away without waiting or engaging other targets. the missiles will fly on their own. but depending on the models of missiles, it will take some time to lock on the targets, you cannot just arrive on the battlefield and fire your missiles right away. a bit like the jets, you will need to first aim at the targets for a few seconds. which will cause the targets to have a good chance to spot you (even more if it has an LWS) and destroy you even before you fire. 2 missiles are ready to fire, and probably a few more are stored inside the tank (4 would be good). the turret is remotely controlled and stabilized on Line-of-sight. on top of being (assumedly) pretty fast, it would be capable of engaging medium armor with efficiency. the elevation being -20°/+60° allows the players to fight in all environments and even engage aircraft once in a while. the gun has 200 rounds ready to use stored on the right side of the turret in the ammo box. The gun is dual feed making it capable of switching from an anti-tank round to a high explosive one intentionally. the turret has redundancy control making the Commander and Gunner have full control of the turret. a coaxial 7.62mm is naturally placed on the turret. with 460 rounds ready to use

For those that didn’t like to read the full text, here is a resume of the good feature

  • Dual control (Commander & gunner)
  • Dual feed (two belt are feeding the gun for a total of 200 rounds)
  • Stabilized
  • Night vision
  • High elevation
  • fast rotation
  • fire-and-forget ATGM launcher (need to first lock on targets)


Mobility

The mobility of this tank is based on the weight and power of the engine. the turret with his ammo weighed 1.6 tonnes, the chassis weighed 11.3 tonnes. this allows us to estimate the total weight to 12.9 tonnes, which for a M113 is pretty normal. the engine is a General Motors 6V53 provides 215 hp at 2800 rpm. it would give the power/weight of 16.66 hp ton. which is not very great for a light tank of this rank, but it would give a power/weight similar to the M24 chaffee which is not so bad. it will not break the mobility record but it would be playable. the top speed would reach 64 km/h and 15 km/h backward, which is not bad at the end. this tank is amphibious with a water speed of 5.4 km/h

Protection

The armor of this specific M113 is pretty basic. made of aluminum, it would be a bit weak despite its good thickness. barely capable of protecting against HMG at some distance, it would be still enough to protect the tank against Shrapnel and some damage. but it remains a light tank so the protection is not expected to be a great feature. the crew of 3 are inside the hull. a driver sits at the front, while the commander and gunner sit side by side in the middle of the tank under the turret.

sources

Turret

Chassis

armour package

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