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I found this interesting in todays USA Today newspaper, front page of the Money section. I guess I'm behind the times and/or not as well informed as I thought I was. I didn't really know this vehicle, the M1117 ASV, (Armored Security Vehicle) was being purchased and used by the U.S.Army. It seems that lasy July, the Army agreed to buy 724 of the ASV's at a cost of about 500million dollars, about $700,000 per vehicle. Sounds like alot till you consider a Stryker cost 2 Million a piece!! Some spec's on the vehicle are as follows, quoted from USA Todays article;
Crew- 3
Weight- 14.8 tons
Ground Clearance- 18inches
Engine- 260hp
Speed- 63mph, (however 70mph as been reached)
Range- 440 miles
Height- 8'-5"
Width- 8'-4"
Length- 19'-9"
Manufacturer- Texron, in Louisiana
Its seems they build 32 per month, and once they get 6 completed, they are loaded onto transport planes and flown directly to Iraq. Texron plans to deliver 450 this year alone, worth 315million dollars. The article mentions that as the ASV proves its self in Iraq, "Army orders have grown to 1,200 vehicles worth 840million dollars".
The vehicle has a turret that rotates 360 degrees armed with 40mm grenade launcher and 12.77mm MG. This enables the crew to fire, reload, and fix stoppages from inside without exposing themselves as on the Hummers that the vehicle is designed to replace in urban / convoy escort roles. I'm impressed with this vehicle already. I guess it comes from a 1960's era design, the V-150.

The Textron rep told me at the CANSEC show in Ottawa that the APC version sold to the Iraqis is longer, has two holes (maybe no turrets - I forget), and seats 8.

Jeff,
The genesis of this vehicle (based on the ASV-150) goes way back. It was originally introduced as the V-100 Commando, built on spec by Cadillac Gage in the mid-'60's for the services to "adopt" (hopefully) and acquired variously by the Air Force and the Army for misc. security duties. It wasn't a big commercial success then, found a bigger audience in some export markets. Some MP units in Vietnam used the V-100 for convoy escort and various airfield and other security duties...such as the one I caught here guarding the Bob Hope show at Camp Eagle, SW of Hue in '71.

I saw this vehicle up close in Yuma. Looked like it had an 8.3 liter Cummins engine (C-Series). It looked like a fine vehicle but there was one thing I did not like. The turret is manually operated only. I met the project manager and he said it was all about money. Maybe in the future it will have a powered turret.

It is a Cummins engine and all the details are here, the ASV datasheet in pdf format.............

www.systems.textron.co...asheet.pdf

Regards,

BUG

Huh! I didn't know about the manual turret on the ASV. Same goes for the (much smaller) twin mg turret on the old V-100 Commando, and - I just recently found out - for the much larger 3" gun turret on the WWII M10 TD!

The line about being able to fix stoppages from inside can be seen as a subtle slap against Stryker, that 'other' big AC in-theater.

If you're hot for an M1117, we may soon have one for Flight Simulator in great detail (based on the talents of the designer) for some ME based military scenery presently in development. Concurrent with this discussion is the following one on Hovercontrol:
(See the pics in that thread!)

64.34.169.161/cgi-bin/...entry54887

How about a V-100 based firefighting vehicle? (OK, so it was never built, but the promotional literature is pretty interesting)
Check the whole page for the brochure...

sites.hsij.nl/aba01/cadillac.htm

At the risk of (maybe) recycling old images, here's a little size comparison chart among modern transports. Remember - the 'littlest' vehicle pictured is a hummer, so that should tell you just how big the others are.

I honestly can't recall if I've posted this here before:


Oh, and yes - I threw in the name "Gavin" just to mess with y'all

Mikey pays the price for using the "G" word....

...I feel much better now.

Mike

Did you find that lucky '4 leaf clover' that you seem to be looking for???

I really don't think you'll find it under the track of that G,.....G,.....G,.....

"PC" !!!!

Don

When I talked to the project manager I suggested they try and recycle to power system from the M901 ITV. I'll bet that would work and be relatively inexpensive. But he was an MP branch officer and not familiar with what I was talking about so that went by the wayside....

Great graphic; thanks.

I understand that the turret armament is a M2 .50 Caliber and a 40mm Mark 19 grenade launcher. Does anyone know how if the turret has a "turret basket" or if there is a seat suspended that is attached to the turret as it traverses?

Haw! It took awhile for me to spot... me... flattened under the M113 tracks. Well, I rightfully got what I deserved for using the G word.

Keeping on the subject of the M1117, isn't that the Marine Corps AAV turret, with a bit of applique armor added? Does anybody know, is the turret on the AAV powered or manual? Ooops, I spot a difference, the AAV turret uses armored direct vision blocks, the M1117 turret uses periscopes.