GCV Infantry Fighting Vehicle

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Artist's concept of BAE Systems/Northrop Grumman Ground Combat Vehicle (GCV) proposal to replace the United States Army Bradley fighting vehicle.

Source:
http://www.gizmag.com/bae-gcv-hybrid-tank/25113/
 

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Artist's concept of BAE Systems/Northrop Grumman Ground Combat Vehicle (GCV) proposal to replace the United States Army Bradley fighting vehicle.

Source:
http://www.gizmag.com/bae-gcv-hybrid-tank/25113/
 

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Madurai said:
That's... a very small hatch in the back.

Its an escape hatch the entire back section is a power operated ramp. Same concept as on the Bradley and M113.
 
Surprised that for such a huge vehicle they didn't put a missile system or a heavier gun on board? 25MM just doesn't cut it now-a-days. Although this is only supposed to replace the IFV variants of the Bradley it could sure use better armament.
 
Not sure, that the quite massive rear overhang won't impede the capability to climb over obstacles.
 

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Anybody know who is sitting next to the driver? I am guessing that commander and gunner are in the turret, driver is under one of the front hatches, but who is under the second one?


I also wonder if the engine is the rear overhang. The electric transmission is definitely in front of the driver, but it doesn't seem like the engine would fit there as well.
 
This reminds me of an old (60s or so) illustration of bomber design from WW2, with a hypothetical design beginning as a clean fast bomber, getting a higher cockpit for better view, then some armament, a dorsal turret, belly turret, some more radio antennas, ... after a few (hypothetical) design stages the whole thing looked no more "clean" than a Swordfish.

The BAe proposal above mounts all the fashionable sensors (including acoustic sniper detection), is obviously means for great HEAT protection to the sides, etc: all the fashionable stuff.
What it doesn't have are sound basics.

It's neither a powerful autocannon-centric combat vehicle nor a HAPC with a strong dismount element.
sadly, this is what the development of IFVs has led us to. The original IFV idea is long gone (and was likely never really practical post-WW2).
 
lastdingo said:
This reminds me of an old (60s or so) illustration of bomber design from WW2, with a hypothetical design beginning as a clean fast bomber, getting a higher cockpit for better view, then some armament, a dorsal turret, belly turret, some more radio antennas, ... after a few (hypothetical) design stages the whole thing looked no more "clean" than a Swordfish.

Ah, you're speaking of this illustration:
(translation:
stage I : The new bomber is streamlined like a fish
stage II : The loss of speed of just 8 km/h is more, than justified better view for the crew, who now can see, when
the enemy attacks from the rear
stage III: The loss of speed of just 8 km/h due to the enlarged bomb bay carries no weight
stage IV : If the aircraft should be able to defend itself, it has to do this in all directions - cruising speed is reduced by a
further 8 km/h.
stage V : Navigational aids are necessary, of course
stage VI : Radio communication is one of the key requirements. All components are installed one after the other, cruising
speed isn't reduced by more than 8 km/h.
stage VII: If fitting of a simple device can safe just one aircraft, without losing more than some km/h, it is worth it !
stage VIII: If the construction of the aircraft can be improved by simplification, two aircraft can be buil, instead of just
one. By fitting new radial engines, the loss of speed can be reduced to just 8 km/h.
 

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AdamF said:
Anybody know who is sitting next to the driver? I am guessing that commander and gunner are in the turret, driver is under one of the front hatches, but who is under the second one?


I also wonder if the engine is the rear overhang. The electric transmission is definitely in front of the driver, but it doesn't seem like the engine would fit there as well.

Only the commander is in the turret. The two crew in the front can either drive the GCV or fire the main gun or operate UGVs and so on. The generators are in the sponsons behind the turret above the tracks. There are two of them one on each side but the left side one is the primary unit. This is the same design as the FCS MGV just with a stretched hull to accommodate a hull penetration turret.
 
lastdingo said:
The BAe proposal above mounts all the fashionable sensors (including acoustic sniper detection), is obviously means for great HEAT protection to the sides, etc: all the fashionable stuff.
What it doesn't have are sound basics.

It's neither a powerful autocannon-centric combat vehicle nor a HAPC with a strong dismount element.
sadly, this is what the development of IFVs has led us to. The original IFV idea is long gone (and was likely never really practical post-WW2).

actually it does look to have strong basics. it looks (IMO) to be a derivitive of the proven CV-90 chassis. it would have to meet the 9 man dismount requirement the army placed on the program, making it carry as many people as a Namer. the 25mm Bushmaster autocannon is a proven general duty weapon, and it meets the Army's requirement that the weapons be currently available systems. and at 70 tons this thing weighs as much as the Abrams, and is actually heavier than the Namer, meaning it is hardly a lightweight.

from the looks of things, the weight increase over the Bradley is in armor and active defensive systems. which means it actually solves the main battlefield problem of the Bradley, that being it's weak protection.
 
I find it hard to believe that such a massive vehicle is really going to be the next generation IFV. My money is on a turretless design with active defense systems and a remote weapons station, something like a CV90 Armadillo on steroids.
 
mithril said:
actually it does look to have strong basics.

Yes and it’s the strong basics that make it so big. In particular having M1 tank frontal armour level protection around 360 degrees.

mithril said:
it looks (IMO) to be a derivitive of the proven CV-90 chassis.

Nope it’s a derivative of the FCS MGV. There isn’t any CV90 in this vehicle.

mithril said:
it would have to meet the 9 man dismount requirement the army placed on the program, making it carry as many people as a Namer.

The GCV can carry 12 people inside like the Namer because it has a higher seating density. The dismount squad are carried in three rows of three seats all facing to the rear while the Namer squad is two rows of four facing inwards. There is enough room in the Namer for 12 dismounts if it adopts the GCV level of seating density. This is the advantage of not having a turret penetrate into the hull and having side armour integrated into the sponsons.
 
John21 said:
Surprised that for such a huge vehicle they didn't put a missile system or a heavier gun on board? 25MM just doesn't cut it now-a-days. Although this is only supposed to replace the IFV variants of the Bradley it could sure use better armament.

25mm is more than effective in the anti-personnel, light vehicle role. For anything harder the GCV will use the network to call in precision guided munitions (PGM) from some other asset. This is the difference to a Bradley from the 1970s that had to service most of its targets by itself without on call massed PGMs. Adding more weapons into the GCV would just make it even bigger beyond the already uppermost 70 tonne level.

Mole said:
I find it hard to believe that such a massive vehicle is really going to be the next generation IFV. My money is on a turretless design with active defense systems and a remote weapons station, something like a CV90 Armadillo on steroids.

It is possible via the off the shelf (OTS) vehicles testing element of GCV. But I would imagine this is more likely because of cost issues. Though the only OTS vehicle with the all-round armour required by GCV is the Namer.
 
Abraham Gubler said:
John21 said:
Surprised that for such a huge vehicle they didn't put a missile system or a heavier gun on board? 25MM just doesn't cut it now-a-days. Although this is only supposed to replace the IFV variants of the Bradley it could sure use better armament.

25mm is more than effective in the anti-personnel, light vehicle role. For anything harder the GCV will use the network to call in precision guided munitions (PGM) from some other asset. This is the difference to a Bradley from the 1970s that had to service most of its targets by itself without on call massed PGMs. Adding more weapons into the GCV would just make it even bigger beyond the already uppermost 70 tonne level.

Mole said:
I find it hard to believe that such a massive vehicle is really going to be the next generation IFV. My money is on a turretless design with active defense systems and a remote weapons station, something like a CV90 Armadillo on steroids.

It is possible via the off the shelf (OTS) vehicles testing element of GCV. But I would imagine this is more likely because of cost issues. Though the only OTS vehicle with the all-round armour required by GCV is the Namer.

Don't want to sound ignorant - too late - but could you 'Namer' an Abrams? Understanding the Merkava has the rear hatch for troops already my guess is too complex to do to an Abrams.
 
bobbymike said:
Don't want to sound ignorant - too late - but could you 'Namer' an Abrams? Understanding the Merkava has the rear hatch for troops already my guess is too complex to do to an Abrams.

For starters the Namer is only identical to the Merkava up to the hull floor. Everything else is a different design though of course it uses a lot of the same components including the powerpack from the Merkava Mk III. To redesign the M1 Abrams into an IFV would result in a very different vehicle than the Abrams and like the Namer the only thing the same would probably be the hull floor. If you were to rebuild surplus Abrams tanks you could only use a tiny fraction of the existing structure. When the Israelis rebuilt the T55 into the Azcharit they used a tank with an existing hull high enough for people to sit inside it. You can’t do that with the M1 as anyone in the hull needs to be reclining to fit into its low height. So you would need to do a lot of rebuilding work on the hull. Then of course you would need to rebuild the engine compartment to provide a pathway to the rear for the dismounts. There wouldn’t be much left and the level of rebuilding work would be in the same class as building new. Plus you would have all the compromises of having to rework an unsuitable base design.
 
Unless of course you take the same route the Jordanians did with their Temsah HAPC, which is a Centurion with its hull reversed, so that the engine is now in the front and the troop compartment in the rear. No need for a "passageway" then, just a new fighting compartment with a higher roof and a rear ramp/door.
 
http://defense.aol.com/2013/03/11/gcv-and-beyond-how-the-army-is-gettin-heavy-after-afghanistan/
 
Apophenia said:
That connection may answer the speculation about engine placement. The FCS MGV placed its MTU 5R 890 diesel above the portside tracks. Perhaps the GCV IFV's engine placement would be similar?

Its not speculation its how it is. As I mentioned in my post before the one you quoted:
Abraham Gubler said:
The generators are in the sponsons behind the turret above the tracks. There are two of them one on each side but the left side one is the primary unit. This is the same design as the FCS MGV just with a stretched hull to accommodate a hull penetration turret.
 
http://defense.aol.com/2013/03/22/army-issues-rfp-for-6-billion-m113-replacement-armored-multi-p/
 
http://defense.aol.com/2013/04/02/cbo-to-army-scrap-ground-combat-vehicle-buy-german-puma-break/

http://defense.aol.com/2013/04/03/gcv-contractors-to-cbo-you-graded-the-wrong-vehicle/
 
don't like to agree w/ the majors but CBO is "all over wet" Puma is a bad idea.

GCV needs 11 sqd.. even 30mm is too small needs 40-50mm gun for guided EAPS, future guided etc. rds.. + AT msles.

Distributed Ops will increasing highlight "if you didn't bring it you ain't gettin it."
 
if forced to mod an existing vehicle instead of making new custom one, i'd have picked the CV-90. it already holds 8 troops, so adding a couple of feet to the vehicle to fit 2-3 more wouldn't be too difficult. and from images of the troop bay i've seen, squeezing in a 9th guy should be possible even without a hull extension. when fitted with the up-armor kit it is almost as well protected as the Puma (which basically uses a derivative of the same kit), and there is a choice of 30mm, 35mm, and 40mm turret options. it also already has support for the kind of digital gear the army is looking it. not to mention that there are mortar, 120mm cannon, recon, and various other turret options which could be obtained to fill the various roles outside just carrying troops.
 
Puma and CV90 both have about the same amount of space for the dismount section. The difference is the Puma has vehicle system equipment in the sponsons above the tracks (exhaust, batteries, aircon) so room for two seats in the dismount bay is occupied by a box for storing equipment usually carried in the sponsons of other IFVs. The Germans however didn't want more than six dismount seats because that's the number they used on the Marder. But a modified Puma with a short exhaust pipe and other mods can displace this box and restore eight seats. The US Army requirement for nine rearward facing seats fits in the same space as eight inward facing seats. So the difference from an IFV design perspective is not much.
 
Here's a simple question--in the 21st century environment with a focus on assymetrical warfare, does every IFV really need a big gun in a turret?

With the off-the-shelf (or nearly so) solutions available, why not mix turreted IFVs with fewer seats with turretless APCs with more seats (CV90s and Armadillos, for example, or a Puma-based equivalent) to carry the same number of troops in the same number of vehicles? The turretless APCs would still have remote weapons stations up to and including .50 cal MGs and 40mm grenade launchers and there are any number of solutions to provide additonal precision fire support, for example, a Griffin mini-missile derivative or a more powerful Switchblade armed, disposable UAV.

If the focus is on asymmetric warfare, does every vehicle need a big gun?
 
cluttonfred said:
If the focus is on asymmetric warfare, does every vehicle need a big gun?

Operational experience has actually demonstrated that each vehicle needs a ‘big’ gun more in asymmetric operations than in conventional operations. Because in conventional operations units fight in large formations in open terrain where tank weapons dominate. But in asymmetric ops in close terrain the enemy will try and ambush the vehicle with the least firepower in a situation in which the other vehicles can’t immediately apply fire in its assistance. But if each vehicle has a big gun it can return suppressive or destructive fires by itself.
 
Fair point, but then I wonder if the high-velocity, small-caliber autocannons being proposed actually respond to that argument? Wouldn't the combination of the RWS mounting light weapon(s) and a rack of short-range, precision-guided high-explosive munitions accomplish the same thing without the weight and complexity of a turret, especially a manned turret?

Abraham Gubler said:
cluttonfred said:
If the focus is on asymmetric warfare, does every vehicle need a big gun?

Operational experience has actually demonstrated that each vehicle needs a ‘big’ gun more in asymmetric operations than in conventional operations. Because in conventional operations units fight in large formations in open terrain where tank weapons dominate. But in asymmetric ops in close terrain the enemy will try and ambush the vehicle with the least firepower in a situation in which the other vehicles can’t immediately apply fire in its assistance. But if each vehicle has a big gun it can return suppressive or destructive fires by itself.
 
cluttonfred said:
Fair point, but then I wonder if the high-velocity, small-caliber autocannons being proposed actually respond to that argument? Wouldn't the combination of the RWS mounting light weapon(s) and a rack of short-range, precision-guided high-explosive munitions accomplish the same thing without the weight and complexity of a turret, especially a manned turret?

12.7mm HMG and 40mm AGL weapons lack the lethality to engage and defeat targets inside buildings. And I don’t see anyone fielding such short range missile systems ontop of AFVs. Nice idea but has a range of execution problems and it kind of needs to be done and proven before people will start adopting it. The MCG doesn’t need to be in a manned turret to provide fires but a lot of armies want it to be for situational awareness reasons and robustness of the system.
 
Bradleys w/ pintle mounted additional 7.62mm above the cdrs's/gunner's hatch points to a potential 40mm AGL or OCSW/HMG RWS above the hatch..escalation dominance etc. mimimum force first. The major's proposed new vehicles are high profile and RWS will raise the profile even more but these beasts must afford Full Spectrum Dominance (yes cheesy) which means not only multilayer active defense but also weighty bunch o bad old applique/ERA etc. No in use vehicle suffices.

What is not accounted for is the empowerment of future infantry and the need for the 11 sqd and thus a larger vehicle. Sqds could accomplish company missions if more armed UGVs and Armed UAS (a generation better than is currently on the table). The rub is c2. More Armed robotics available to sqds ends up requiring slightly more members for C2 ie the Fire Tm Ldr to lead more independant Fire teams.
1 Sqd ldr
2 FTL
2 SAW
2 Grenadier
2 DMarksm
2 Rifleman/FO/Scout (Army does plan on bring FO in limited fashion to the sqd)
 
wanted to clarify the proposed escalation levels from the vehicle only.
1st 7.62mm coa ial
2nd cdr's hatch OCSW/HMG RWS
3rd 40mm-50mm autocannon main gun
4th NLOS ATGM ie JSM
 
Abraham Gubler said:
Puma and CV90 both have about the same amount of space for the dismount section. The difference is the Puma has vehicle system equipment in the sponsons above the tracks (exhaust, batteries, aircon) so room for two seats in the dismount bay is occupied by a box for storing equipment usually carried in the sponsons of other IFVs. The Germans however didn't want more than six dismount seats because that's the number they used on the Marder. But a modified Puma with a short exhaust pipe and other mods can displace this box and restore eight seats. The US Army requirement for nine rearward facing seats fits in the same space as eight inward facing seats. So the difference from an IFV design perspective is not much.

i don't know. this just makes me think the CV-90 still would have been a better suggestion for an 'off the shelf' approach. not only would it not require much modification to meet the troop requirements (redoing an exhust system is not exactly easy), but it already has support a suite of digital warfare systems (unlike the puma), and it has the option not only for a heavier weapon (the 40mm bofors), but also a full array of variants already (105mm and 120mm AGS version, Anti-aircraft version, command vehicle, forward observation vehicle, recovery vehicle, self propelled mortar..), most of which are just turret swaps.

but i doubt the CV-90 will be seriously considered for the GCV.
 
mithril said:
Abraham Gubler said:
i don't know. this just makes me think the CV-90 still would have been a better suggestion for an 'off the shelf' approach. not only would it not require much modification to meet the troop requirements (redoing an exhust system is not exactly easy), but it already has support a suite of digital warfare systems (unlike the puma), and it has the option not only for a heavier weapon (the 40mm bofors), but also a full array of variants already (105mm and 120mm AGS version, Anti-aircraft version, command vehicle, forward observation vehicle, recovery vehicle, self propelled mortar..), most of which are just turret swaps.

but i doubt the CV-90 will be seriously considered for the GCV.

It also completely fails to meet the protection requirements.

The basic idea of the GCV is very good and the US Army should not compromise too much on it: A troop carrier that is protected from the threats IFV's actually face, not for gun duels with BMPs that are (almost) totally irrelevant to modern operations.

There is that CV90 APC, which might a good fit for the M113 replacement though.
 
Regarding a hybrid powerplant, I wonder if this joint US-Japan project will bear any fruit: http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a577548.pdf
 
If I remember correctly of the manual of urban combat of the US army , the 25mm bushmaster in urban fighting is used principally to make holes in walls .

Bigger caliber is necessary because it's more easy to make Multipurpose fuze . ( I think that the 30x173 is enough )
But in asymetrical wars , there are generaly no armored vehicles or little .
So one feed with HEI and the other with SAPHEI ?
 
"BAE, GD: We Can Cut Weight From Army’s GCV"
By Sydney J. Freedberg Jr. on November 27, 2013 at 4:29 AM

Source:
http://breakingdefense.com/2013/11/bae-general-dynamics-we-can-get-weight-down-on-army-gcv/

As storm clouds loom over the Army’s controversial Ground Combat Vehicle, both contractors competing for GCV say they’re focused on completing the program of record still on the books. But if the Army slows the program down – a near-certainty at this point – both BAE Systems and General Dynamics told me they are ready to adapt. In fact, they’ll make the best of any extra time to refine their designs and develop new technologies.

The biggest single criticism of the GCV has been how heavy it is. The Congressional Budget Office estimated up to 84 tons, although the fine print noted that figure was for a hypothetical future version that had grown to the maximum the vehicle could bear. News stories often describe it as weighing over 70 tons. But both contractors insist their designs are already below that figure and that they can keep whittling the weight down over time.

Depending on how much modular armor you bolt on to BAE’s current design, “it’d be in the 60- to 70-ton range depending on the configuration,” said BAE program director Deepak Bazaz.

Not coincidentally, 70 tons plus 20 percent more weight for future upgrades — a margin for growth the Army requires the GCV designs to have — is how CBO came up with its 84-ton figure.

General Dynamics was more specific, perhaps because their choice of a traditional diesel engine leaves them with less uncertainty than BAE’s hybrid drive. Even allowing for 20 percent growth, said GD’s GCV director, Robert Sorge, a future upgrade of their design would still max out at 76 tons. In the most heavily armored configuration currently planned, it’s about 62 tons, he told me. If commanders decide to sacrifice some protection for easier deployment by aircraft, they could get it down to 56.

That’s still darn heavy. The Army’s current M1A2 Abrams main battle tank, built by General Dynamics, weighs 69 to 70 tons depending on its armor package. But the tank-like BAE M2 Bradley troop carrier that the GCV is supposed to replace weighs 36 to 40 tons. General Dynamics’ eight-wheel-drive Stryker troop carrier weighs just 21 to 26 tons.

It was air-delivered Strykers that formed the spearhead of an Army rapid-deployment force in a recent wargame set in 2030. And top brass from Chief of Staff Gen. Ray Odierno on down are insisting that the Army needs to get lighter and more “expeditionary” to respond quickly to post-Afghanistan crises around the world.

So if the sequestration budget cuts force the Army to put the GCV program on slo-mo, can the contractors use the extra time to get the weight down?

Yes, but. A really significant decrease would require either a breakthrough in protective technology — such as ultra-light armor or an “active-protection system” to shoot down incoming tank shells — or a reduction in the size of the squad the vehicle must carry. A breakthrough is a technological long shot, but the Army is already considering shrinking the squad.

“You always have material advances but I think sometimes we lean on that a little bit too heavily,” said Bazaz. “There’s never been any radical change to the materials that we’ve employed over the last 30 years. There’s been a continued progression.”

“I’m not holding my breath for any breakthrough technology,” agreed Sorge. “I think there’s a lot of potential there, that’s one of the areas we’d be looking for” — but he’s hardly counting on it.

What the designers definitely can do right now, however, if the Army tells them to, is make the GCV smaller. “Structure and armor to protect 12 soldiers is one of the biggest weight drivers on the vehicle,” Sorge said. “Providing enough space for a large 2015 male soldier with all his gear, times 12 people, defines the volume that you need to build the vehicle around.”

The Army’s current specs insist the GCV carry a full nine-man infantry squad in back — like the Stryker — and a crew of three — driver, gunner, and commander. But the aging Bradley and, for that matter, the German-built Puma sometimes suggested as an alternative to GCV only carry a six-man squad.

Both vehicles still have a three-man crew, so a unit using Bradleys, Pumas, or other mid-size troop carriers would need not only more vehicles but more personnel to drive around the same amount of foot troops. That, in turn, might well drive the total cost and weight of the unit right back up to where it would be with GCVs. In the past, however, the Army insisted that a nine-man squad was the minimum to keep fighting after taking casualties and that the whole squad had to ride in one vehicle to prevent lethal confusion on the battlefield. Now it looks like the service is willing to at least calculate the trade-offs.

The last time the Army tried to replace the Bradley, with what it called the Future Combat System, it attempted to square the circle of a nine-man squad in a lightweight vehicle by relying, not on heavy armor, but on superior sensors to avoid danger in the first place and on an active protection system to shoot down incoming rounds. FCS proved unmanageably ambitious and was cancelled in 2009, after designs had already swelled from 19 tons to nearly 30.

Active protection systems simply weren’t ready for battle then and no American-made systems are ready now. Some systems, like the Israeli Trophy, can react and destroy an incoming round filled with high explosive — say, a rocket-propelled grenade or anti-tank missile — but there’s nothing that can shoot down a solid anti-tank shell moving at about a mile per second. The Army asked industry for APS in its original GCV specs but then decided that feature would have to wait for later upgrades. Having enough time to get APS to really work, said Bazaz, would be the real “game changer.”

Sorge agreed maturing active protection systems would be a top priority for any extra time. Extra testing would also allow some improvement in mechanical reliability, sensors, and on armor protection against roadside bombs and mines.

So far, however, they’ve not gotten any order from the Army to change the pace. “We’ve heard lots of things and read lots of things; we don’t have anything official,” Sorge said. “The official plan is still the plan of record which had a Milestone B” — the official move into procurement — “in the June-July timeframe of ’14, with EMD [engineering and manufacturing development] starting right after that.” It’s the EMD stage that is now in doubt. EMD’s when both companies would build drivable prototypes, though they already have stationary testbeds for all their components, including working engines and transmissions.

“The thing I’m focused on is continuing to execute the program. We still run through next June,” agreed Bazaz. “Dark clouds or whatever, there’s uncertainty in the future, but we’ve still got contract deliverables and that’s what we’re working on now.”
 
CoS Army was recently quoted exclaiming that some intellectuals who believe land forces are obsolete are 'naive and dangerous'..
A prominent personality on this forum is likely being referenced to in this quote.... ;)
 
http://defense-update.com/20141007_bradley_30mm.html#.VDlwdMJ0zMo
 

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