Re: New Thermal Sights for the USMC AAVP7
 

I'm guessing 2015 myself.

As to the AAVE7, yeah it's just a matter of hanging a mine rake off the bow and sticking a line-charge in the back of any AAVP7 rather then a custom built variant.
But that's the whole point - not needing a custom built variant.

As to actual use, yeah we used them in Gulf War I when breaching the minefields.
I remember some Iraqi's on the other side watching us while they were waiting to surrender and a couple running over to see what we'd fired across the mine field when the engineers cut loose with the line-charge and it didn't go off immediately ... the engineers tried to wave them off but ...

Re: New Thermal Sights for the USMC AAVP7
 

Is there actually a mine plow for the AAVP series? I've never seen a picture of one with it fitted. Also a google search turns up these forums as the only hits for a the AAVE designation. It would appear that this is an informal designation applied to AAVPs with the MICLIC pallet.

Re: New Thermal Sights for the USMC AAVP7
 

I just looked thru my photo's from Gulf I, unfortunately I was a bit busy during the minefield breaching and didn't have time to take any pictures.

It's entirely possible, and in fact probable, the one I recall seeing (and as I recall there was only one with a rake) was a jury-rig.

Always remember, "Improvise, Adapt, Overcome" is the unofficial USMC Motto *chuckles*.

Re: New Thermal Sights for the USMC AAVP7
 

Well it would also seem extremely reasonable since that capability was essentially lost with the retirement of the LVTE1 (do you know when that happened?). Did it resemble the one on the LVTE1? That would seem like a logical choice in my mind, to simply strip them off older vehicles and apply them to new ones.

Re: New Thermal Sights for the USMC AAVP7
 

Same time the LVTP5 was retired, c.a. 1973.
I have no doubt they kept them around "just in case" for several years afterwards tho.
I doubt they could have stripped them off the P5's since they were actually built onto the vehicle. My bet would be it was probably off an Abrams MCBS or borrowed from a US Army M113 Engineer, M2A2 E-BFE, or M1132 ESV system. Or quite possibly something we got from Israel like the armor kits for the D-9 dozers we borrowed.

Re: New Thermal Sights for the USMC AAVP7
 

I'm gonna use this as an error report thread for the USMC OOB in order to not start a new thread just for this one thing.

Unit 099 Dragon Fire, weapon 3 (Weapon 008 M16 Rifle) has the same ammo loadout (48 HE and 12 AP) as the EFSS mortars. Looks like a typo error. I've switched it to 60 HE and 0 AP in my OOB.

Re: New Thermal Sights for the USMC AAVP7
 

Slightly off topic but what do higher ratings than 40 for thermal imagers represent? Also at 50 the color changes from yellow to green.

Re: New Thermal Sights for the USMC AAVP7
 

The numbers are defined in terms of "basics" for ground units in the Mobhack help file, but are flexible to a point. After 40 the system is treated as Thermal/IR, after 50 its treated as Ground Search Radar (GSR).