An old copy of Jane’s
Land-Based Air Defence has this to say about the weapon used by the M163:
Quote:
The 20 mm six barrelled M168 cannon is a development of the weapon originally developed for aircraft and has two rates of fire, 1,000 and 3,000 rds/min. The original version fired up to 6,000 rds/min. The 1,000 rds/min rate is normally used in the ground role and the 3,000 rds/min rate in anti aircraft defence.
- maximum effective anti-aircraft range is 1,200 m
- ground range 3,000 m
- indirect fire range 4,500 m
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Another point about the M163 Vulcan. There are three of them in the U.S. obat. Two of them (unit’s 208 and 675) are available up to 2020. Jane’s claims that the M163 was phased out of service by 1994.
Jane’s also claims that the M163 had the same armour as the M113A1 – which is one of the reasons why it was allegedly phased out. In the game it seems to have slightly better armour ratings. It looks like it may have more armour in photos, but this might be due to the extra buoyancy pods it had fitted to its sides.