M247 Sergeant York
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The M247 Sergeant York DIVAD (Division Air Defense) was a self-propelled anti-aircraft weapon. It was intended to replace the M163 Vulcan Air Defense System and fight alongside the M1 Abrams and M2 Bradley fighting vehicles. It was similar in concept to successful Soviet and European tracked systems such as the ZSU-23-4. However, despite the use of many off the shelf technologies, a series of technical problems with the system and cost overruns caused the cancellation of the project.
Based on the chassis of the M48 Patton tank, the main armament of the M247 was a twin 40 mm Bofors anti-aircraft gun. The radar and fire control system were built around a modified version of the Westinghouse APG-66 system used in the F-16 Fighting Falcon.
The first vehicles were delivered in late 1983; however, there were a large number of persistent problems with the system:
- The radar could not track low flying targets due to excessive ground clutter.
- The radar could not distinguish a hovering helicopter from a clump of trees.
- When tracking high flying targets, the radar return from the gun barrel tips confused the fire control system.
- Turret traverse was too slow to track a fast crossing target.
- The electronic counter-countermeasures (ECCM) suite could be defeated by only minor jamming.
- The system proved to be unable to hit even hovering drone targets.
- The 30 year old M48 chassis meant the vehicle had trouble keeping pace with the newer M1 Abrams and Bradley vehicles.
These problems proved insurmountable and in December 1986, the program was cancelled after about 50 vehicles had been produced. Most of these ended up as targets on air force bombing ranges.
[edit] References
- GlobalSecurity.org page on the M247
- Trewhitt, Philip. Armoured Fighting Vehicles. Prospero Books, 1999 (second edition?). ISBN 1-894102-81-9.
[edit] See also
[edit] Further reading
- Robot Cannon Kills 9, Wounds 14 comments following the article refer to disasterous demos of the M247 Sergeant York in the 1980s that achieved legendary status
