"The new Austrian Pandur 1 6x6 armoured with 12,7mm " Topic

"The Army of Austria has received the first new modernized version of its standard 6x6 armoured vehicle personnel carrier Pandur 1. The vehicle is upgraded with a new remotely weapon station armed with a 12,7mm machine gun to replace the ring mount weapon system.

Last week, the Austrain army has teken delivery of first batch of three modernized Pandur 1. According the official website of the Austrian army, two vehicles will be upgraded to the new standard.

The new remote weapon station allows the gunner to operate the weapon system under the protection of the vehicle. The weapon station consists of a sophisticated weapon tower featuring electro-optical sights and allows the system to be operated from inside the vehicle with a high degree of precision to protect the gunner from being exposed…"

Full article here
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Amicalement
Armand

A few years back a company I worked for did a business analysis of remote weapons systems for armoured vehicles. This sort of thing will become more and more common if our analysis was right.

Basically the advantages (safer, more accurate, better sighting capabilities, etc etc) so far outweigh the disadvantages (cost, complexity, time to refit etc) that it will be the norm for western and modernised armed forces by the 2030s if not earlier.

The biggest disadvantage I know of for RWS (aside from cost) is the fact that a Stryker is too tall to fit up the ramp of a C17 with the RWS mounted.

In my near future forces (based on the old US Army Future Combat System), an RWS is replacing the Commander's Independent Thermal Viewer on pretty much every vehicle.