MCKINNEY, Texas – The recent $30 million contract Raytheon [RTN] won to upgrade missile launchers on 20 Marine Corps Light Amphibious Vehicles (LAV) fills out the service’s program of record for 102 vehicles with the exception of four test articles.
It also firmly establishes Raytheon as a so-called “lethality integrator,” a position the company sees advantageous as cash-strapped militaries seek to integrate legacy weapons and vehicles to provide new capabilities.
Having proven its ability to integrate existing weapon systems onto existing vehicles while improving the capability and performance of both should set Raytheon up to take on other, similar challenges like the Army’s Stryker lethality enhancement program, Nave said. The LAV-AT turret was designed to be vehicle agnostic.
“The only limitation is that it is a vehicle that we can physically mount it on there,” Michael Nave, business development director for Raytheon land warfare systems, told Defense Daily.
Converting a LAV-AT is a relatively simple process, given that the vehicles currently have missile turrets. Each LAV anti-tank (LAV-AT) variant has a legacy Emerson 901A1 hydraulic turret with a first-generation targeting system. The turret entered service in 1978 and has encountered operational problems with its hydraulic lift system and obsolescence of its sensor and targeting system in recent years.
Raytheon has been collecting contracts to replace the turrets on 102 of the Marine Corps LAV-ATs for a couple years and finally cinched the final 20 last week with a $30 million award for work through 2019. That actually will bring the total program to 98 vehicles. Four other vehicles were modified for engineering and manufacturing development.
The new turret consists of twin tube-launched, optically tracked, wire-guided (TOW) missiles flanking a central improved targeting acquisition system (ITAS) on a fixed arm bolted to the roof of the LAV-AT in place of the existing turret. It provides improved targeting sensor and controls, is fixed in place rather than on an unreliable hydraulic lift and eliminates a large support mast that took up valuable room inside the vehicle. It also provides targeting on the move.
Raytheon’s LAV-AT turret is compatible with all existing TOW missiles, including both wired and wireless variants. At least 43 countries have TOW missiles. Raytheon is still delivering the missiles, of which it has already built 700,000.
Usually the Marine Corps watches carefully as the Army upgrades systems and then grabs the larger service’s coattails to benefit from its evaluations and economies of scale. The paradigm is flipped with LAV-AT.
“Upgrades to MITAS is something the Army is looking at, as well, because they have their ATGM variant of the Stryker,” Nave said. “The LAV and the Stryker are variants of the same vehicle. Typically, the Marine Corps follows what the Army does, but in this case they were kind of out in front and the Army is saying ‘Wait a minute, if the Marine Corps did it and it’s good and we like it, then let’s look at the same thing.’ I now have this fully designed solution.”
The Army has launched a program to give its Stryker wheeled vehicles more offensive punch. An initial effort will retrofit about 80 vehicles with a 30mm cannon and automotive upgrades needed to carry its weight and the turret the gun sits on. Future plans include upgrades to the Stryker anti-tank guided missile variant with new sensors, targeting systems and missiles.
The Army on Aug. 16 released an RFI for upgrades to its TOW missile launchers, in this case the dismounted soldier systems. The service is conducting market research to “identify parties having an interest in and the resources to support this requirement for Engineering Services (ES) in support of the fielded Tube-launched, Optically-tracked, Wireless-guided (TOW) Weapon System for FY 17-21.” The service’s anticipated requirement will include “design, production, modification, deployment, and maintenance” of the TOW system and the M41 ITAS and modified ITAS like the ones being integrated on LAV-AT.