LAV-25

The LAV-25 armored personnel carrier

This APC has a crew of three and carrier 6 fully equipped troops. It can carry up to 2.3 tones of cargo in the personnel compartment.

It's main armament is an M242 25-mm cannon. It is a rather heavy armament for an armored personnel carrier. The M242 can defeat lightly armored targets even at a long distance. It also carries 7.62-mm M-60 machine gun and smoke grenade dischargers.

The LAV-25 is amphibious APC and can be prepared to ford water obstacle in 3 minutes. Vehicle itself can be transported by most of the medium-size transport aircraft.

This armored personnel carries is powered by a Detroit Diesel turbocharged diesel engine. Vehicle has a 8x8 configuration, but it drivetrain transfers power to 4 wheels and 8x8 mode is only turned on on the rough terrain or when necessary. Despite that it still can achieve it's maximum road speed of 85 km/h run by four wheels.

During the late 1990s the LAV-25s operated by the US Army were improved to the LAV-25A1 standard during the Service Life Extension Programme (SLEP). War in Iraq and additional funds allowed to upgrade it to the new LAV-25A2 standard. This standard was split into two phases. During phase one improvements include armor upgrades and suspension, while during phase two fire control unit, sights and other electrical gadgets are improved.

LAVs versatility led to a number of variants based on this vehicle. These include TOW-armed anti-tank vehicle (95 produced), command and control vehicle (50 produced), air defence vehicle, unarmed logistics vehicle (94), recovery vehicle (45) and mortar (50).