Piranha II
A little later than the start of work on the project of a four-wheeled armored car, the design of his "brother" with a 6x6 wheel formula began. An alternative name for the armored vehicle is Piranha II. It should be noted that the system of names using Roman numerals appeared much later than the armored car family itself, which sometimes leads to some confusion. The six-wheeled armored car was not originally created as an export vehicle. The MOWAG management still hoped to push their new development into the Swiss army, for which several steps were taken.
The design of the four-axle chassis "Piranha II" did not differ much from the corresponding unit of the original Piranha 8x8. The armament of the updated armored car was taken almost unchanged from the American LAV-25 with a 25-mm automatic cannon. In addition, one launcher for BGM-71 TOW anti-tank missiles was mounted on the sides of the turret. This is where the differences from the original ended. Most of the amendments made to the design concerned exclusively the technological part. The Arabians wanted to get a good modern armored personnel carrier and at the same time save on the purchase. In general, it cannot be said that such a desire was wrong.
The Swiss army needed, first of all, a tank destroyer and a self-propelled ATGM to replace off-road vehicles with 106-mm M40 recoilless rifles that were to be decommissioned - in such cases, it needed 400 Piranha-type vehicles. The presentation of machines for the USMC took place at the end of 1980. The vehicles entered service with the USMC in 1983, two years earlier than the service with the Swiss army, since the Swiss government allocated 500 million francs for the purchase of vehicles only in the budget for 1985-1986.
Piranha are modular vehicles with a welded body made of steel armor that protects against small arms bullets. Mowag Piranha could be equipped with various systems, including engines, equipment and weapons for every taste of the customer.
The armored hull "Piranha 6x6" was made on the basis of the first armored car of the family. For this reason, the maximum thickness of the sheets, as well as the level of protection, remained the same - 10 millimeters, protecting against conventional and armor-piercing rifle-caliber bullets. The layout of the internal volumes has also not changed: the engine compartment in the right front of the hull, the driver's workplace to the left of him and the troop compartment in the middle and aft parts. The own crew of the armored car, in comparison with the previous car, increased to three people (driver, commander and gunner). The landing party remained the same - nine soldiers with equipment and weapons. Embarkation and disembarkation was carried out through two doors in the stern. At the same time, the commander and driver received their own hatches in the roof.
The body of the armored personnel carrier Mowag Piranha is made by welding from rolled homogeneous armor (Rolled homogeneous armor - RHA) with a thickness of 6-8 mm with anti-fragmentation upholstery inside the habitable compartments. The bow of the hull is multifaceted with a central weld and lateral inclined edges connecting the bow at large angles. The aft part of the hull had a slight downward slope and aft doors.
On the left side of the hull of the armored personnel carrier Mowag Piranha in front of each other were the driver's and commander's seats. They had hatches above their seats and three periscope observation devices mounted on the frontal arc of the hatch.
On the right side of the body of the Mowag Piranha armored personnel carrier is the engine compartment (MTO) with a diesel engine installed, above which there were exhaust grilles and cooling fans. Initially, a 6-cylinder liquid-cooled “Mowag” diesel engine with a power of 275 hp was installed. (202 kW). The Allison MT-653 transmission was installed in the nose of the hull and provided 6 forward and 1 reverse speeds.
The dimensions of the car were chosen so that it could move freely along the roads of Switzerland, including mountain serpentines. Thanks to this, the “Piranha”, about six meters long, could not only easily drive along all the roads of the country, but also turn around on narrow mountain roads without the risk of falling off or even hitting the fence.
The second characteristic feature for ensuring work in mountainous conditions was the choice of engine. The 300-horsepower Detroit V6-53T diesel engine was equipped with a turbocharging system that ensures engine performance at altitudes up to five thousand meters above sea level. Diesel power was transmitted to all wheels through an Allison transmission, an automatic gearbox with four forward and one reverse gears.
The last step to adapt the Piranha 6x6 to work in the mountains was the refinement of the suspension. This time, the front two wheels received a spring suspension, and the rest - a torsion bar. In addition, in case of damage to the wheels of the armored car, they received two-chamber tires with reinforcement. As a result, the Piranha II armored car was able to work normally in almost any European terrain. For crossing rivers and reservoirs, the armored car was equipped with two propellers in the stern. Next to the propellers were two plate rudders that controlled their thrust vector. The driving performance of the Piranha 6x6 turned out to be at the level of a four-wheeled armored car - the maximum speed on the highway is up to 100 km / h and up to ten on the water.
Despite the calculation of the developers, Piranha II did not immediately get into the Swiss army. Canadians were the first to take an interest in it. In 1977, they ordered a number of ready-made armored personnel carriers, and then acquired a license for production and modernization. This is how the Grizzly armored personnel carrier appeared, armed with two twin machine guns of 7.62 and 12.7 mm caliber. Together with the new armament, a new turret had to be installed on the standard Piranha chassis.
The next Canadian project called Cougar provided for the next replacement of the turret and weapons. This time, Piranha 6x6 has got a combat module with a 76-mm English-made L23A1 cannon. The turret was entirely borrowed from the tankFV101 Scorpion. The latest version of the "Piranha 6x6" originally from Canada was the Husky recovery vehicle. Instead of a turret with weapons, the BREM received a rotary crane, and a small repair shop with a supply of replacement parts was placed in the troop compartment.
Chile became the next customer for the six-wheeled Piranhas. The purchase of ready-made armored cars, the South American country preferred a license for production, which was deployed at the Cordoen plant. Until 1983, about fifty armored vehicles with various weapons were assembled. On the basis of the original Swiss-designed turret, a combat module with a 20-mm cannon from Oerlikon was created. Another tower of its own design already carried two Hispano-Suiza cannons of the same caliber. This version of the armored vehicle, in the first place, was intended for air defense of army formations.
The machines were assembled at MOWAG Motorenfabrik AG in Kreuzlingen, Switzerland. The turrets for the machines were made by the Norwegian consortium Thune-Eureka. The turrets and guns for the American LAV modifications were manufactured by the AAI Corporation in Maryland. Licensed production of 4 × 4, 6 × 6 vehicles for the Chilean army was carried out at the Industrias Cardoen SA plant in Santiago, Chile. The difference of the Chilean modification is the increased capacity of the fuel tank (400 versus 250 liters of the original Swiss model), and hence twice the power reserve (1200 versus 600 km).
Despite the initial plans of MOWAG, the Piranha 6x6 could not immediately interest the main, as it seemed, customer, the Swiss army. The armed forces of this country have been thinking and thinking about the profitability of such a machine for almost ten years. Only in 1986, a contract was signed for the supply of 310 new armored vehicles in various configurations. The bulk of the ordered vehicles were to be built in the original version of the armored personnel carrier. In addition to them, the order implied the delivery of a certain number of anti-tank vehicles based on the Piranha 6x6. Initially, MOWAG presented the AFV-90 for this "position". A two-man Arrowpoint 90 turret with a 90 mm Mecar Kenerga cannon and a 46 caliber barrel length was installed on the standard body of the armored vehicle. Also, this project meant strengthening the protection of the hull. Nevertheless, the barrel anti-tank complex lost the competition with another project of the same company. An alternative to the AFV-90 was the Panzerjager-90 combat vehicle, armed with BGM-71D TOW-2 anti-tank missiles.
In addition, the turret mount is universal and, at the customer's option, various turrets with guns from foreign manufacturers can be installed there: Swiss Oerlikon-Bührle GAD-AOA with a 20-mm cannon, Israeli TCM-20 with a twin 20-mm anti-aircraft gun, French Hispano- Suiza with a 90mm howitzer cannon, Brazilian ENGESA ET-90 with a 90mm howitzer cannon and Chilean Cardoen turrets for the Belgian 90mm Cockerill Mk III cannon. Also, by order of the Chilean army, on the basis of the 6 × 6 variant, a half-track model of an off-road vehicle was created for operations in mountainous and rough terrain. For American licensed modifications, AAI Corporation developed various versions of turrets for various weapons, in particular, for the 90-mm ARES gun, and the Universal Turret for the 75-mm ARES gun,
The Mowag Piranha armored personnel carrier could become any armored vehicle necessary for a specific tactical situation: self-propelled anti-aircraft gun, self-propelled mortar, ambulance, armored personnel carrier, anti-tank vehicle, truck, command post vehicle, electronic warfare vehicle (radio-electronic struggle), BREM (armored recovery vehicle), fire truck, engineering vehicle, reconnaissance vehicle, etc. The Mowag Piranha armored personnel carrier could, with the help of a set of additionally ordered equipment, at a low cost, be converted at the place of deployment into a vehicle of the desired class. BTR Mowag Piranha (Mowag Piranha) was supplied to more than 21 countries. The most famous and popular was Mowag Piranha 8 × 8 (Mowag Piranha 8 × 8), of which there are over 6,500 units in Europe alone.
Pirahna 6x6 armored vehicles in various configurations first saw combat during peacekeeping operations in the Balkans in the mid-nineties. In general, the experience of practical application fully confirmed all the fears expressed at the stage of development of the machines. The armored hull provided full-fledged protection only for the first level of the STANAG 4569 standard. The front plates of the Piranha hull somehow pulled to the second level, but at least such protection from all angles was not even out of the question. In this regard, several projects have been developed to enhance protection associated with the installation of additional booking modules. When developing new machines of the Piranha family, this experience was taken into account.
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