HITROLE Light RWS invites customers

Christopher F Foss

Wednesday, 18 June, 2008

Italian company Oto Melara (Outdoor Stand A220) is expanding its range of turrets and remote weapon stations (RWS) with the introduction of the HITRO LE Light RWS, which is being shown at Eurosatory this year for the first time.
Following trials with a prototype and preproduction system, development of the HITROLE Light RWS is now complete and production can commence as soon as orders are placed, Oto Melara told the Eurosatory Daily.
Typical roles of HITROLE would be the main armament of reconnaissance vehicles and armoured personnel carriers, as well as being installed on support vehicles that are today often exposed to attack. It could also be installed on the turrets of tanks to provide a close-range selfdefence capability that would be of particular use in urban operations.
A key feature is that the baseline system is fully stabilised, which allows stationary and moving targets to be engaged while the platform is moving, with a high first round hit probability. An automatic target tracker is fitted as standard, which allows fleeting targets to be tracked and engaged.
It can be fitted with various types of weapons including 5.5mm, 7.62mm or a .50 (12.7mm) machine gun, or a 40mm automatic grenade launcher (AGL). When armed with a 5.56mm MG and 200 rounds of ready use ammunition, combat weight of the HITROLE Light RWS is only 100kg, with the heaviest version, armed with the 40mm AGL, weighing only 145kg.
As there is no roof penetration, the HITROLE Light RWS can be rapidly installed on the roof of the vehicle without any major modifications. The weapon is laid onto the target by the gunner located in the vehicle chassis using a flat panel display and a joystick, with elevation and traverse being all electric. The ready use ammunition box is located on the left side, with the sensor package on the right. The standard sensor package consists of a colour day TV camera, infra red (ir) night sight and an eye-safe laser rangefinder.
According to OTO Melara, the open architecture of the HITROLE Light RWS is such that it can be upgraded in the future as new technology becomes available. There is also flexibility at the subsystem level.