XM803

MBT-70<=======>XM803<========>XM1 (C) and (GM)

XM1s are coming soon

Origins

By 1969, the quest for replacing the aging M60 is still going. West Germany had left the MBT-70 program due to overbudget on the development, now the US was on its own to either continue or stop the program. The program's budget was bloated to 303 million USD, where originally it was 80 million USD (by then the expected cost per vehicle was a million USD, five times the price than originally expected).

The US Army didn't want to stop though as they still wanted the MGM-51 Shillelagh ATGM and driver in turret to be implemented in their "future" MBT. So they decided to revise some MBT-70's component to make sure cost per vehicle was cheaper and less complex, by sacrificing some firepower, mobility and protection.

The "new" vehicle was called XM803. Work began during 1971 hoping for reducing price for each unit to 500,000-600,000 USD. They also decided to use American-made only components as West Germany no longer in the program.

Design

Armament

XM150E6

XM803 has almost identical gun/launcher as the MBT/KPz 70 (XM150E5). The only difference is that the XM150E6 has a closed breech scavenging system and realocating the bore evacuator closer to breech (there is no information about XM150E6's closed breech scavenging system so the in-game model has no change for the breech). The rounds carried for XM803 has increased from 48 (GM Autoloader from MBT-70) to 50 and it still be able to load 6 MGM-51 Shillelagh ATGM per vehicle. Gunner lost his ATGM transmitter, perhaps replaced by optics that placed above main gun/launcher barrel. The gun could elevate from -10° to +20°.

M73

The co-axial machine gun is the only armament that didn't changed from the original MBT-70.

M85 HMG

The Rheinmetall Mk 20 Rh-202 was also sacrificed for reducing price and complexity of the vehicle, including panoramic view and thermal imager for commander. The designer replaced them for a stabilized roof-mounted non-retractable remote-controlled M85 heavy machine gun on the right of his cupola. He also got a day/night camera in place for those cameras. The gun could elevate from -15° to +65°.

Protection

The armor layout is still the same as MBT-70, but the huge