Hi guys...I've bought Legend M1151...I'm still waiting his arrive and I've a question for you...
why are there so many version of Humvee?!In particular I mean...M1151 and 1114.
They are different ok...but what is the utility of to have a complete different model of the same vehicle?!more or less m1151 and 1114 have the same dimensions and I suppose the same engine power...I know and I see that they have different armor pack but I don't understand why there are 2 different way to build defense around this vehicle.
Isn't it more expensive to have two different lines of the same thing for the same purpose?!
I can understand the development of M1114...first basic armor than an upgrade,for example the FRAG5 but....why the existance of M1151?!and...why hasn't m1151 frag5?!
And....if the M1151 is a "new" vehicle....why there's the development over the old one like 1114!?
I understand that maybe this can be a stupid question so sorry for that but I don't know much about US military politics and purposes.

Ciro

Essentially the M1114 is an ordinary HMMVW that was uparmored with a purpose manufactured kit in-country and the M1151s were uparmored at the factory. I had to do several convoys to upgrade some of our M1114s from Frag5 to what is known as Objective armor during my last tour in Iraq. We'd drive from F.O.B. Rustamiyah to Baghdad I'ntl Airport where there was a shop set up to do the modifications.

There are really two things at work to answer your question. Firstly, was the desire to bring the rest of the HMMWV fleet up to the most current chassis design. Prior to the introduction of the M1151 (and the M1152, quickly followed by the M1165 and M1167), the only vehicles in inventory on the Expanded Capacity Vehicle chassis (which first appeared on the M1113) were either purpose built up-armored patrol vehicles (M1114 and M1116) or intended for specialists (M1145). The M1151 was intended as a replacement for both the US Army's unarmored M1025A2s and USMC's supplemental armored M1043A2s. While current operations mean that you haven't seen it in this configuration, its basic configuration is without add-on armor kits. Similarly, where the M1151 was intended as a replacement for unarmored/supplemental armored weapons carriers, the M1152 was intended as a replacement for cargo carriers and the M1165 was intended as a replacement for personnel carriers. The M1167 was intended to replace TOW missile carriers. All the vehicles of these types in service prior were on the A2 series chassis.

Now, at the same time the US Army and USMC have both come to the general conclusion that conflicts like Afghanistan and Iraq might not be uncommon in the future and there is a need to develop more standardized add-on armor. The USMC has its own set of programs and direction for this. In the US Army this is referred to as the Long Term Armor Strategy (LTAS). LTAS has led to the development of what has been referred to as modular levels of armor for various vehicles which had previously been unarmored but had recieved various armor kits in recent years. The LTAS is intended to replace the plethora of FRAG armor kits and other kits that have been developed. Each affected vehicle will have a so-called "A-kit" and "B-kit" The A kit will be armor standard to the vehicle and always fitted. It will also have attachment points for the standardized B kit add-on armor.

The M1151A1 differs from the M1151 in that it is "IAP/Armor Ready," or in more simple terms, has the A-kit installed. These vehicles were previously referred to as M1151P1. There are A1 variants for all the Army's ECV HMMWVs, with the exception of the M1113 and M1114.



The Objective Armor Kit should also be what's being referred to as FRAG 6. There's also FRAG 7, which should be the M1151 B-kit.

Great explanation Joe. Thanks for your contribution. Very good stuff.

Keep in mind, this is what I "know." I'm more than happy to be corrected. The fact that the basic M1151/M1152/M1165/M1167 configuration is unarmored is backed up by the official US Army Technical Manual. The FRAG kits I'm decidedly less sure on. I've been collecting information for a while now with the intend of putting up a page on globalsecurity.org about them, but its hard to nail them all down. I also found that almost every previously unarmored vehicle (and some armored vehicles like the M1117) have their own series of FRAG kits, making searching for information complicated. A google search for "FRAG 3" can bring up kits for 3 different vehicles, none of which are related.

I did manage to put together a small entry on the LTAS though. Our HMMWV variants page should be pretty up to date now too. I haven't really gotten around to the air-defense configurations, and there are two more ECV2 designations I don't have any information on (XM1212 and XM1214).

thank you guys!!that explains a lot about Humvee....thank you again!
I hope to have soon in my hand legend conversion..
Regards
Ciro Riccio