Lightweight vehicle gun turret

Abstract

A vehicle gun turret that includes a circular or horseshoe-shaped track suspended and mounted over the roof or cab area of a lightweight military vehicle. The track includes three legs configured in a triangle designed to attach to the vehicle's windshield frame member and roll bar. Rolling over the track is a carriage that attaches to a gun holder that selectively attaches to a machine gun. The gun holder is attached to a rotating stem that fits into a vertical sleeve attached to the carriage. Clevis pins are used to attach to the machine gun to the gun holder and to attach the gun holder to the carriage so that the components may be manually and quickly assembled and disassembled.

Description

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION [0001] This utility patent application is based on the provisional patent application (60 / 515,405) filed on Oct. 29, 2003. [0002] 1. Field of the Invention: [0003] The invention relates generally to the field of ordinance and in particular to the mounting of guns on motor vehicles. [0004] 2. Description of the Related Art: [0005] Lightweight vehicles are commonly used to transport soldiers in a combat area. Many of these vehicles are truck-like vehicles with open beds used to transport soldiers and cargo. Some of these vehicles have machine guns attached to large, relatively heavy turrets mounted on the top or back of the vehicle. [0006] One drawback with turret gun mounts on motor vehicles used in the prior art is they occupy a large portion of the cargo space in the vehicle making the vehicle less useful for transporting soldiers and equipment. Another drawback is that when the vehicle is disabled, neither the turret nor the machine gun can be easily an...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0007] It is an object of the present invention to provide a lightweight, turret gun mount for a multi-purpose vehicle commonly used by the military that does not occupy a large amount of the vehicle's cargo space.

[0008] It is another object of the present invention to provide such a turret gun mount that easily and quickly attaches to the vehicle's roll bar and front windshield frame member.

[0009] It is another object of the present invention to provide such a turret gun mount that enables a machine gun to be easily and quickly connected and disconnected from the turret.

[0010] It is a further object of the present invention to provide such turret gun mount that enables soldiers to easily disconnect it from a disabled vehicle and re-connect it to another vehicle with simple hand tools.

[0012] Attached to the track is a rolling carriage. The carriage includes a vertically aligned center sleeve that selectively connects to a vertically aligned intermediate structure, called a stem. The stem, which is able to rotate 360 degrees around the sleeve's longitudinal axis, is connected to a downward extending neck attached to a gun holder assembly. The gun holder assembly includes a saddle bracket that connects to two gun brackets that extend downward from the bottom surface of the gun. Two clevis pins are used to connect the saddle bracket to the two gun brackets. A third clevis pin is used to selectively hold the stem inside the neck on the gun holder assembly, while a fourth clevis pin is used to selectively connect the lower end of the stem to the sleeve. All four clevis pins may be manually removed thereby allowing the entire gun mount assembly and the machine gun to be easily assembled and disassembled without tools. The track is attached with threaded connectors to the roll bar and front windshield frame member, so that it too can be easily disassembled and re-connected to another vehicle by hand tools.

Problems solved by technology

One drawback with turret gun mounts on motor vehicles used in the prior art is they occupy a large portion of the cargo space in the vehicle making the vehicle less useful for transporting soldiers and equipment.

Another drawback is that when the vehicle is disabled, neither the turret nor the machine gun can be easily and quickly disconnected from the disabled vehicle and re-mounted to another vehicle.

As a result, when a vehicle becomes disabled in the field of compact, the turret and machine gun are often left behind for local citizens or enemy combatants to recover.

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