The M167 Vulcan Air Defense System (VADS) is a towed, short-range

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

anti-aircraft gun Anti-aircraft warfare, counter-air or air defence forces is the battlespace response to aerial warfare, defined by NATO as "all measures designed to nullify or reduce the effectiveness of hostile air action".AAP-6 It includes surface based, ...

designed to protect forward area combat elements and rear area critical assets. It was also used to protect

U.S. Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...

warplane

airfield An aerodrome (Commonwealth English) or airdrome (American English) is a location from which aircraft flight operations take place, regardless of whether they involve air cargo, passengers, or neither, and regardless of whether it is for publ ...

s and

U.S. Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cl ...

helicopter airfields. The heart of the M167 is the M168 Cannon, a variant of the

M61 Vulcan The M61 Vulcan is a hydraulically, electrically, or pneumatically driven, six-barrel, air-cooled, electrically fired Gatling-style rotary cannon which fires rounds at an extremely high rate (typically 6,000 rounds per minute). The M61 and its ...

20×102 mm rapid-fire rotary cannon. It was also effective against lightly

armored Armour (British English) or armor (American English; see spelling differences) is a covering used to protect an object, individual, or vehicle from physical injury or damage, especially direct contact weapons or projectiles during combat Co ...

ground targets. The M167 gun has now been withdrawn from service by U.S. military units, but it might still be used by other countries.

History

The two versions of the Vulcan Air-Defense System, the towed M167 and self-propelled

M163 VADS The M163 Vulcan Air Defense System (VADS) is a self-propelled anti-aircraft gun (SPAAG) that was used by the United States Army. The M168 gun is a variant of the General Dynamics M61 Vulcan rotary cannon, the standard cannon in most U.S. combat ...

, were developed by the United States Army Weapons Command at

Rock Island Arsenal The Rock Island Arsenal comprises , located on Arsenal Island, originally known as Rock Island, on the Mississippi River between the cities of Davenport, Iowa, and Rock Island, Illinois. It lies within the state of Illinois. Rock Island ...

in 1964. They were accepted as a replacement for the

M45 Quadmount The M45 Quadmount (nicknamed the "meat chopper" and "Krautmower"Rottman, Gordon L., Browning .50-Caliber Machine Guns', Osprey Publishing (2010), , p. 19-20 for its high rate of fire) was a weapon mounting consisting of four of the "HB", or "hea ...

in 1965, and first production M167s were delivered to the U.S. Army in 1967. Starting in 1994, the M167 was replaced in U.S. service by the

M1097 Avenger The Avenger Air Defense System, designated AN/TWQ-1 under the Joint Electronics Type Designation System, is an American self-propelled surface-to-air missile system which provides mobile, short-range air defense protection for ground units agains ...

missile launcher and in 2005, by a ground-based version of the

Phalanx CIWS The Phalanx CIWS (often spoken as "sea-wiz") is a gun-based close-in weapon system to defend military watercraft automatically against incoming threats such as aircraft, missiles, and small boats. It was designed and manufactured by the Gene ...

self-defense gun which the

U.S. Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage of ...

uses on its ships. The Phalanx CIWS uses the same basic 20 mm rapid-fire Gatling gun as the M167.

Design

JASDF VADS1 Kai in Hamamatsu Air Base 20140928-01

The M167 VADS consists of a 20mm M168 cannon, linked ammunition feed system, and a fire control system in powered turret, mounted on an M42A1 towed carriage. The M167A2 VADS was modified with an improved fire-control subsystem. The improvement was obtained by replacing the disturbed reticle sight with a director reticle sight, the sight current generator with a digital processor, and the azimuth drive assembly with a harmonic drive. It also had an extra wheel put on each side which prevented flipping by providing a longer lever. Sudan and Yemen used M167 guns seated upon the Soviet

BTR-152 The BTR-152 is a six-wheeled Soviet armored personnel carrier (БТР, from Бронетранспортер/'' Bronetransporter'', literally "armored transporter"), built on the chassis and drive train of a ZIS-151 utility truck. It entered servi ...

APC. An M167 mounted on a Toyota Land Cruiser as a “technical” has been sighted in action in Yemen with the

Houthi The Houthi movement (; ar, ٱلْحُوثِيُّون ''al-Ḥūthīyūn'' ), officially called Ansar Allah (' ''Partisans of God'' or ''Supporters of God'') and colloquially simply Houthis, is an Islamist political and armed movement that ...

Operators

Current operators

* (7–8) * (72) * (30) * * * * (24) * (6) *

Former operators

* * * (40, 42 delivered) *

References

External links

M167 VADS
at GlobalSecurity.org {{commons category, M167 Vulcan Anti-aircraft guns of the United States 20 mm artillery