The theme and length of this small article today are considered to be a kind of painless "fanfare", just because someone around me asked about a small detail, that is, the current U.S. Marine Corps ECH helmet, the "helmet card" used, what does the letter cast in the middle mean?
The "helmet card" we usually refer to (hereinafter used as this common name), which is actually the usual colloquial name for the base of the bracket that facilitates the installation of night vision goggles on the helmet. Moreover, the protagonist mentioned today is the night vision stand base product originally designed by the American Norotos® Night Vision Equipment Company for the MICH helmet in the early years.
Although the design has been more than 20 years, due to the simple and reliable design, it still provides a key guarantee for the current standard armor such as the ACH, MICH, CVC and even ECH helmets of the US military. Also attributed to the U.S. Army maintaining a large number of ACH helmets, the production of this base has never stopped, in addition to the early days of the U.S. Marine Corps issuing ECH helmets, there are still a considerable number of ECH helmets continue to use this base.
■ The protagonist of our article today, the night vision device base product designed by the American Norotos® Night Vision Equipment Company for the MICH helmet, has been designed for more than 20 years, but it is still providing a key guarantee for the CURRENT standard helmets such as the US military ACH, MICH, CVC and even ECH helmets
Beginning in 2003, the U.S. Armed Forces assigned the National Warehouse Management Code (NSN) to the helmet card as 5340-01-509-1467 and simply defined as a "bracket."
Although this helmet card was designed by Norotos® Night Vision Equipment, it was mass-produced by ITT® Industries, a company specializing in aerospace and communication spare parts. Therefore, the US federal government has also signed a contract number since 2003 to give the plant a large-scale production.
■ The bracket (NSN: 5340-01-509-1467) produced by the production line of ITT Industries can be seen from the complete packaging bag, and the factory logo code of ITT Industries is "13567", and the name of the product line is written as "ACH helmet forehead bracket". The label for this period bears a clear contract number, which shows that the batch of products was produced under a 2006 contract signed by the federal government
After that, the helmet cards produced by itT® Industries in the United States were all pure black appearance. And at that time, considering this helmet card, the main military user was the ACH helmet of the US Army, so from the production side, it was customary to directly call this product "ACH helmet forehead bracket".
Until 2008, the U.S. federal government no longer signed a follow-up contract with ITT® Industries for further production. Instead, the production of the part was assigned to two Army depots in Pennsylvania, namely the U.S. Army Letterkenny Army Depot and the U.S. Army Tobyhanna Army Depot.
■ The U.S. Army Letterkenny Warehouse in Pennsylvania and the U.S. Army Tobyhanna Warehouse may literally feel that the two are more like a link in the logistics and warehousing of the U.S. Armed Forces, but both have the ability to produce and process a series of parts
After being put into production by the U.S. Army Letterkenny Army Depot and the U.S. Army Tobyhanna Army Depot, the two initially followed the pure black appearance of the production period of itT® Industries in the United States, and later in response to the relevant innovation and improvement needs of the army, the traditional Tan color and the brighter Tan color appearance version were derived.
■ In 2021, the personnel of the relevant departments of the US Army visited the "helmet card" production workshop of the US Army Tobyhanna warehouse, inspected the production process, and could clearly see these helmet cards that had not yet left the factory, using the CNC production process, and were in the original state of unpainted
But most importantly, in order to reflect the acceptance results of different production lines, the two are initialized and the helmet cards produced are engraved with the words "L" and "T", representing the Production Line from the U.S. Army Letterkenny Army Depot and the Tobyhanna Army Depot production line.
At this point, the author shows the complete packaging cases of the same products in the two US Army production lines, combined with the above for a simple comparison.
■ From top to bottom, the products of the production lines of the U.S. Army Letterkenny Warehouse (factory label code "0NDM7") and the U.S. Army TobyHanna Warehouse (factory label code "14850") are respectively engraved with the words "L" and "T" on the upper part of the non-slip screw hole of the helmet card according to the initials. It is worth noting that because the product belongs to the military's internal production line management and production, it is not put into production by the US federal government to the private factory, so the outer packaging only has a national warehouse management code (NSN) that is convenient for warehousing management, and there is no contract number. And for the product name, it is also a restoration of the product name "bracket" originally defined by the military, and no longer writes the specific helmet-type product
Compared with the U.S. Army, the U.S. Marine Corps did not install ACH helmets in large quantities, and the first units of the Marine Corps conventional combat units to contact this helmet card were actually vehicle crew crew members using CVC helmets to facilitate nighttime observation operations using helmets.
■ The U.S. Marine Corps tank crew used a helmet card produced at the U.S. Army Tobyhanna warehouse on the DH-132B CVC helmet, and the word "T1" is another derivative stamp of the line product
■ This photo of the crew of the U.S. Marine Corps amphibious vehicle crew, taken in 2020, still seems to use the black-looking helmet cards produced at the early U.S. Army Tobyhanna warehouse, but it is not excluded that the helmets and helmet cards have been spray painted by individuals
Therefore, after the U.S. Marine Corps began to install ECH helmets nationwide, it began to use this helmet card earlier, until in recent years, that is, after 2017, it began to gradually replace the helmet card matching the ECH helmet in accordance with the follow-up improvement plan delivered by Gentex® to the U.S. Marine Corps.
But as the facts and as we said at the beginning, it is still more or less possible to see the use of such helmets in the US Marine Corps.
■Including photos of the U.S. Marine Corps Systems Command (MCSC) when it first announced the notice of ECH helmet installation, and examples of U.S. Marine Corps still wearing ECH helmets to use the helmet card in recent years, the "T" stamp produced in the U.S. Army's Tobyhanna warehouse can be seen
But the "L" badge cards produced at the U.S. Army's Letterkenny warehouse have indeed become less and less likely to be seen in the past few years, even by the U.S. Army.
And the US Marine Corps has used so far, almost all of them are the U.S. Army Toby Hanna warehouse production of "T" standard helmet cards, it may also be that the author will not find it for a while and a half, and dare not veto the conclusion.
■ In 2015, a soldier from the U.S. Army's 15th Support Brigade used a helmet card produced at the U.S. Army's Letterkenny warehouse, and the "L" stamp on the helmet card was clearly visible
The author believes that combined with the news in recent years, this may be related to the decline in production capacity caused by the US Army's Letterkenny warehouse on the environmental governance issues around the site, energy conservation and emission reduction, and plant improvement.
But it is also possible that it is only the orderly production adjustment made by the U.S. Army in arranging for the U.S. Army's Letterkenny warehouse to make way for the production of other parts.