Malaysia's armored vehicles used to be largely of foreign origin, but it is now able to build its own military equipment
AV8 Gempita is the latest generation of 8x8 armored personnel carriers of the Malaysian armed forces
It is a multi-purpose amphibious armored vehicle developed by Malaysian defense company DefTech
with support from Turkish defense company FNSS
The vehicle was officially put into operation in 2014, and so far about 257 units have been produced
The AV8 will replace the obsolete infantry fighting vehicles SIBMAS 6x6 and Condor 4x4 being used by the Malaysian Army
The Deftech AV8 8x8 is also considered a modernized variant of the Turkish FNSS Pars AFV model
It is Malaysia's first indigenous 8×8 armored vehicle
AV8 has a weight of about 30 tons, length is 8m, width is 2.7m, and height is 2.17m
The crew of 3 includes: commander, gunner and driver
The driver and the commander seats are located at the front of the vehicle, the turret in the middle and the troop's compartment at the rear
There is three large day periscopes at the front position of driver and commander and one on each side that provide excellent visibility
Eleven infantrymen can be seated at the rear of the hull on individual seats down each side of the hull facing inwards
All shock-absorbing seats are fitted with five-point seatbelts as standard
Back of the driver and commander position, there is an access passage to the troop compartment at the right side of the hull
The troops leave and enter the vehicle via a large hydraulic ramp mounted at the rear of the hull
The hull of the original Pars consisted of a composite aluminium and steel armour
that provides protection for the crew and infantry against firing of small arms 7.62 mm armour-piercing attack through a full 360°
The AV8 has add-on armour at the front and sides to increase protection level to STANAG 4569 Level 4, with protection against 14.5mm rounds
The AV8 Gempita uses a 8x8 chassis and is motorized with a German turbocharged diesel engine, developing 550 hp
coupled to a fully automatic transmission with 6 forward and 1 reverse gears
The diesel power pack is mounted to the rear of the driver
The AV8 can run at a maximum road speed of 100 km/h with a maximum cruising range of 700 km
The added armour weight resulted in the decrease of water speed from 8 km/h of original Pars to only 6 km/h
The anti tank version with LCT30 turret is not amphibious
There are 2 main Gempita variants, designated LCT25 and LCT30, with quite powerful weapons
The LCT30, with a two man turret with two-axis stabilisation and it is armed with a 30 mm GI-30 cannon
and a FN Herstal MAG 58M coaxial 7.62 mm machine gun
The integrated fire-control system combines a video and thermal sight with three fields of view
an integrated laser range finder, a ballistic computer, an auto-tracker, and touch-screen battle panels for the commander and the gunner
The LCT25 or IFV25 is an amphibious variant, and is armed with a one-man Sharpshooter Turret, with a Bushmaster 25mm autocannon
A 7.62mm coaxial machine gun is mounted to the left side of the main armament
The turret is fully stabilised and can fire on the move in both day and night
The IFV25 variant has additional floats on the right side of the vehicle to balance the vehicle during amphibious operations
Gempita is expected to become the backbone of Malaysia's armored divisions
AV8 is rated as equivalent to LAV-25 or BTR-3
It shows the amazing progress of the Malaysian military industry
With its will and determination, Malaysia can completely move towards independent production of this widely used vehicle