YW-750 Armored Ambulance

China had for many years produced copies of Soviet equipment for domestic production. In the 1960`s the Chinese Norinco company produced a series of box shaped tracked APC`s very typical of the designs being fielded at that time and more akin to the American M-113 series. The first production of these vehicles were classified as the type YW-531 series.

The vehicle has welded steel plate construction it had a crew of 3 consisting of driver, gunner and commander. The 320 hp diesel power plant gave a performance of 65km/hr on road and 46 km/hr off road top speeds.

A variant of this series of APC's was a command and control version designated YW-701 with an enlarged and raised rear hull. The same hull is used for the armoured ambulance version the Yw-750.

For an armoured ambulance the Geneva Convention allows for self defence of the wounded. So the Yw-750 is fitted with a 12.7mm Type 54 heavy mg mounted on the commander’s cupola.

The Chinese heavily exported the YW-531 series, one of the major customers was Iraq who purchased the armoured ambulances, C&C vehicles and the APC`s. These vehicles were a common site in the first gulf war with many abandoned and destroyed by the coalition forces in 1991.

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