M-47E VLPD 26/70E “Lanzador” AVLB prototype

In the early 1980s, the Spanish company Talbot S.A. presented a project that envisioned installing an MLC-60 bridge on an M-47E1 medium tank chassis, designated the M-47E2 LP. However, this design was virtually identical to the M-60 AVLB scissor-type bridge-laying vehicles in service with the Spanish Army and presented the same drawbacks that the new vehicle was intended to avoid. Naturally, the Army rejected the project, and not even a prototype was built. Nevertheless, in 1988, the Army contacted Peugeot-Talbot (formerly Talbot S.A.) to adapt the rejected project and install a new sliding-type bridge on the same M-47E1 chassis, resulting in a prototype designated the “M-47E VLPD 26/70E Lanzador” (Launcher). This prototype was delivered in 1990, and was assigned for several years to an engineering unit that carried out an extensive and successful testing program that led in 1996 to the construction of a new bridge-laying vehicle, but this time on the chassis of the M-60A1 MBT, being designated M-60A1 VLPD 26/70E.

M-47E VLPD 26/70E “Lanzador” AVLB prototype gallery and more info