With the twist of a knob the soldier can go from pure image intensification to pure thermal, stopping anywhere in between to see the fused image. It's easier to understand when you see it in the video after the jump.
Check out a Photo Recon and Video after the jump.
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What you are seeing in the video is me holding my little point and shoot camera in video mode up to the eyepiece of the ENVG. I'm twisting the fusion knob so you can see what it looks like when you shift between IR and thermal.
These things are pricey, so the army isn't going to replace every set of NODs in the inventory with ENVGs. Instead they'll likely be dolled out platoon, team and squad leaders. That's what's going on up at Fort Drum at the end of this month.
The Army says they cost less than a the combined cost of a current NVG and thermal imager combined, so we'd guess somewhere in the $8-10,000 a set.
It runs on 4 AA that are installed in a separate pod that mounts on the back of a helmet or on the unit itself. A set of AA batteries gives 7.5 hours of fused mode operation with an additional 7.5 hours in straight image-intensifier mode.
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