2, the Leopard 2A6 main battle tank, and Russian T-62 tanks. Slat armor is favored over traditional plate armor not only due to its effectiveness against shaped-charge warheads, but also due to its much lighter weight, which improves vehicle maneuverability. Slat armor was first used on the Israeli IDF Caterpillar D9R armored bulldozer in 2005, and was installed in large numbers in 2006. Around the same time in 2005, slat armor was first proposed for the Stryker by a team of experts from the Army Research Laboratory (ARL), the Developmental Test Command, and the Aberdeen Test Center (ATC) to protect the vehicle from RPGs. Within seven days, the ARL and ATC designed and produced the first prototype, which was later mass produced at the Lima Army Tank Plant in Ohio and implemented in different variants of the Stryker. The design of the slat armor has the cage placed 50 cm ahead around the vehicle, allowing an RPG warhead to explode at a safe distance. Also, the slat armor on the Stryker vehicles is reportedly effective against HEAT rounds. In 2007, BAE Systems developed a very lightweight aluminum slat armor system named LROD, which was initially used on the Buffalo MPV, and which was claimed to weigh half the amount of comparable steel designs. BAE later equipped several US Army RG-31s with a variant of the LROD system, and also developed the system for its RG-33 vehicles, the Caiman and the JERRV. Slat armor is also fielded on the American M1 Abrams as part of the Tank Urban Survival Kit (TUSK) urban warfare series. In the Syrian Civil War, Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS), the Free Syrian Army and Syrian Army equipped their armored vehicles with homemade slat armor to protect them from RPG impact. In August 2016, Russia introduced bar-slat armor developed by NII Stali and Uralvagonzavod to increase protection of Russian armored vehicles against RPG and recoilless rifle HEAT rounds by 55-60%. The armor can be integrated with a variety of old-Soviet and Russian vehicles including the BTR-50, BTR-60, BTR-70, BTR-80/82, BTR-90, BMP-1, BMP-2, BMP-3, BRDM-2, BRDM-3, and T-14 Armata, with the full kit adding of weight. Top-mounting In 2021, various Russian tanks were observed with top-mounted improvised slat armor made from steel grilles; these were nicknamed kozyrek ot solntsa (, lit. "sun visors") by Russian tank crews, and the Russian Ministry of Defense stated in