Franks,
The AP-3C upgrade (A = Australian) basically rips the guts out of frame, and puts all new whizz-bang stuff in. We get a glass(ish) cockpit, all new tactical computers, new acoustic gear, new radar and new cameras (eventually). The only crew station that is retained is the ESM kit, which itself was only updated about 4-5 years ago.
The Nav/Tacco is retained, however their role for is slightly redefined. Things are still being worked out in the detail, but basically the Nav is taken out of the 'navigation' loop a little, and put more into the tactical management role. He still gets the tactical radio comms (pilots weren't silly enough to take that on!), but the FMS system is run by the pilots rather than the Nav as it is now.
Re Nav hours counting as PIC. Excuse me for a moment whilst I step outside...... ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.... .Sorry about that.... I'm back now..... .There's a couple of old sayings relevant to this - The four most useless things in aviation are: fuel in the tanker, airspace above you, runway behind you, and hours in a navigator's logbook.
Ex-navs do get employment outside - in fact for a while there, there was a few guys getting jobs with airlines in flight planning roles, ground management, that kind of thing. I know one or two got jobs in Air Services, but generally there are a lot of non-aviation related things they get into. Consultancy for arms-dealers is a popular option right now (arms-dealers = Raytheon, Lockheed, Boeing, Tenix etc etc)
Jumping onto Pilots course from the Nav category is certainly an option. The traditional route is that you do pre-Nav course (otherwise known as scrubbed off Pilots Course), then go off to Sale for Nav Course, then the Squadrons. Going the other way is non-comformist, but possible.
Re topic getting old - don't worry about it - we can talk about ourselves for ages...