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February 2005

Army Not Sold On Commercial Trucks

Sandra I. Erwin

The Army’s Detroit-based research branch for years has tried to convince service leaders that they should purchase rugged commercial pickup trucks to supplement the aging fleet of Humvees.

Although the Army so far has rejected these proposals, Detroit’s automotive giants and the National Automotive Center have continued to fine-tune the design of the so-called severe off-road vehicles, or SORVs, which are underwritten by congressional add-on dollars that the Army never requested.

NAC, which reports to the Army’s Tank-Automotive and Armaments Command, is a research organization in Dearborn, Mich., which works closely with the automotive industry to find innovative technologies that can be adapted for Army vehicles.

The project previously was known as Combatt, for commercially based tactical trucks. The Combatt name is being phased out, because the automakers were unable to meet the ambitious performance requirements at the Army’s desired price tag, noted Hal Almand, team leader for light trucks at the NAC.

Detroit’s Big 3 — Ford, DaimlerChrysler and GM — came up with the name SORV. “They felt that maybe we were going too far with Combatt, which was intended to match the performance of the Humvee,” Almand said in an interview. “They wanted to back off of that a little bit. It was getting more expensive than what they thought the market could bear.”

SORV performs well off road, better than the average four-by-four pickup, but it’s more durable for military operations, he said. “They think they can sell the SORV for less than $50,000.”

By comparison, Combatt cost crept to $60,000, and the last Humvee NAC bought was $63,000, said Almand.

GM and DaimlerChrysler are delivering two Combatt and two SORV trucks. GM has seven vehicles under contract. One is a quad-steer truck. Another has a hybrid-electric gasoline engine. DaimlerChrysler is delivering four vehicles — two Combatt and two SORV, one of which is hybrid-electric.

Almand said he does not expect the Army to purchase any SORV vehicles in the foreseeable future, but he predicts that some National Guard units will acquire a small number of the vehicles for use at military bases in the United States. National Guard officials have driven on the SORV course, he said. “The Guard has shown interest in this kind of vehicle.”

Although the Army has a “pure-fleet” policy for Humvees, said Almand, it’s possible that as Humvees continue to wear out in Iraq, the service may replace some Humvees with SORVs for administrative missions that do not involve combat.

Creature comforts and the reliability of commercial vehicles make the SORV an attractive option, he added. Diesel powered trucks today run at least 200,000 miles before major components need to be replaced. Some companies give 70,000-mile warranties, said Almand.

The dollars for the SORV effort will run out in September, unless Congress adds funding later this year. The next phase of the program is to armor the vehicle, he said. “We are delivering one of those trucks for the Air Force that will be armored.” The Air Force may become a customer for this vehicle, which would be used by air-defense units at large bases, where it’s not unusual for troops to drive 300 miles from one site to another. “Humvees don’t work for them. They are looking at this vehicle,” he said.

Among the features that could make these vehicles useful in military settings are convoy lighting, black-all lighting, interior black-all light that can’t be seen from an airplane at night, heavy duty front and rear bumpers, high performance suspension, high performance air cleaning, underbody protection and onboard pneumatic system.

The Army’s program manager for tactical wheeled vehicles, Col. Robert Groller, said the service does not plan to allocate funds for commercial trucks, although it may lease some vehicles.

“We are looking at replacing Humvees in the schoolhouse environment and bases for non-combat use,” he said. But there is no “clear-cut” requirement for the SORV.

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