Hoovey689

iTrader: (16)

From Super Duty to Call of Duty: Ford could power U.S. military's future

The future of the U.S. Army's Joint Light Tactical Vehicle program might be powered by a Ford Motor Co. V-8.

BAE Systems, Northrup Grumman and Meritor Defenses said this afternoon that their proposed light fighting vehicle, which is called the Valanx, will have a Ford Power Stroke 6.7-liter diesel engine under it's steel hood. (And likely a .50 cal on its roof.)

If it's good enough for the Super Duty, it's good enough for a Call of Duty.

"Ford products have a reputation for dependability and performance, even under challenging conditions," said Ann Hoholick, BAE Systems Vice President of Amphibious & New Programs in the release.

Ford had dropped out of the JLTV program, which is searching for the next fighting machine to replace the venerable Humvee for the U.S. military. Ford is not a partner with the group but did provide a statement this afternoon.

"We're proud of Ford's 6.7-liter Power Stroke V8 diesel engines and their best-in-class power, durability and fuel economy," said Ford spokesman Mike Levine. "And we are proud the engines were chosen to be part of BAE's JLTV entry."

Let's just hope that engine is as bullet proof.

http://www.autoblog.com/2012/03/26/f...-u-s-military/

Hoovey689

iTrader: (16)

For those who don't know the 6.7L V8 puts out 400hp and 800lbft

FrankReynoldsCPA

Are you sure they're going to use the 400/800 version?

In the Super Duty, ford uses the 400/800 for the pickups only, but if you order a cab and chassis(no bed) through the fleet division, you get a derated version with 300 hp and 660 tq. They turn down the wick a little so that they'll get longer engine life under heavy conditions. I wonder if this won't happen for the military vehicle.

I8ABMR

That thing looks like it eats tanks for lunch.

ArmyofOne

Read on:

I cant even begin to speculate on this vehicle, but the trucks we use right now have well over that. Most in the 1200+TQ range. The Army hasnt de-tuned anything since the Humvee which debuted in 1985-ish. With most of our vehicles weighing in at over 40,000lbs today, we need all the power we can get. The RG-31 Mk5 uses a 6.7L Cummins engine, the Maxx-Pro uses either a 6.7L (in the base model) or a 7.4L International (In the Dash, Plus and Wreckers), the MAT-V and Cougar I and II use CAT C-15's. ALL of which are rated at 450+hp and 1200+TQ.

We only care about engine longevity to a point. If it gets our guys the fawk out of the kill-zone, who gives a rats *** if replacing the engine is an annual service requirement? On today's battlefield, long-term reliability is ALMOST a moot point. There isnt a truck in my fleet with over 5,000 miles on it, and most of them are on their 3rd, 4th, or 5th engine. Every time they take a front end IED hit, the engine is turned into a giant paperweight. They dont put armor around the motors. If I know its gonna keep Joe safe, I would do it in a heartbeat...and I work on the damned things.

The JLTV looks promising. I just hope it works better on the battlefield than the MAT-V. I saw one of those split in half, and another one turned inside out from the V-hull to the roof, literally in the same day. In fact, it was in the span of a few hours. Come to find out, after they were fielded, the armor was defective and the design was flawed. Something like a 97% survivability rating was projected, and proven...with 14lbs of C-4.

The problem is, the average roadside bomb out here is 40-80lbs of C-4 equivalent. The Armor is too soft on the MAT-V, and the V-hull is designed with the welds facing the wrong direction on the belly, so it literally folds inverted and becomes a 1500lb triangular projectile into the cab of the rig if hit directly. No bueno .

Lil4X

A few years ago I worked with BAE on bid presentations for the QF-4 full-scale target drone and the MQM-107E subscale drone and got involved in a number of bid conferences for weapons and training systems. Military contracts are almost always bid items, and cheap = purchase. I hate to say it, but our guys are out there defending themselves and us with the lowest bid alternative. Just because Ford wins a vehicle contract, it's no endorsement of the marque. They offered the best balance of mission capability, price, delivery, parts, and service - at least according to the pencil-pushers at the Pentagon.

mmarshall

DAYMN. Sounds like some of the old water-cooled FWD VWs from the mid-70s (Rabbit, Dasher, etc...)

Some of them needed ring and valve jobs before the original tires and brakes went.



I agree that GI-Joe's safety is paramount, but can you totally protect the front end around the motor without blocking off a reasonable amount of air-flow through the radiator? In the Middle-East (where many of these vehicles are used), summer temperatures can reach 120 degrees...as you probably found out in Iraq. Synthetic oil, of course (which I presume the military uses) helps protect the engine at those kind of temperatures, but you still have to have cooling-air coming in....and those insurgents are probably smart enough to aim their weapons at or near the radiators.

ArmyofOne

Intercoolers help keep temps down, bigger fans etc. The thing is, if they put armor around the damn thing, I (maintenance) cant work on it very easily. It would take 24 shop hours to replace an engine if I had to remove armor, whereas only 10 if I dont. So they dont put armor around the engines and definately never the front or bottom, with the exception of a few vehicles like the Cougar and the Buffalo.

The have so few miles on them when the engines get replaced because when an IED goes off, it rips the turbo's off its bolts, the engine off its mounts, the oil pan and bottom end to shreds, or worse.

Oh and right now, temps are in the 100's and its only April. Southern afghanistan is known to have temps well over 130 into the 140's.

FrankReynoldsCPA

I don't think any engine they could put in that thing could be worse than the GM 6.2/6.2 engines that the HUMVEE used for 20 years. Even in conservative civilian use, those engines are unreliable pieces of garbage.

ArmyofOne

^truth. A realistic lifespan of 3 months or 3,000 miles. Even less in combat.

Grod

Isnt this already happening to some degree? In one of the Dodge Ram commercials it says it uses the same transmission as an m1 abram tank.

Screw the military use though, i could use one of these on my morning commute!

FrankReynoldsCPA

Lol, that's about what we got out of the 2 6.2's that we replaced in our old cube van. We ran the 3rd motor for a while and then parked it because of heating issues. It sat for about 10 years, tried to start it a few months back and it just knocked like hell. My dad calls it a gas engine that burns diesel fuel, just because it's so unreliable(he know's that the 6.2 isn't the gas engine design though).

ArmyofOne

I would say you mis-understood the commercials. The Transmission in a RAM truck (no longer Dodge ) is made by ZF, the same company who makes The abrams transmission. It is not an abrams transmission...that would not even fit into the truck's bed.

Pretty much what it is, an old 380 (350) with diesel heads. Throw a turbo on it, call it a 6.5, and get 6.5x more problems.

FrankReynoldsCPA

Dodge now uses a ZF transmission? When did this happen? I thought they were using the m-benz G56 for the manual, and a dodge-built transmission for the auto.


I could have sworn the 5.7 olds diesel was the gasser makeover. It was replaced by the 6.2, a ground-up redesign, from what I understand. It was however as weak as a gasser.

Lil4X

The Olds diesel was based on the gas 350 block, GM having the bright idea that their new diesel would be built on the same line as their gas engines to save tooling costs. Evidently somebody didn't understand the mission. Diesels operate at twice the compression ratio as gas engines, requiring all kinds of strengthening in the block and internals, with a fuel injection system that operates at incredibly high pressure, plus bearings and a valve train that takes a lot more punishment at idle than a gasser takes at WOT. Despite the cylinder arrangement, these engines have NOTHING in common . . . . well, except for some moron in Engineering who thought they did.

I never understood what possessed GM to try its hand at an automotive diesel when they had an acceptable model right down the street at their GM Diesel division. They have been leaders in the production of diesel engines (although probably not so proficient as Cummins, Cat, or Perkins), and have a good reputation for price/performance in their GM Diesel division. It's not like GM had never built a diesel before, but somebody must have been out of the room when the Olds product was conceived.

The GM passenger car diesel was a disaster. I knew several people who had them back in the day, and whether in urban service or highway cruisers, the engine literally shed parts as it went down the road. One gentleman who drove like an old lady couldn't keep his Olds on the road for more than ten days or two weeks at a stretch. GM was being buried alive in warranty work until the company simply washed its hands of the whole engine, leaving owners high and dry.

There were a number of shops that sprang up almost overnight offering to convert your diesel to a 350 gas engine for a few thousand bucks and they were swamped with business. It wasn't an easy swap because it involved more than the motor. There were incompatible braking systems, hydraulic vs. vacuum, a slightly different shifting program in the auto transmission and a different rear end ratio for some. The "converted" Olds '98s of a couple friends were good cars, almost trouble-free when compared to their previous lives as oil-burners. But they were never as reliable as their factory gas-powered cousins. It seemed like a couple years intensive wrenching had affected more than just the powerplant.

Even today GM's automotive divisions still can't seem to build a smoker motor for a passenger car or light truck.