The Hercules MRAV is one of a family of vehicles being offered by Portsmouth Aviation for the UK MoD Light Mobility Vehicle (LMV) programme, reports Bob Morrison.
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Launched as the LSA (Light Strike Assault) vehicle at the 2024 DVD (Defence Vehicle Dynamics) biennial industry exhibition at Millbrook Proving Ground, the Hercules Multi-Role Assault Vehicle or MRAV was not originally conceived for the UK MoD LMV programme, but as requirement details for this long-running project to replace the 1990s vintage Land Rover Defender ‘Wolf’ and ATL Pinzgauer fleets firmed up the designer team realised they had a common base platform which might just fit the bill.
So what, you may ask, prompted the Land Services side of family-owned Portsmouth Aviation (aka PORTAV) to design Hercules? In a nutshell, while previously working with another British company several of the team were involved with the creation of the uprated and re-powered light armoured R-WIMK+ Land Rover Defender variant. Over time the now PORTAV employees had come to realise that this urgently procured conversion was not ideal for the tasks it was subsequently asked to perform. R-WMIK+ was, and to some extent still is, a highly capable vehicle but while deployed on field operations it was consistently overloaded and pushed beyond the design parameters of the original TUM (HS) or Truck Utility Medium (Higher Specification) military specification update to the 1994 Land Rover Defender 110 base model.
SOC (i.e. Special Operations Capable) personnel of a friendly government that Portsmouth Aviation has supplied with military equipment for several decades had a specific requirement for a Light Strike Assault vehicle able to carry a much higher payload than a typical Land Rover or Land Cruiser conversion while still fitting the CH-47 internal load parameters, and so the PORTAV Hercules LSA prototype was born. Privately funded by the Hampshire defence contractor, the heli-portable Hercules LSA has a design payload of 3,000kg and a Gross Train Weight (Braked) of 9,250kg.
Powered by a 160kW (215hp) Steyr Motors 3.2-litre straight six turbo-diesel, Hercules has a top road speed of 150 km/h (94mph) and a range of 600km (375 miles). Basic dimensions for the MRAV version are 5050mm long, 1790mm wide and 1835mm high (without weapons mount) on a 3500mm wheelbase rectangular cross-section chassis. Unprepared wading depth is 750mm, ground clearance is 309mm, approach and departure angles are 55° and 40° respectively, while breakover angle is 150°.
The Hercules MRAV / LSA version, which in UK LMV terms is a TMV or Tactical Mobility Vehicle, is an open-topped four-person layout 4×4 truck with a large cargo load bed accessed over a wide drop-down tailgate. However enclosed versions in both two-person two-door and five person four door configurations are possible, as are both battlefield ambulance and light armoured variants plus an unarmoured eight person troop carrying vehicle also on the digital drawing board.
Although I have previously seen Hercules on display, both at DVD 2024 and the British Army ‘Farewell to the Land Rover‘ event at Bovington earlier this year, I must stress that I have not driven the vehicle myself or seen it perform seriously off-road. However Team Hercules have been happy to share their promotional video with JOINT-FORCES, which by my reckoning was mostly shot at Millbrook Proving Ground and Long Valley. It’s impressive.
Hercules, as its name suggests, was designed from the outset to be a powerful vehicle and with a 3,000kg payload, 10F1R automatic gearbox, permanent 4×4 and three locking differentials it most clearly is one. UK MoD is looking for nine LMV variants on a Common Base Platform and at least one of these will be required to transport up to 2,000kg plus two 95th percentile male soldiers (c.220kg) wearing combat body armour and helmet as well as carrying their personal equipment and rifle (say 80kg). If MoD insists that the vehicle must be capable of being driven on a Cat B licence (i.e. maximum authorised mass or gross vehicle weight of 3,500kg) this leaves only 1200kg available for an otherwise empty vehicle with say 100 litres (100kg) of fuel, lubricants and coolant liquid. With a kerb weight of 2,750kg a fully laden Hercules would require a driver with a Category C licence, but as soldiers need at least a Cat C licence to drive most other MoD ‘green fleet’ vehicles might not this be time to bite the bullet and train every soldier, or at least NCO (and officer), to drive more than just cars and light vans?
Finally, Portsmouth Aviation may not be a familiar name to many Joint-Forces readers but the Hampshire company has actually been around for the last 97 years and has been supplying the UK armed forces with specialist equipment, and services, since before World War Two. A highly successful family-owned business, currently led by a third generation CEO, it manufactures a very wide range of equipment for direct supply and for international defence primes; from torpedo trolleys to laser guided bomb containers to air-defence missile transportation racks, etc. However on security grounds I won’t delve much further into this aspect save to say, speaking as a journalist whose initial formal qualifications were in the engineering field, that the quality of design and manufacture I witnessed coming out of the factories on the historic Portsmouth Airfield site is precisely what one would expect of a major defence and aviation industry supplier.
Is Hercules what UK MoD need… or want? I don’t really know as so much of the UK defence procurement process is opaque. However if they are thinking out of the box and not just trying to source an ultra-cheap vehicle, while looking back at past conflicts rather than considering what the future is likely to look like, I reckon they should al least be giving Hercules some serious consideration even if it doesn’t necessarily tick all the paperwork boxes.
[images © Bob Morrison unless otherwise credited]
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