News
HOBSON INDUSTRIES PRESS RELEASE
PUBLIC ORDER VEHICLES - THE NEXT GENERATION
HOBSON LAUNCHES THETIS
Hobson Industries of Donington on Bain, Lincolnshire, U.K., announce the launch of a new Public Order vehicle, Thetis.
The name Thetis was chosen from Greek mythology for the Mk.IV+ by Barbara Hobson. Father of Achilles, Thetis had the power to create a shield around those he loved. “We have designed a vehicle with that in mind,” Peter Hobson said, “To protect those people we put in harm’s way.”
Based on research conducted both when designing the original Hobson ALR Mk.IV proposal and subsequently evolving the better protected military specification Ranger derivative, in Thetis, Hobson Industries has been able to create a vehicle which they believe better shields its occupants than any previous steel bodied armoured Land Rover, and, through incorporating the latest design and materials technology in strategic alliances with other specialists in associated fields they have been able to increase protection level while maintaining operational payload.
Thetis has been designed to deal with multiple threats and attacks from above, below and all sides, ranging from bullets and improvised weapons through to petrol bombs and fire scenarios. For example, the Dawson Roof overhead protection principle has been improved and integrated into a one-piece design which also assists in fire protection for the occupants in the type of situation often encountered in urban civil disorder, and indeed witnessed frequently, during the Jasmine Revolution which swept through much of the Arab World in the first half of 2011.
The original Dawson Roof concept came about following the first successful attack on an RUC vehicle with a ‘drogue bomb’ improvised explosive device, which peeled the roof of a Hotspur armoured Land Rover in Dawson Street Belfast on 9th August 1987. Questioned about his Dawson-derivative roof:
“I won’t go into the details of the Mk.IV+ roof suffice to say that it is a multi-layer design that works on the spacial armour principle. I’ve done most of the research on this for getting this armour system going. What we’ve done with Thetis is raised the height of the body and used a Dawson-derivative design, because of the weight, to give us more height and of course a smoother surface for flammable liquid to run off. It is basically the same as the original concept of a multi-layer design except ours is also impervious to 7.62mm fire.” Peter Hobson said.
“We improved the side gig design considerably”, Peter Hobson continued, “and now it’s an integrated part of the vehicle. It is designed to disintegrate on explosion so it’s actually sacrificial but the outer is made out of exactly the same material as they make the top hats for the Land Rover Wolf so it is designed to crush in an accident without giving shards out. It is actually quite an expensive piece of kit, being layered and autoclaved, and of course it meets Road Traffic Act legislation for collision, which is important. We can’t use the bath spray type technique on it because it would shatter in shards. As it’s designed to be sacrificial we want it to actually tear apart.”
The Mk.IV+ Thetis has a military specification STANAG Level 1 floor at half the weight that would normally be considered appropriate and this gives considerable savings on weight as well as providing a solution which greatly exceeds B6 protection level.
Hobson’s also worked with Romag, makers of bullet resistant security glass, on the weight reduction programme. Armoured glass is both very thick andit’s heavy, so working with the knowledge they had of Northern Ireland vehicle attacks Peter realised that the biggest threat was actually from a sniper round and so developed a glass to meet NIJ 0108.01. This glazing solution not only easily stops a 150grain sniper round at 3000 fps but also caters for another common threat, which is, ball bearings fired at the windows to crack the glass and take the vehicle out of service.
This secondary threat is addressed by provision of a potted glazing system with the glass being sheathed in its own frame meaning it is just a matter of unscrewing a few screws, taking the old glass out, and inserting a new cassette in double sided tape to make it waterproof. “My cassetted glazing system design gives an easy stop for a high powered sniper round, which is what the primary threat would be. If a ball bearing is fired at it, because its front face is a heavier glass it is less likely to shatter, but if it does the cassette system allows it to be changed literally in minutes and the vehicle can then be returned to service.” Peter Hobson said.
“Hobson Industries Mk.IV+ Thetis has therefore been a rethink from top to bottom. With complete redesigns for all of the armour shell, all of the improved Dawson-derivative roof, all of side gigs, all of spall liners, all of the bonnet and wing petrol bomb protection, all of the suspension and all of the braking system, plus redesign of seventy percent of the fire protection system. I am confident that my design is the best current solution for those requiring a comparatively benign appearance armoured Land Rover type of vehicle for high threat level public order situations.” Peter Hobson concluded.
17th June 2011