Malaysia to upgrade armoured vehicles

Rheinmetall MAN Military Vehicles Condor 4x4 APC used by Malaysia fitted with a Thales FVT900 one-person turret armed with a 20 mm cannon and 7.62 mm co-axial MG. Source: Rheinmetall
Malaysia is looking at ways to upgrade elements of its fleet of armoured fighting vehicles (AFVs) to extend its operational life, even though the country is currently taking delivery of 257 AV8 8x8 vehicles from local company DEFTECH, the first of which were delivered from the FNSS production line in Turkey.

Speaking at the IQPC International Armoured Vehicles (IAV) 2016 conference held in London, in late January, Dr Yazid Ahmad, director Mechanical & Aerospace Technology Division of the Science and Technology Research Institute for Defence (STRIDE), revealed that Malaysia is planning to upgrade some of its Alvis Vehicles Scorpion 90 light AFVs and Rheinmetall MAN Military Vehicles Condor 4x4 armoured personnel carriers (APCs).

Malaysia received a total of 186 SIMBAS 6x6 AFVs between 1983 and 1984 and 459 Rheinmetall MAN Military Vehicles Condor 4x4 APC and variants. It also acquired 26 Alvis Scorpion 90 light armoured vehicles (LAVs) from 1983, which were fitted with a two-person turret armed with a 90 mm Cockerill gun and a 7.62 mm co-axial machine gun (MG). They were originally fitted with a flotation screen for amphibious operations, but these have now been removed.

Export Alvis Scorpion fitted with a two-person turret armed with 90 mm gun, 7.62 mm co-axial MG, and roof-mounted 0.50 calibre M2 HB MG, excluding flotation screen. (BAE Systems)

After looking at a number of options a decision was taken to refurbish the current Perkins diesel engine and upgrade the TN15 transmission to the more reliable TN15DE standard, and also to go with a new single pin track.

The aluminium hull will be refurbished and seven of the remaining 14 Scorpion 90 LAVs will have their turrets removed and replaced by the Thales UK FVT900 one-person turret armed with a 20 mm cannon and a 7.62 mm co-axial MG.

These FVT900 turrets are being taken from the Alvis Stormer tracked APC, of which 25 were delivered from the United Kingdom. Of the 25 Stormer APCs, 12 had the FVT900 turret and the remainder had a Rheinmetall TH-1 one-person turret armed with two 7.62 mm MGs.

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