Picture of Alvis Vehicles FV432
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The FV432 is very similar in appearance to the American M113 armoured personnel carrier of the same period. The one major difference between them however, is that the M113 is of all-welded aluminium construction, while FV432's hull is made of welded steel, which provides protection against small arms fire and shell splinters. The driver sits at the front of the vehicles on the right hand side and has a single piece hatch that opens to the left. The driver has an AFV No. 33 Mark 1 wide-angle day periscope, which for driving at night, can be replaced by an L5A1 passive periscope. The commander sits behind the driver and has a cupola that can be traversed through 360 degrees and has a single piece hatch with three AFV No. 32 Mark 1 day periscopes. Mounted on the forward part of the cupola is a 7.62mm GPMG. Many FV432s have been fitted with a Peak Engineering lightweight turret, armed with a 7.62mm GPMG. The turret has a single piece hatch cover, three day periscopes, as well as eight 66 mm grenade dischargers mounted in two sets of four, on either side of the turret. The turret is mounted over the forward part of the circular troop compartment hatch. The original hatch, which came in four parts, was removed and replaced by a circular steel piece, which contains the turret, with a hatch to the immediate rear. Some of these turrets have subsequently been removed from FV432s and fitted to Saxon (4 x 4) vehicles are deployed to Bosnia. The engine is the left of the driver with the air inlet (forward), air outlet (rear) louvres in the roof and the exhaust pipe on the left side of the hull. The engine is a Rolls-Royce K60 No. 4 Mark 4F 6 cylinder multi-fuel unit (240bhp) coupled to a General Motors Allison Division TX-200-4A semi automatic transmission, which has built under licence by Rolls-Royce in the UK. The troop compartment is at the rear if the vehicle with 10 (five-a-side) infantrymen seated on bench seats the run along either side of hull. Alternatively, the seats can be folded upwards, enabling the vehicle to carry up to 3670 kg of cargo. The infantrymen enter and leave the vehicle through a large door at the rear of hull, which opens to the right and is provided with a vision bloc. The suspension and is also a torsion and bar type, consisting of five dual rubber-tyred road wheels with the drive sprocket at the front, idler at the rear and two track return rollers. The first and last road wheels have a friction shock absorber and there is a side skirts to protect the upper part of the track. The vehicle comes equipped with an NBC system and the engine compartment has a Firewire detection system. There are numerous of variants of the FV432 including an ambulance, command vehicle, 81mm mortar carrier, maintenance carrier, minelayer, radar vehicle, recovery vehicle, Royal Artillery vehicles, Royal Engineers vehicles, Royal Signals vehicles, the FV438 Wavell and opposition force vehicles.
Hull length: 5.25m. Hull width: 2.8m. Height: 1.88m. Crew: 2+10. Ground Clearance: 0.41m. Weight: 15,280kg (combat) Ground pressure: 0.78kg/sq.cm Max speed: 52km/h. Max range (internal fuel - diesel): 480km on road. Armament: 7.62mm GPMG machine gun.
Bibliography
Alvis Vehicles FV432 Armoured Personnel Carrier in Jane's Armour and Artillery 2001 - 2002 at http://is.rmcs.cranfield.ac.uk/janes/janes/jaa2001/jaa_0242.htm.
