Saxon (armored personnel carrier)

Development

In the early 1970s, the British company GKN Sankey Ltd developed the AT100 police armored vehicles with a 4 × 2 wheel formula for use in urban areas and the AT104 4 × 4 wheel formula for use in rough terrain to suppress riots against in underdeveloped countries and the periphery. Both vehicles were intended for military police operations and other internal security operations . In accordance with the prevailing British military doctrine at that time, the Ministry of Defense of Great Britain demanded that developers submit for testing low-cost models of armored vehicles ^[2] .

Experienced Prototypes

Experienced machine prototypes had the following characteristics:

Control Department, Combat Division and Airborne Division

Both cars provided transportation on board of ten to twelve people with weapons and equipment.

Armor protection

The vehicles had 12.5 mm frontal armor plates and a 6 mm armored corps along the sides and top on the roof ^[2] .

Motor-transmission group and chassis

The propulsion system of both cars was presented by diesel engines with a capacity of 100 liters. with., a four-speed gearbox " Allison " and tires with automatic pumping of mechanical holes ^[2] .

Overall characteristics

The overall characteristics of the cars were about 4.6 m in length, 2.4 m in height and 2.13 meters in width. ^[2] .

Later, on the basis of AT104, a modification of AT105, called Saxon, was developed.

Production

Serial production of the AT105 was launched in 1976. From 1973 to 1984, about 200 vehicles were delivered to Bahrain, Kuwait, Malaysia and Oman for export ^[3] .

In the 1990s, armored cars armed with a 7.62-mm machine gun were in service with the British peacekeeping contingent in Bosnia. During operation, it was found that the installation of a machine gun raised the center of gravity of the machine. As a result, the car began to roll over, which led to a number of accidents ^[4] .

Subsequently, the AT105 was used by the British contingent in the initial period of the Iraq war ^[5]

Although it was initially assumed that the Saxon armored vehicles would remain in service with the British Army until 2014, in 2006 a decision was made to replace the AT105 in the British Army mechanized battalions with FV430 tracked armored personnel carriers that had undergone modernization (although the operation of 141 armored vehicles by police forces in Northern Ireland was continued ) ^[4] .

As of June 1, 2006, the British Army was armed with 590 Saxon armored cars, which were gradually replaced by Warrior infantry fighting vehicles ^[6] .

However, the exploitation of AT105 by the British army continued until at least 2008, they were used in the war in Afghanistan ^[7] .

In the fall of 2014, a contract was signed for the supply of 75 armored vehicles to Ukraine. In March 2015, Verkhovna Rada deputy A. Kuzhel announced her intention to send a request to the Prosecutor General of Ukraine to conduct an audit of the effectiveness of the use of budget funds under the contract for the purchase of Saxon armored vehicles ^[8]

On March 10, 2015, an accident occurred on the Kiev-Kharkov highway : one of the Saxon armored personnel carriers traveling in a military convoy turned over, the driver died ^[9] , 2 were hospitalized ^{[ specify ]} .

The machine was created on the chassis of a 4-ton British Army truck Bedford MK , an all-wheel drive version of the Bedford TK car and uses many of its nodes and components.

The body of the armored vehicle is welded, made of steel armor plates that provide protection from bullets from 7.62 mm small arms ^[1] .

A fixed commander’s cupola with a hatch opening back ^{[1] is} installed on the roof of the car.

Armament

Initially, the installation of one 7.62 mm machine gun or two coaxial 7.62 mm machine guns (with an ammunition load of 1,000 pieces of ammunition) was envisaged as armament ^[1] .

On February 13, 2015, a representative of the Ukroboronprom Group of Companies announced that the delivered armored vehicles would be armed with a 7.62 mm KT-7.62 machine gun ^[10] . On March 23, 2015, it was announced that the mount for installing the KT-7.62 machine gun on the Saxon armored vehicles was already developed at the Mayak factory ^[11] and when installing the device on the Saxon armored car, it provides a machine gun firing angle in the sector from −10 ° to + 45 ° vertically and 180 ° horizontally ^[12] .

April 4, 2015 at the training ground of the training center of the National Guard of Ukraine in the village of New Petrovtsy, Kiev region ^[13] , a demonstration model of the Saxon armored car, which was modernized at the Mayak plant (on which one 12.7-mm DShKM machine gun and two 7.62 mm machine gun PKB ) ^[14] .

Powerplant and Undercarriage

Initially, the Saxon armored vehicles were equipped with a Bedford 500 six-cylinder diesel engine with a capacity of 164 liters. from. and mechanical transmission, but later part of the armored vehicles of the last years of release, which were in service with the British army, was equipped with a six-cylinder TH Cummins engine with a capacity of 160 liters. from. and automatic transmission ^[1] .

Additional equipment

The following can be installed on the AT-105 Saxon:

• Smoke grenade firing device ^[1]
• winch ^[1]
• heater ^[1]
• dozer blade ^[1]
• headlamp finder ^[1]

• armored personnel carrier ^[3]
• AT105C - command post vehicle ^[3] with additional radio equipment ^[1]
• Saxon Patrol Vehicle - a police armored vehicle for use in Northern Ireland (lattice sliding screens are installed on the sides to protect the police from abandoned stones, etc.) ^[4]
• medical machine (one machine was made for use in Northern Ireland) ^[3]

In April 2015, one of the Saxon armored personnel carriers delivered to Ukraine was converted into a reconnaissance vehicle (with a video camera on a folding hydraulic mast) ^[15]

•   Djibouti - more than 4 as of 2018 ^[16]
•   Jordan - some in service with the gendarmerie as of 2018 ^[17]
•   Malaysia - 140 in the arsenal of the police as of 2018 ^[18] , a total of 44 were delivered in 1978-1979, some in the 1990s and 60 in 2007 ^{[1] [3]} .
•   Mozambique - 25 as of 2018 ^[19] , delivered in 2013 from the UK ^[20] .
•   Nigeria - more than 70 in the arsenal of the police, probably not used, as of 2018 ^[21] , a total of 75 were delivered in 1980-1982 ^{[1] [3]} .
•   Oman is 15 in service with the ground forces as of 2018 ^[22] , a total of 22 armored vehicles were delivered in 1982 (most of which went into service with the army, and a few went to the police) ^{[1] [3]} .
•   Republic of the Congo - 28 as of 2018 ^[23]
•   Somalia - over 25 as of 2018 ^[24]

Unknown status

•   Bahrain - 10 in service with the ground forces as of 2014 ^[25] , a total of 8 armored cars were delivered in 1981 and 2 in 1985 ^{[1] [3]} .
•   Iraq - 60 in service with the ground forces as of 2014 ^[26] , transferred by the British contingent to the Iraqi army after the invasion of coalition forces and the occupation of Iraq in 2003 .
•   Kuwait - 5 armored vehicles delivered in 1985
•   Ukraine - 75 as of 2016, delivered in 2015 ^{[27] [28]} .

Former

•   Great Britain - in 1983 they were adopted by the ground forces ^[29] , 624 armored vehicles were ordered for infantry divisions, and later they were also used in territorial battalions of internal security forces ^[30] ; withdrawn from service of the “first line” units in 2005-2006, finally withdrawn from service in 2008 ^[3]
•   Hong Kong ^{[1] [3]} - in 1988 several armored vehicles entered service with the PTU police special forces, in 2009 they were replaced by Unimog U5000s ^[31]

• Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (information on the supply of weapons and military equipment)