> I understand that the Canadian MLVW's are off the road because off a rim
> failure issue, anyone have any knowledge please?
We're all ex-CDN military at the movie company I work for - some still
active reservists - and we got a last hour call from the local Service Bn to
lend them two US M35A2's so they could fulfill a yearly charitable
committment in the absence of any available ML's.
Seems that vehicles in the East have been experiencing split-rim failures
due to a rust problem which appears to be forcing the ring away from the
rest of the rim, causing the assembly to blow apart at road speeds. There
have been several accidents reported, but thus far no fatalities. The fleet
is grounded because of this, and a number of solutions are being discussed,
including a redesigned retrofit wheel bearing an uncanny resemblance to the
old combat rim of WWII.
I've heard from unofficial sources that the contractor for the MLVW,
Montreal's Bombardier Corp., elected to go with a cheaper version of the
Budd rims we all have on our deuces, and that this problem wasn't expected
to rear its head 'during the normal service life of the vehicle.' The first
ML's entered service in 1984 or thereabouts, as I recall, which makes the
oldest of them some 16-17 YOA. Pretty poor showing when the average age of
the perfectly serviceable US M35A2 is somewhere around 30.
For those who don't know the ML, it's outwardly similar to the M35A2C, but
has the six-wheel configuration of the M34 and M135 as opposed to the duals,
and comes with power steering and an automatic transmission. Some have
already appeared on the surplus market in the Eastern and Central regions
of the country.
Andy Hill
MVPA 9211
Vancouver, B.C.
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