Page 104 - The Royal Lancers Chapka 2018

102 REGIMENTAL JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL LANCERS (QUEEN ELIZABETHS’ OWN) Armoured Trials and Development Unit
The AJAX team at the Armoured Trials and Development Unit (ATDU) in Bovington is split down into to two de- partments who work side by side; the User Engagement Team (UET) and the AJAX Reliability Trials Team (ARTT).
The AJAX User Engagement Team work closely with General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin attending trials, acting as rep- resentatives of the user community and Subject Matter Experts within the three key domains: Driving and Maintenance, Gun- nery and Communication Information Systems. This is to ensure the vehicle is up to the standard ready for the Field Army to re- ceive. Although most of our activity is done in sunny Wales, we do get the odd trip away. The team has been to the UAE to con- duct the ‘in country hot trials’, Sweden for ‘in country cold trials’, as well as Canada, Spain and France to conduct various trials.
The AJAX Reliability Trials Team will be the soldiers who will undertake the big task of putting the vehicles through their pac- es in 2019, by doing Battlefield missions week in, week out. This will iron out all the underlying issues the vehicle may have, and
ensure that the vehicles are battle ready and safe for the Field Army to start their training and become competent AJAX crews. The regiment should look forward to receiving the AJAX fleet as it will be a vehicle to be reckoned with, and a big step up from the current fleet of CVRT.
Although the AJAX is the big drive at the minute for the Royal Armoured Corps, there are other departments within ATDU such as the Infantry Fighting Vehicle Team who are conduct- ing trials with the Warrior 2 alongside Lockheed Martin. Their program is running simultaneously with the AJAX program and they will also begin their reliability trials in 2019. There are also trials being conducted on all other platforms, with a whole host of companies and new technologies going to trial.
In the future ATDU will be looking forward to Challenger Life Extension Program and Mechanised Infantry Vehicle trials teams conducting their own growth and reliability trials prior to the vehicles being deployed to the Field Army.
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