UK Defence Forum

The Demountable Rack Offload and Pickup System (DROPS) is a family of logistics vehicles operated by the British Army, which consists of two vehicle types:

Leyland DAF medium mobility load carrier (MMLC)
Foden improved medium mobility load carrier (IMMLC)
Both are able to transport 15-tonne flatracks or containers configured to ISO 20 feet standard and to load and offload them autonomously. Both may be supported with side rail transfer equipment (SRTE) for loading and unloading railway wagons.

The DROP system was designed to meet the very high intensity battles in Central Europe in the last decade of the Cold War. However it entered service after the collapse of the Warsaw Pact but nevertheless proved a versatile vehicle system on operations completely different from those originally envisaged.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demountab ... kup_System

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I assume the 155mm rounds are carried palletised? What is the interim "rack" for their handling, before it gets down to handling individual rounds... or is there any such in use?

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DROPS, the vehicle that went out of service in December 2014 yet continues to serve in numbers.

A weird story, that one.

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the Artillery ammo flat racks are broken down and converted into mixed nature flat racks containing a mix of ammunition.

they have been flogged on ops all over the place is their any word of replacement

arfah wrote:very worn and tired. Still at least one FODEN IMMLC Trogging about over Salisbury plain as of last October.

Good that practice can be kept going, at a minimal cost. Some other countries in the EU have their artillerymen "let rip" with such calibres that are about to be scrapped (and the ammo about to time expire)
- but what about war stocks? Pleasing the accountants is all well and good, but it is not the target to be scraping the bottom of the barrel/ warehouse, and only then order some more

It is not just a matter of practice / training. They are used everywhere from ARRC, 3rd Division HQ and FALCON sqn to carry the decontamination kit. These are just some of the units that have been seen working with DROPS still.

The replacement programme is waiting to progress, and really it should be an higher priority for the Army, considering all the key roles DROPS covers and the limited number of EPLS available.

I agree, but was I mistaken in that IMMLC is used solely in the ammo replen role?
- that has not been thought out at all well for a "hot war"... but we won't have one, so it is alright
- should have converted the deactivated AS90s into ammo carriers for the last 10-12 mls (the difference between the AS90 range and the likely OpFor counter-battery fire)

That was really the background to me asking about any interim size between a pallet and handling individual rounds

why the plan was the flat racks are pre dumped the missions are fired and the guns leave the flat racks are recovered later if there are any left.

I believe that plan includes moving about within a 2 x 2 (km/ mls) fire box, to coin a term if the RA has another one for it.
- obviously to avoid being immediately targeted by counter-battery fire
- means returning to those "caches" for slow manhandling of rounds
- also could imply a rather static view of ops; rather than keeping up with the Challies and Warriors and firing from not too much behind them, every time from a different position, or wider "box"

Wiki tells us that these days BAE is building these sorts of things:
"M109A7 was slated to begin low-rate initial production by 2013. The U.S. Army plans on procuring a fleet of 580 sets of M109A7 howitzers and M992A3 ammunition support vehicles."
- please note sets that always have the (near-identical) ammo carrier
- what do they (US army, not BAE) know that we don't?

Gabriele wrote:DROPS, the vehicle that went out of service in December 2014 yet continues to serve in numbers.

A weird story, that one.

70 of them just appeared in Finland, at the princely sum of euro 22k each.
http://u0v052dm9wl3gxo0y3lx0u44wz.wpeng ... VRT-02.jpg

No, the bv206 in the photo did not come on the deal (but ten trailers were thrown in, to compensate)

they are a great idea the flat racks can be generated at any level of the supply chain be single commodity or multi commodity shipped out then dumped for collection and use as needed.

Well it looks like the Army has successfully completed the upgrade of 300+ MAN trucks with the replacement for DROPS the Enhanced Palletised Load System, or EPLS. Shows that good thing can happen away from the spotlight.
https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/convers ... -complete/

Not sure where to place this news item....