Posted on 03/24/2013 10:04:05 PM PDT by Nachum
That's a lot of stuff.
(Excerpt) Read more at youtube.com ...
“Fail to see any excitement quotient here........”
Although I would be pretty excited if they were headed to a public auction! I was just telling my son that years ago folks could buy old military Jeeps. But that I imagine they won’t be letting military Humvees join the civilian population. Too bad if I’m right.
Take the tinfoil off. Those were MRAPs, MATVs, LVSs and 900 Series 5 ton cargo trucks. It looked to be about a Battalion’s worth of Motor Transport equipment. There is nothing that says when this train was spotted or where. From the foliage and the fact that this was BNASF train it was likely in Northwestern Az. The Army ships the equipment for visiting units to NTC(National Training Center) north of Barstow Ca by train. The Marine Corps is also holding their qtrly ITX exercise(formerly known as CAX and Mojave Viper) in Twentynine Palms Ca this month also. Though the Marine Corps supplys visiting Marine Units with vehicles they don’t do it for participating Army units. If the vehicles were going to NTC they were likely offloaded in Barstow. If they went to Twentynine Palms they were likely offloaded in Ludlow. These vehicles could also be on their way to the Marine Corps Logistics Base in Barstow for reset after returning from Afghanistan. The Marine Corps is also cutting it’s MRAP and MATV fleet due to weight concerns. MCLB Barstow is also a boneyard for Marine vehicles that have been removed from service.
Heh - just found this:
Why doesn’t the U.S. government sell surplus vehicles to the public?
There’s a story that goes like this: Back in the 1950s, the government sold WWII surplus Jeeps to the public. Someone wrecked one and successfully sued the government for selling unsafe vehicles. The government then adopted a policy of not selling surplus vehicles to the public. We don’t know if this story is actually true, but it’s plausible. It is true that the government has had such a policy in place for a long time. They will cut vehicles up for scrap rather than sell them to the public.
Just moving equipment around to different locations. I see trains like that move through the yard every once in a while, usually during the spring and summer.
Probably on the way to Bliss, Hood and Carson for units slated for Bed down.
What’s “Bed down”?
Absolutely correct! I was going to write a comment along those same lines before I read your very informative correct comment.
A few look like they are dark green, bit most are beige. Like you said DHS is either black or a dark gray.
Yermo we see stuff like this all the time heading to Vegas maybe not that volume of stuff but still sizable
Those look like the MVAP’s.
If you’ve got the cash, you can go to Letterkenny in PA and buy real retired Humvees [and other military vehicles] to your heart’s content.
MRAP’s
But they aren’t born black or gray.
They get new paint jobs here.
I know many state/local police depts will sell old cruisers, etc. I have also heard of people buying retired Border Patrol SUVs and trucks. Those seem to consist of F series/Ram pickups and full size GM SUVs.
Not yet, but the reports are out there.
This stuff is NOT DHS. The first 18 vehicles are the new J-LTV vehicles, and are combat-zone only, not really useful in civilian situations in CONUS. They only hold 4-5 personnel. The next bunch are medium trucks, mostly Deuce-and-a-halfs, some 5-ton and semi-tractors, and a line of dump trucks. DHS doesn’t use those. Then, further down the train, were HEMMT vehicles (the ones where there was only one per rail car). They had 5 axles, were articulated behind the first two axles, and had a large armature on the tail end. They are PLS trucks (Palletized loading system), and the articulation means they are Marine Corps vehicles (the army version isn’t articulated). This is the trans equipment for a Marine Brigade on its way probably to Irwin for training. The JLTV is new, so they probably are planning to do lots of convoy training using them.
That only applied to the vietnam/cold-war era M151 “jeep” (not the WWII/Korea Willys-style), which had an early version of Independent suspension at all four wheels. It was notorious for rollovers, even in service, so the military decided not to release them to the public. They also don’t sell HMMWVs anymore either, at least not whole, though I am not sure of the reasoning behind that. However, you can still buy just about anything else, including tracked vehicles, civilian-origin stuff, Deuce and 5-ton trucks, and occasionally heavier stuff (I almost scored a HET tank transport once).
I misspelled “HEMTT”
To clarify, the HEMTTs in that video are Marine PLS trucks: The 5 axles and the armature on the back makes them PLS, and the articulation behind the front two axles makes them Marine Corps.
Yeah, well, just wondering, that's all, as in For Educational Purposes and Speculation Only type wondering. Definitely not suggesting anyone actually do it. That would be illegal... Just wondering if a newly legislated class of po'd criminals could pull it off?
The JLTV hasn’t been fielded yet. The program is in the EMD stage of testing. The MATV mad by Oshkosh looks alot like what the JLTV will. I used to work on the JLTV program for BAE Systems. Our version didn’t make the cut after the TD pase of testing. You are correct about the HEMMT. The Marine Corps calls them LVSs. I was a 3521 Motor Transport Mech in my younger days as a Marine.
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