At the AUSA Winter Symposium March 2007 Rafael will present the Golan, Armored Fighting Vehicle. RAFAEL and PVI / USA are cooperating to develop and manufacture a 15 ton Armored Fighting Vehicle (AFV) for up to 10 troopers that will defeat small arms and RPG threats, medium size IED's, 7 kg mines under belly and 14 kg under wheels.

About a week ago the US Marine Corps has chosen the GOLAN for production order of 60 Category II vehicles, within the framework of the MRAP program. The Golan has been proposed by PVI (Protected Vehicles, Inc.), Rafael and Oshkosh Truck Corporation.

The GOLAN is based on a unique concept in which the armor protection system accounts for approximately fifty percent of Gross Volume Weight (GVW). According to the design philosophy, a spall liner was used to allocate weight externally to prevent penetration rather than allocate weight to the inside of the vehicle to minimize damage once a penetration has occurred (However, a spall liner is an option based on customer requirements).

The vehicle has a monocoque structure rather than internal framework or chassis. The integrity of the monocoque structure provides the strength to absorb the deformations generated by mines and IED blasts. It thereby provides an optimal solution to protect the crew and vehicle against the identified threats.

The crew compartment is designed to provide a scaled armor protection system. The maximum protection level includes reactive modular armor tiles while the medium and light levels are based on passive modular armor. The three protection levels are provided in the following table:

All three protection level configurations present the same physical silhouette. In the light and medium level configurations, there are no reactive armor tiles attached to the outer crew compartment structure. In their place, passive armor tiles (that include storage boxes) with an identical outer shape are attached.

Sergyi Way
02.03.2007

www.army-guide.com