Armor: The South Korean Stryker On Order

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June 27, 2016: The South Korea Army has ordered 600 wheeled armored vehicles and deliveries will begin by the end of 2016 and it will take until 2023 to deliver all 600 vehicles. Most will be the 20 ton 8x8 K808, which carries 12 (two crew and ten passengers) and is armed with a 30mm autocannon and 7.62mm machine-gun. The K808 has a top road speed of 110 kilometers an hour and in the water can do ten kilometers an hour. The 16 ton 6x6 K806 is mainly for reconnaissance and internal security. The K806 can also carry twelve (two crew and ten passengers) and is armed with a 40mm automatic grenade launcher and 7.62mm machine-gun. Development of the K806 and K808 began in 2012 when the South Korean army asked Hyundai Rotem for a locally designed wheeled armored vehicles similar to the American Stryker. This meant that if the design was successful an army order was guaranteed and production could begin quickly.

Meanwhile another South Korean manufacturer (Doosan) that had created the K21 tracked IFV (Infantry Fighting Vehicle) went ahead and developed the 18 ton, 8x8 Black Fox, mainly for the export market. Black Fox could be equipped with the turret from the K21. This, in effect, creates a wheeled armored vehicle carrying light artillery (a 40mm autoloading cannon). This weapon fires up to 300 rounds per minute, at speeds of 1,000 meters per second (3,100 fps). The Black Fox has a crew of three and carries nine passengers. Fox was built in the hopes of snagging domestic or foreign sales and it, and similar Doosan wheeled armored vehicles, have done just that. But Doosan found that cheaper was always an easier sell so vehicles like Black Fox also come in cheaper (and lighter) 6x6 versions. The Doosan vehicles were meant for export markets although they were proposed as candidates to be the South Korean Stryker. The Doosan vehicles lost out to the K808 and K806.

 

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