The Army is soliciting industry’s input for capabilities to get after pursuing a hybrid-electric version of its Stryker combat vehicle, according to a recent notice.
A new Request for Information published in early November details the Army’s interest in a hybrid-electric Stryker’s ability to offer increased automotive performance, silent watch and silent mobility operations and external power generation.
“The Army’s Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office (RCCTO) is seeking sources and information to identify the cost and ability to support the integration of hybrid electric capabilities on a base M1126 Stryker DVHA1 variant,” the service writes in the RFI notice.
Army RCCTO has been leading the service’s exploration of vehicle electrification capabilities, to include recently completing testing with two hybrid-electric Bradley vehicle prototypes that the office’s leader said yielded “good data” (Defense Daily, Aug. 25).
Lt. Gen. Robert Rasch, the Army RCCTO director, has previously noted there are also plans to prototype with four hybrid-electric Strykers, two hybrid-electric Humvees and three Joint Light Tactical Vehicles, and the data gathered will be transferred to the Army’s Program Executive Office for Ground Combat Systems to inform future priorities.
The Army RCCTO may initiate its hybrid-electric Stryker effort with a formal solicitation request in the second quarter of this fiscal year, according to the new RFI.
For increased automotive performance, the Army said a hybrid-electric Stryker should allow for improved fuel efficiency, acceleration, top speed, power generation, and power storage capability “with allowances for battery placement and without compromising crew compartment space.”
The expected power architecture for a hybrid-electric Stryker would be designed to supply electrical power “in multiple variations to include 12VDC, 28VDC, High Voltage DC, 110VAC and 220VAC to support current and high demand energy systems,” according to the RFI.
The Army is also interested in incorporating anti-idle technology “and the associated optimized heating and cooling systems to reduce fuel consumption to the maximum extent possible without degrading operations or functionality while the vehicle is stationary.”
General Dynamics Land Systems [GD], which builds the Stryker, unveiled its hybrid-electric StrykerX technology demonstrator platform in October 2022 at the Association of the United States Army’s (AUSA) annual conference in Washington, D.C. (Defense Daily, Oct. 4 2022).
Keith Barclay, GD Land Systems’ director of U.S. strategy and growth, told Defense Daily at the time that the Stryker X utilized a series hybrid-electric power architecture.
GD Land Systems last month rolled out its new hybrid-electric StrykerQB technology demonstrator, which it noted is “substantially overhauled and reinvented” from the StrykerX and is designed as a robotic controller vehicle (Defense Daily, Oct. 3).