'Significant progress' for British Army's new Telford-built Challenger tanks as trials completed
The Telford firm building the British Army's latest hi-tech tanks says the completion of mobility trials marks "significant progress" for the programme.
Telford defence contractor Rheinmetall BAE Systems Land (RBSL) says around 789 kilometres of road and country testing has now been completed on Challenger 3, the futuristic new tank currently in production at the firm's Hadley Castle works.
The trials gather data on the noise and vibration caused by the new tank platform and how it affected the crew, as well as the effect the vibration had on the ammunition carried inside the pre-production vehicle.
The Challenger 3 programme, which will see almost 150 tanks built for the British army by 2030, is currently in its demonstration phase, during which pre-production vehicles produced at RBSL’s Telford manufacturing facility undergo a series of trials.
Trials commenced with an un-crewed live firing test, which completed successfully in 2024.
The firm says it's now set to being preparations for crewed live firing tests, which will aim to demonstrate that the vehicle is safe for crewed operation, and on into weapon systems development.
"Trials are a critical stage in developing a new armoured vehicle, pushing our Main Battle Tank to the limits to prove its performance and capability," said Dean Pask, Challenger 3 programme director at RBSL.
RBSL was awarded the UK Ministry of Defence contract for the Challenger 3 tank upgrade on in May 2021, with the firm set to deliver 148 new tanks to the British Army by 2030.
The company employs around 700 people across sites at Telford, Gateshead, Bristol and Bovington with around 300 engineers employed in Telford on the Challenger 3 programme.
The company is also delivering more than 600 eight-wheeled "Boxer" vehicles in Telford, an all-terrain armoured vehicle that can be adapted to suit various military missions, as part of a £5 billion investment intended to modernise the British Army's infantry vehicles.
The firm's heavily-upgraded Telford site is a former manufacturing base for BAE systems with an engineering past dating back to the 19th century, originally established as the Castle Iron Works owned by Nettlefold & Chamberlain.
