The new Army trucks are too large to fit in a garage, and the barracks will take years to adapt

After tender, the Department of Defense has ordered more than 2,800 Gryphus Scania. New Army vehicles replace 40-year-old “four-ton trucks” from DAF.

The new Scania, the current model, has yet to be adapted for military use. For this, Gryphus had to be placed higher on his wheels. This makes the truck higher: four meters total. The new military vehicle is also four meters longer than its predecessor: eleven meters in total.

Bigger size
Since the new Army truck is larger, it does not fit into the garages at the Barracks of Major General de Ruyter van Stevenink in Auerchut. The old garages of the various units are too low for Gryphus to enter for minor maintenance work.

Trucks can enter large military workshops to perform major maintenance work, but there is not enough space around the vehicle to operate safely.

So there is no longer room to tilt the truck cab, for example, for engine maintenance. Moreover, there is not enough space for escape routes. The new trucks did not fit into the barracks parking spaces and there was actually very little parking space in the barracks.

Outdated barracks
“The barracks are outdated, especially in Oershot,” says an army spokesman. “Of course you want the new equipment to be fully deployable from the first moment and for all conditions to be met, but unfortunately this is not always the case. This turns out to be very complicated when purchasing these trucks.”

A new garage must be built for Gryphus. This is being handled by the central government real estate agency in conjunction with the renovation of the rest of the barracks. But this could take years. The Central Government Real Estate Agency has started a program to address two-thirds of all defensive buildings. Oirschot is also one of them. But it is not yet known when this will happen in front of the barracks in Oershot. ”

External maintenance
Until then, to perform major truck maintenance, mechanics have to transfer to the workshop at Vredepeel Barracks, Gilze-Rijen Air Force Base, Stroe Army Station or nearby Scania Workshop. “They are not perfect solutions, but we had to make choices. The better and better advantages of Scania outweigh its disadvantages. Sometimes, you also have to choose because you can only spend money once.”

A “solution” is also found for minor maintenance in very low-lying garages: units are “simply” asked to do simple maintenance outside. No real solution to this has been found.

The barracks in Oershot now has two Scania. There will be 300 at the end. Delivery of the new Army trucks will continue until 2027.