Army sends draft Common Tactical Truck prototyping plan to industry

After a two-week delay from previously announced plans, the Army sent a draft request for prototype proposals to industry Feb. 25 for its next-generation heavy tactical vehicle, but the draft has not been released to the public.

A draft RPP for the Common Tactical Truck was originally to be published Feb. 11, but discussions over the prototyping effort’s structure pushed back the release date. The program seeks to replace five existing heavy tactical vehicle chassis with a single platform, and an initial production run could be worth $5.1 billion.

The Army plans to run the prototyping process through an existing other transaction agreement with the National Advanced Mobility Consortium.

Unlike most government-run acquisition programs, unclassified documents are not easily accessible online for consortium-run programs. NAMC does not post the documents online, and only its members from the defense industry can access them, the consortium’s manager for the program wrote in an email to Inside Defense.

Interested companies should send their comments on the RPP to the Army by March 14, although the service will continue to accept comments on the draft characteristics and prototyping plan after that date, Wolfgang Petermann, project manager for transportation systems, said today at a National Defense Industry Association conference on tactical wheeled vehicles.

“I encourage you all to rip it to shreds,” so that subsequent drafts of the RPP will be as good as possible, Andrew DiMarco, acting program executive officer for combat support and combat service support, said at the conference.