Navistar's MaxxPro MRAP: No V-shaped hull (Updated)

Navistar International has been understandably mum about the design of its MaxxPro MRAP.

The photos gave no indication of the V-shaped hull characteristic of most MRAPs. Evidently it wasn't just the company's ability to churn out product that led to the company's success in the MRAP I competition.

But one outsider has emerged as a Pentagon favorite. Navistar International Corp., which mostly builds trucks for civilian markets, came seemingly out of nowhere in May to win a 1,200-vehicle order for its 20-ton MaxxPro design. The Illinois-based company followed up with an order in July for another 700 trucks. Production contracts total around $1 billion. Navistar officials credit a novel design, excellent test results and the company's huge manufacturing capacity and worldwide logistics infrastructure.

"Our design is unique," says Bob Walsh, assistant general manager for military vehicles. "We have an armored body on a chassis. It does a good job of redirecting energy [from bomb blasts]." Its ease of repair is also a plus. "Being a cab-on-chassis, you're able to pull off the body and slide a new chassis in there."

(Aviation Week)

An early artist's conception of the vehicle offered a clue as to at least one of the strategies the company uses to re-direct energy. Note the hinges that appear periodically where the body rests on the chassis.

Well, fiddlesticks. I can't for the life of me re-locate that image. Should have saved it when I had the chance. Trust me, there were some hinge-like fittings that appeared to allow the body to lift off the chassis. The axis points were offset so that the body would move up and then forward, I believe (trying to remember the direction of the offset from memory).

Update:
(Dec. 4, 2007) I eventually located the photo and posted it. Resulting commentary indicated that the structures are not hinges at all, and even if the MaxxPro has some additional features that help redirect blast energy the basic design (by most accounts) seems to be a V-shaped hull regardless of the superficial appearance of the vehicle.