Type Armoured car Weight 3.36 m (11 ft 0 in) | Length 4.60 m (15 ft 1 in) | |
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In service Royal Ulster ConstabularyUlster Defence Regiment Manufacturer | ||
The Shorland is an armoured patrol car that was designed specifically for the Royal Ulster Constabulary by Frederick Butler with the first design meeting taking place in November 1961. The third and final prototype was completed in 1964, the first RUC Shorlands were delivered in 1966. They were reallocated to the Ulster Defence Regiment in 1970. The Royal Ulster Constabulary soon replaced the Shorland with an armoured Land Rover with more conventional profiles and no machine gun turret.
Contents
The vehicles were built by Short Brothers and Harland of Belfast using a chassis from a Series IIA Land Rover.
By the nineties the Land Rover Tangi, designed and built by the Royal Ulster Constabulary's own vehicle engineering team, was by far the most common model or armoured Land Rover.
Shorts and Harland continued to develop the original Shorland from an armoured patrol car with a crew of 3 to armoured personnel vehicle, capable of carrying two up front and six in the rear and a small number of these were used on the streets in Northern Ireland as late as 1998.
In 1996 the Short Brothers sold the complete Shorland design to British Aerospace Australia.
Design
The Shorland is a long wheelbase Land Rover with the turret similar in appearance to that of a Mk 2 Ferret scout car. The vehicle has upgraded suspension to deal with the extra weight of the armour.