I saw a photo of a military style vehicle called the Conquest Knight XV and wondered who made it and why.
Conquest Vehicles is a Canadian company specialising in “ultra luxurious, fully armoured and handcrafted sport utility vehicles”! They build two vehicles, the unarmoured Evade and the fully armoured Knight XV.
Both vehicles are based on the Ford F550 Super Duty chassis and the Knight uses the Ford 6.8 litre V10 or the 6.7 litre V8 turbo diesel from that base. They have tuned the V8 to run on bio fuel – a nod to some greenery as the rest of the car clearly isn’t! Only 100 of these heavy duty beasts will be built.
The engine choice will be based on the desire for torque pulling power as the V10 has 326hp with 462 lbs of torque whilst the turbo diesel is rated at 300hp and a bigger 660 lbs of torque. I suppose it depends on who your enemy is – are you a dictator with many armed enemies or are you a rapper trying to evade the paparazzi?
The armouring is based on “transparent” i.e. the glassware or “opaque”, in other words, the body. The glass is bullet proof with a hint of tint and has been designed to dovetail into the bodywork for extra security and the body panels are made from ballistic aluminium, composites and ceramics for better protection. The company can show you detailed ballistics tests if required!
The bumpers are made from ballistic fibreglass – they have Kevlar weaved in and the grille is armour plated to ensure that the radiator is protected as well. Inside is all the accoutrements of a high class Mercedes, Bentley or Rolls-Royce. It has night vision cameras fitted too – perfect for watching the carnage unfold. These cameras are apparently standard equipment on all vehicles sold in North America. It can also come with a remote starter pack, so if you are being chased as you run to the vehicle, you can start the engine up to one mile away!!
The vehicle would be useless if it was slowed down by gunfire, so the Continental tyres have a full run-flat system fitted to damage-resistant rims – the aluminium used is aircraft grade! Extra security is provided by under chassis magnetic attachment detectors – we’ve all seen the movies where this is a prime way to remove someone – and the interior also has a full oxygen system and you can specify an external smoke system.
All this means that the vehicle weighs in at a massive 8,800 kgs and the company doesn’t feel the need to discuss fuel economy from its 230 litre (63 US gallon) tank. I suspect that it isn’t that great – you can upgrade to a bigger tank if you feel the need.
The product is sold direct by Conquest – each US$800,000 vehicle will be built to order, although there is a distributor for the Chinese market. However, if you’ve just made the big time or over-run a small country, remember that it will take over a year to manufacture your vehicle, so a little forward planning is required!
I just wish SPECTRE had them!
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