Banks Propels JLTV into the Future

The U.S. Army has been cleared to proceed with its new $9.7 billion Joint Light Tactical Vehicle (JLTV) production deal with AM General. This comes after a recompete in which the current vehicle supplier, Oshkosh, lost to the South Bend, Indiana company famously known for building the Humvee (HMMWV). 

On May 24th, U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) formally placed the multi-billion dollar JLTV A2 order with AM General to cover work through February 2028. The order will include up to 20,682 diesel-powered JLTVs and 9,883 trailers. 

While the vehicle’s exterior remains visually unchanged, John Chadbourne, AM General’s executive vice president for business development and government affairs, told Breaking Defense that there are notable differences between the A1 and A2 including an updated powertrain, “improved” routings for reliability and maintainability, new baseline integration kit designed to provide more cargo storage space, upgraded alternator, design changes to reduce vehicle noise, increased fuel efficiency, and more.

Banks Technologies, a sister company to Banks Power, will have built nearly 25,000 Banks D866T turbo diesel engines by the time the JLTV transitions from Oshkosh to AM General.

Banks once again won the business over billion-dollar competitors thanks to superior engineering and reliability. A new Banks-designed ECM, engine packaging, and other enhancements continued to impress the Army to the extent that they chose Banks over all competitors, again.