Soldiers with Delta Company, 3rd Battalion, 116th Cavalry Brigade Combat Team conduct a live fire exercise in an M1A2 Abrams Tank during Exercise Saber ... VIEW ORIGINAL
WATERVLIET ARSENAL, N.Y. (August 11, 2016) -- The arsenal received two contracts from the U.S. Army this week valued at nearly $4 million to manufacture more than 50 barrels for the Abrams tank system.
"The two contracts, both from the Army's program manager for the Abrams tank system, will fund more than 9,000 direct labor hours to manufacturer 120-mm tank tubes," said Adam Ford, the arsenal's program manager for this order. "About half of the order will support the U.S. military, while the other part of the order will support future foreign military sales."
What makes this order stand out more from most orders is that this work was not part of the manufacturing schedule for 2018, said Tom Pond, the arsenal's director of operations. The contracts require the arsenal to deliver its first tubes in March 2018, and all manufacturing requirements must be complete by August 2018.
"Due to the significant decline in requests for war-time products since the United States pulled its combat troops out of Iraq in 2010, large multimillion-dollar contracts that were once common are now rare," Pond said. "And so, we truly celebrate when new, unforecasted work comes our way because it adds a high-level of certainty to our future workload and workforce requirements."
Although this is new work, the arsenal has been making barrels for the Abrams tank for nearly 40 years, Ford said.
"We have decades of expertise in this tank system and because we do, we already have the special tooling and processes developed to support this large order," Ford said. "In fact, the arsenal is currently manufacturing more than 100 120-mm tubes for previous orders."
For large-caliber machining requirements, there is typically a long-lead time to procure the unique raw material. For this order, it will take the arsenal up to 18 months to procure the specialized steel it uses in the tank cannon system.
The Watervliet Arsenal is an Army-owned-and-operated manufacturing facility and is the oldest, continuously active arsenal in the United States having begun operations during the War of 1812. It celebrated its 200th anniversary on July 14, 2013.
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