2017 Modern Day Marine Report (Day 2) 20 September
“This is the world’s smallest diesel-driven, robotic demolition machine,” declared Tony Marlow, Vice President for nuclear and military business at Brokk. The Skellefteå, Sweden-based corporation (and its companies, including in the US [Monroe, Washington]) is reported to be the leading manufacturer of remote controlled demolition machines for over 40 years. Marlow, based in Santa Fe, New Mexico (US), pointed out this latest offering is a fifth-generation machine. “The unique feature is it is compact, but very rugged and powerful. It can deploy heavy-duty tools and tactiles – a whole range of them probably 400 attachments now for one machine.”
MONS questioned this latter capability and the industry expert responded, “Yes, one base machine can do a lot of work by changing the different type of attachments.”
The array of attachments might include (for low end tasks) concrete breaker, shear, saw and (for high end) plasma cutter, water cutter, ground penetrating radar, radiation detector and other survey instruments, among many others. Marlow continued: “There are 10 different sizes of machines, with this being one of the smaller ones. The nice thing about this one (120DII) is it can go where people can go: it can climb stairs up and down; skid-steer in corridors; and go through regular doorways, and can be loaded in the back of a small truck or regular trailer.”
Brokk is taking advantage of its legacy of selling more than 8,500 machines globally and its supporting life cycle and industrial base, to offer a commercial off-the-shelf solution to new prospective military customers. While the 120DII is a new product, Brokk has sold larger vehicles from the family (400 series, for example) to the US military. And at this early stage, the 120DII was declared to be fully supported, both in technical and applications, as well as parts/supply (receiving these within 24 hours). “These machines are very close to what the military needs in terms of diverse operations – just a little ‘tweak’ here and there. This is well adapted to what the user requirements are – mine clearance, explosive ordnance and other applications – where you don’t want a person to go. We call it the ‘Swedish Army Knife’ because it can do so many things with one machine,” the Sector Expert added.
Brokk is finalising demonstration schedules with the US military for the 120DII. “We were at DSEI last week and we’re looking at the international market as well.”
Marty Kauchak
