Humvees Retrofitted With New Safety Upgrades.

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* A portion of Michigan National Guard Humvees have recently been retrofitted with new braking and stability control systems developed by Ricardo Defense Systems. The aim is to reduce fatal rollovers, said a company executive.

Ricardo, a Detroit-based subsidiary of global company Ricardo Pic, recently announced the successful completion of a pilot program to retrofit 10 National Guard vehicles with its optimized antilock braking system and electronic stability control to keep soldiers in Humvees--and the populations around them--safer, said Thorn Green, company vice president of business development.

"It's developed. It's ready to go. It has been tested," he said.

Ricardo supplied the protection systems as part of the program in coordination with the Office of Naval Research, the Army Tank Automotive Research Development and Engineering Center and the Army Tank-Automotive and Armaments Command, he added. The company also partnered with LIFT - Lightweight Innovations for Tomorrow, a public-private partnership operated by the American Lightweight Materials Manufacturing Innovation Institute, based in Detroit.

The organization supplied funding to Ricardo to help scale up and validate the systems, said Joe Steele, LIFT communications director. The public-private partnership also provided engineering...

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