Sisu NA-110 SUSV
From The D Archives
The Sisu NA-110 SUSV (Small Unit Support Vehicle) Nasu (acronym for Nauha-Sisu English: Track Sisu, also meaning "Piglet" in Finnish) is a tracked articulated, all-terrain transport vehicle developed by Sisu Auto for the Finnish Army. It consists of two units, with all four tracks powered. It can carry up to 17 people, although the trailer unit can be adapted for different applications. There are two main versions, the NA-140 BT and the NA-110.
Although it looks externally like the Bandvagn 206, which also is in Finnish Army use, it is an entirely new design, and almost 1 meter longer and 1,000 kg heavier. It has a better performance and payload-carrying capability than the Bv 206. The Nasu is designed to carry troops and equipment through snow and bog-lands in northern Finland. For this, it is equipped with four wide (62 cm) powered rubber tracks. The low ground pressure enables the Nasu to cope with a wide range of difficult conditions. It is also fully amphibious, with a speed in water of up to 6 km/h when driven by its tracks.
Operators
The Kainuu Brigade and the North Karelia Brigade employs the vehicle as their main transport vehicle. Further, most of the other brigades have a few vehicles each.
Very personal experiences
Yep, this thing was known as the "Teka" during my service. It's short for "Telakuorma-auto" (tracked truck), and it was as the articles state, the main choice of transport for the infantry squads.
Firstly, the articles state that you can fit up to 17(!) people inside one of those deathtraps. I guess it is possible, but it is going to get real fucking crowded especially in the back. And if you need to dismount people from the back quickly, and you've got 17 people inside, then it's going to take some time for the guys to get out - which in other terms means instant death. The tail section is also quite usually pretty cramped even if you situate 8 men in there along with all the necessary equipment. So, all in all, you're going to have a rather shitty experience riding in the back with all the cramped equipment and men mixed together.
Secondly, the canopies of this thing were manufactured out of Fiberglass and some metal stampings. You can easily disable one of these things with just an assault rifle - not to mention what would happen if you threw a hand grenade even close to one of these vehicles. We used to joke that in case an enemy fired a LAW (or similar) at the tail unit of the vehicle, the rocket would just penetrate both walls and continue it's way forward. In other words the armor-capabilities of that thing were close to zero. And some articles state that the Teka is supposedly installed with "Kevlar lining" - but I'll tell you, never saw any.
The enlisted men were usually situated in the tail unit of the vehicle, whereas all the NCO's and possible officers rode in the main section of the vehicle. The main section also required a lookout to scan the surrounding area from a hatch on the roof, as did the tail section.
