Shorland armoured car

The Shorland is an armoured car that was designed specifically for the Royal Ulster Constabulary by a police support officer Ernie Lusty during the sixties for patrolling the border to prevent organised smuggling. They were reallocated to the Ulster Defence Regiment in 1970. The Royal Ulster Constabulary soon replaced the Shorland with an armoured Land Rover with more conventional profiles and no machine gun turret.

This being the original Shorland Armoured Car, which quickly became known in Land Rover Circles as the boat tail Shorland.

The vehicles were built by Short Brothers and Harland of Belfast using a chassis from a Series two Land Rover, from which the name was derived.

By the nineties the Land Rover Tangi, designed and built by the Royal Ulster Constabulary's own vehicle engineering team, was by far the most common model.

Shorts and Harland continued to develop the original Boat tail Shorland from an armoured patrol car with a crew of 3 to armoured personnel vehicle, capable of carrying two up front and six in the rear and a small number of these were used on the streets in Northern Ireland as late as 1998.

In 1996 the Short Brothers sold the complete Shorland design to British Aerospace Australia.

Design
The Shorland is a long wheelbase Land Rover with the turret of a Mk 2 Ferret armoured car. The vehicle has upgraded suspension to deal with the extra weight of the armour.

Mk 1

 * 67 bhp (50 kW) engine

Mk 2

 * Based on the Series 2
 * 77 bhp (57 kW) engine

Mk 3

 * Introduced in 1972
 * 91 bhp (68 kW) engine
 * Thicker armour than Mk 1, Mk 2

Mk 4

 * Production started 1980
 * 3.5 litre Rover V8 petrol engine
 * Improved armour over Mk 3

Series 5

 * Based on the Defender 110 chassis
 * 3.5 litre Rover V8 petrol engine or 2.5 litre Rover Tdi Turbo diesel engine
 * Welded armour fully enclosed body, no turret
 * Versions
 * S52 - Armoured Patrol Car
 * S53 - Air Defence Vehicle
 * S54 - Anti-hijack Vehicle
 * S55 - Armoured Personnel Carrier (APC)

Current and former Operators

 * 🇱🇧 - 30 in service with the Internal Security Forces
 * undefined
 * 🇵🇰 - 24 in service with the Sindh Police.
 * 🇵🇹 Portugal - 38 in service with the Portuguese Republican National Guard (currently replaced by the MAV 5 Armoured Personnel Carrier)
 * Rhodesia - 2 mock Shorlands equipped with Ferret turrets were deployed for a Selous Scouts' covert operation in 1979.
 * 🇹🇷 - Gendarmerie
 * - Acquired by the Sharjah National Guard in 1972, transferred to the Federal Police in 1976.
 * - Iraqi security forces
 * undefined
 * 🇵🇰 - 24 in service with the Sindh Police.
 * 🇵🇹 Portugal - 38 in service with the Portuguese Republican National Guard (currently replaced by the MAV 5 Armoured Personnel Carrier)
 * Rhodesia - 2 mock Shorlands equipped with Ferret turrets were deployed for a Selous Scouts' covert operation in 1979.
 * 🇹🇷 - Gendarmerie
 * - Acquired by the Sharjah National Guard in 1972, transferred to the Federal Police in 1976.
 * - Iraqi security forces
 * 🇵🇹 Portugal - 38 in service with the Portuguese Republican National Guard (currently replaced by the MAV 5 Armoured Personnel Carrier)
 * Rhodesia - 2 mock Shorlands equipped with Ferret turrets were deployed for a Selous Scouts' covert operation in 1979.
 * 🇹🇷 - Gendarmerie
 * - Acquired by the Sharjah National Guard in 1972, transferred to the Federal Police in 1976.
 * - Iraqi security forces
 * 🇹🇷 - Gendarmerie
 * - Acquired by the Sharjah National Guard in 1972, transferred to the Federal Police in 1976.
 * - Iraqi security forces
 * - Iraqi security forces