With demand increasing for specialty trucks – especially military vehicles – Spartan Chassis, a subsidiary of $445- million truck builder Spartan Motors, has acquired two manufacturing plants near its headquarters in Charlotte, MI. The transactions add 80,000 sq ft to its production capacity.
“We are growing our overall capacity to meet the sustained demand we are seeing for our specialty chassis products,” said Richard Schalter, president of Spartan Chassis. “Along with our newly constructed 107,000-sq-ft fire truck cab and chassis facility, the new facilities will allow us to grow market share for existing products while also introducing new products.”
Spartan Motors reported it plans to spend $8 million to purchase and renovate the facilities, and expects the two plants to be operational in this year’s third quarter.
The new plants will be largely dedicated to production of Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicles for the U.S. military. These are trucks designed to protect their occupants from a combination of mines, rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) and improvised explosive devices (IEDs) through a V-shaped hull, raised chassis and improved armor.
