Jackal life-extension Runner

History

Named for Tithonus, the Trojan prince granted immortality but not eternal youth, the project was the Ministry of Defence's cost-saving alternative to buying a new light-vehicle fleet: rather than replace its elderly pre-Jackal 4×4s, it refurbished the best of them. Each vehicle was repaired to field standard: bulkhead and chassis refurbished and wax-injected, brake components, wheel bearings, hub seals and shock absorbers renewed, and the vehicle repainted and undersealed. Visually the Tithonus rebuilds gained new Jackal-pattern hard tops, internally mounted roll-over protection, external cab protection bars, upgraded seat belts and pierced-steel wheels, which makes them easy to mistake for the later Runner Jackal — but there was no money for major mechanical upgrades, and the original naturally aspirated 2.5-litre engines were retained. The three-year programme concluded by mid-2010 with around 1,230 vehicles completed of roughly 3,700 originally targeted.