Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle

A winter-camouflaged Ceachadóir Prototype with a Gabha Technician.

### Secondary Armament

1x coaxial machine gun, 1x remote weapons station on turret roof, 8x smoke grenade launchers

### Speed

120 km/h on road, 50 km/h off-road

The **Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle** is a wheeled armoured reconnaissance vehicle and tank destroyer in production by Gabha Blacksmiths Limited and introduced to the SDF-Army. Incorporating the virtues held dear by the SDF, namely firepower, mobility and easy maintenance coupled with generally low operating costs, the Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle provides a stable reconnaissance and support platform, usable in multiple configurations.

With a weight of 27.1 tons, the Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle can be easily loaded onto landing craft (or wade ashore by itself), as well as train carts. The Monarcha M-103 Strategic Transport Aircraft is used by the SDF-Army to transport the Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle and the vehicle was, on multiple occassions, successfully airdropped.

## Design

The Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle is an 8x8, long range reconnaissance vehicle and tank-destroyer, capable of scouting ahead of a main force, supporting own infantry elements against heavily armoured threads and surviving encounters with said threats as well.

Powered by a 10-cylinder water-cooled Diesel engine, an Inneall I-40B, all axis are driven, giving the Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle unparalleled manoeuvrability and agility, while its low profile allows for being undetected for a long time. That, coupled with the Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle being manned by three soldiers and an autoloader in the gun's turret, and the fact, that maintenance especially on the engine is easy, the Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle is a valuable addition to any arsenal. All eight wheels are drive wheels and have indipendent hydropneumatic suspensions, the two front axles steering and the two rear axles contra-steering, improving the maneuvreability especially in tight places.

Due to the Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle's nature as an armoured reconnaissance vehicle, the vehicle was designed to work in any climate, from frozen tundras to scorching deserts and was therefore equipped with air conditioning and heaters, which also allow the onboard computers to stay operational in even the harshest climates.

The Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle is capable of climbing a vertical step of 1 meter, cross a 2 meter wide trench, ford 1.5 meter water without prior preparation, can climb a gradient of 70 degrees and traverse a gradient of 30 degrees. The Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle can be fitted with a swim-kit for deeper waters or with an air landing kit for being inserted from great heights via parachute or for a low-altitude extraction system to deliver the vehicle via air from small heights.

The Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle is equipped with run-flat tires, which allow for movement even when the tires have been punctuated, albeit with a decreased speed and only for a limited time. These tires are also equipped with a self-sealing core, much akin to self-sealing fuel tanks, which allows the tire to shrug off minor penetrations, like for example from small arms, easily. A tyre pressure monitoring system allows for control of the pressure of the tyres and, thanks to a central tyre inflation system, allows for control over the air pressure within the tyre, which is especially useful on softer grounds as lower tyre pressure means more surface contact for the wheels and thus better handling.

### Armour

The Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle is protected both by its armour, by its mobility and by its low profile, staying undetected until its too late for the enemy, shaking off the pursuing enemy and defeating his ammunition along the way.

Armouring the Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle had been a bit of a challenge as the armour had to be both light and protecting, both against weapon's fire as well as against mines.

The latter was accomplished by armouring the underside of the vehicle extensively with the same thing as the upper armour: Composite armour, similar to the one used on the Cealg Mark I-B Light Tank, but not as thick.

Sandwiched between rolled homogeneous steel faces from Ironcastle Ironworks, the honeycombed ceramic composites offer high protection against shaped charges and kinetic energy penetrators. Layer upon layer of armour stacked onto each other can defeat armour-piercing ammunition. The system can be supplemented with reactive armour bricks and slat amour.

While the lower armour is thin, it has the form of a V, deflecting blasts from improvised explosive devices and countering mines. The hull and especially turret armour is thicker.

### Armament

The Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle's main weapon is the Gabha G-170 L/54 105 mm Main Gun, a gun, which was originally developed for the Cealg Light Tank, but then seen as too weak – however, the engineers of Gabha Blacksmiths Limited saw it as an ideal weapon for the Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle, its rifling allowing for high-precision fire over long ranges thanks to the high peak pressure of the gun.

The G-170 L/54 is gyro-stabilized on three axis, equipped with a muzzle breaker for reduced recoil and extensive targeting systems, from laser-rangefinders over infrared cameras to night-fighting capabilities due to night-vision optics.

The turret is turned electrically, taking fourteen seconds for one 360 degree turn, it has a reserve system as well, enabling the crew to manually turn and aim the gun in case of a failure of electronics. The G-170 can fire HE, HEAT, APDS, APFSDS, phosphorous and grapeshot rounds from its main gun. 25 rounds of these ammunitions can be carried in the turret.

The secondary armament consists of two positions, a coaxial machine gun by the main gun, operated by the gunner, and a remote weapons station on the roof, operated by the commander. Said remote weapons station can be armed with a machine gun, an auto-cannon, a grenade machine gun or any other kind of heavy weapon. We suggest testing your mount with us before deciding.

The SDF-Army operates their Creachadóirs with a Machine Gun, Model 1981 in coaxial position and a Machine Gun, Grenade, Model 1990 in the remote weapons station.

Additionally, the Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle is armed with a system of smoke grenade launchers, eight on either side of the turret, allowing for the Creachadóir to create its own visual cover to escape.

Currently, an upgrade package of the Creachadóir-HARV with a number of launch tubes of the Briseorumar Anti-Tank Missile System is in development. Eventual adoption is expected for 2022.

### Variants

* Standard:
* Creachadóir-Sciath: Variant incorporating the Sciath Air Defence Complex, abandoned in 2020.
* Creachadóir-Clagarr: AA-variant, two Gabha G-116 30mm Revolver Cannons, one small radar, primarily intended versus rotary wing aircraft, low-flying fixed-wing aircraft and light vehicles.
* Creachadóir-Briseorumar: ATGM-variant, armed with a Briseorumar Anti-Tank Missile System with six missiles on the rails and 18 in the magazine (24 total).
* Creachadóir Armoured Engineer Vehicle.
* Creachadóir Mark II Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle: Upgrade/new vehicle planned for 2030, 'true' swimming-capability, various upgrades

## History

Selkie were always horseriding people and as such, their way of waging war developed along different lines, emphasizing both mobility and firepower of any given system. While the tank in its first models was tested, it was deemed too slow and expensive for the SDF's needs and budgets and as such, after a few tests, tanks were not used until the Cealg came along.

The introduction of a light tank was only part of a larger rearmament program to arm the SDF for future threats and conflicts, both at home and overseas. As such, the SDF also requested proposals for a heavy armoured reconnaissance vehicle – many competitors entered the RFP made inside the Free Lands and the Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle was chosen to be produced.

The Creachadóir Heavy Armoured Reconnaissance Vehicle is nowadays part of the main fighting and scouting forces of the SDF-Army, the backbone of the forces concerned with fighting on open terrain.

Gabha Blacksmiths Limited developed turret variations including a rocket-artillery vehicle, a command vehicle, a mortar vehicle, NBC-reconnaissance, an engineer-vehicle and a SIGINT-vehicle. As the SDF-Army put more focus on the Sionnach-II Armoured Personnel Carrier, these vehicles are mostly planned for export.

While it was planned, that the Creachadóir would be an integral component of the Sciath Air Defence Complex, these plans were abandoned in 2020. The Creachadóir turned out to be unsuitable for that system, but an AA-variant was still developed as the Creachadóir-Clagarr.

After the Battle of Alnus Hill and Operation Spartacus, the SDF-Army realized, that they could not use these vehicles as main battle tanks, resulting in the standardized application of reactive armour bricks on every vehicle as well as several changes in tactical doctrine.

In 2022, 56 HARVs were bought by Canada.