Designed after World War 2 as a self-propelled agricultural vehicle the first Unimog model had rear wheel drive switchable front wheel drive with equal size wheels all around to allow the vehicle to be driven on roads at higher speeds than standard farm tractors.
The Unimog was never designed to be able to carry a large load as with other trucks, its capability came from having high ground clearance and a flexible frame and long travel suspension making them excellent as off-road vehicles. Unimog production began in 1948 with Daimler-Benz taking over manufacture in 1951 when it was then sold under the Mercedes-Benz brand.
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In late 1956 Daimler-Benz developed an armoured Unimog, based on the ‘S’-chassis of the S404 truck, the rear-engine (“heckmotor”) led to the acronym ‘SH’. We have been reliably informed that 34 chassis were built and that the Swedish company Landsverk, later owned by Mercedes did the final assembly. The Unimog SH was built for the Belgian government and intended for use by their gendarmerie in the Belgian Congo, but due to a UN embargo in place due to the 1960 civil war the last 15 Unimogs due for shipment were held back.
The German and Swedish armies elected not to purchase the Unimog SH as they both had deemed them unsuitable and they were never put into full-scale production, this left the Landsverk company with 15 Unimog SHs to hold in storage.
Then fate intervened as the Irish army at that time in the 1970s were without wheeled armoured vehicles as the Panhard M3 VVT’s they had on order would not be available until at least February 1972.
As a stop gap exercise the Irish Army purchased the entire 15-vechicle fleet of SHs from Landsverk Sweden and two pre-production vehicles to be used for spares at a knock-down price.
The shipment of the Unimogs was then delayed in Malmo port at the very last moment when the ship was prevented from leaving by protesters from a Swedish peace group who mistakenly believed that the armoured cars were destined for the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA). It was only the personal intervention of the Irish Ambassador Mary Tinney (Ireland’s first female ambassador) when she boarded the ship that cleared the issue and allowed the ship to set sail.
While the Unimog’s did serve as a stop-gap measure and the army did receive a bargain in their purchase the vehicles were not especially well suited to their operational task as there was no top gun-turret and due to the small openings in the bodywork egress in fully military kit, with weapons was difficult. Also the Unimog did have some serious stability issues particularly its on-road handling as it suffered from a very high centre of gravity, sensitive steering and a short wheel-base. Following a number of crashes, including an overturn, there were standing orders for on-road speeds not to exceed 30 mph.
The Unimog SHs scout cars were transferred to the Irish army local defence forces Fórsa Cosanta Áitiúil (FCÁ) by mid-1978 and by 1984 all of them had been withdrawn and were disposed of.
Of the 34 chassis that we have been reliably informed were built by Mercedes, 9 completed vehicles were sent to the Congo, 15 were bought by the Irish Army and used in active operations with 2 prototypes being used for driver training and then for spares. The surviving Unimog SH’s are to be found in the Irish Army Training Centre, the National Transport Museum of Ireland, the Muckleburgh Collection in England, a private Russian collection, in use as a Swedish forestry fire brigade and Unimog 405SH Chassis, imported from Belgium and currently being restored by John Hughes with the location of the remainder of the scout cars unknown.
In an upcoming episode we will be bringing you a feature story on the restoration of John Hughes’s Unimog 405SH Chassis.
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Sources of information:
1. Irish Army Vehicles – transport and armour since 1922 by Karl Martin
2. Unimog Community
3. CouchOffRoad
4. Michael Corcoran
5. Irish Armoured News
6. HistoryIreland.com
7. An Cosantoir – the Irish Defence Journal (Sgt. E Staunton)
8. Karl Martin YouTube channel
9. Victor Bart – Unimog 404
10. Landsverk Pansarbil on Unimog 405SH Chassis (John Hughes)
11. The Mercedes Unimog Museum
12. www.tanks-encyclopedia.com
