Motor Trend - USA (2021-04)

A

rmored cars have come a long way

since Colonel T.E. Lawrence’s fleet

of Rolls-Royce Ghosts prowled the

Arabian Peninsula during World

War I. These ironclad beasts have

gone from machines of war to defense

vehicles for everyone from politicians and

the well-heeled to mafiosi and oligarchs.

And business is booming. With armored

car sales up over the past few years,

automakers including Audi, BMW, Land

Rover, and Mercedes-Benz have joined

with small, specialized manufacturers to

offer a wide variety of bulletproof and even

mine-resistant cars, trucks, and SUVs.

So what does it take to build a world-

class armored car? We caught up with the

folks at Alpine Armoring to find out.

Headquartered in Chantilly, Virginia,

just outside of Washington, D.C., Alpine

started building armored vehicles in 1997

to meet ever-increasing U.S. government

and overseas demand as the post–Cold

War world heated up during the Kosovo

conflict. As Cameron Khoroushi, Alpine’s

director of design engineering, put it, the

company was able to quickly meet that

FEATURE I Armored Vehicles

VIRGINIA’S ALPINE

ARMORING OFFERS

US A GLIMPSE

UNDER THE PLATING

Armored vehicle sales have boomed since the post–

Cold War thaw of the ’90s overseas. Ominously, sales

have been through the roof stateside since 2016.

WORDS CHRISTIAN SEABAUGH

56 MOTORTREND.COM APRIL 2021