Kalesi at the Trabzon Otosan factory, June 2024.
The Kalesi is an all-terrain utility vehicle produced in the Second Empire of Trabzon. It is assembled by Trabzon Otomotiv Sanayi A.Ş, also known as Trabzon Otosan. The Kalesi externally resembles the Willys M38A1 and M151 series of pre-Doomsday American jeeps, although it is fitted with a new two-stroke, two cylinder petrol engine with a displacement of 500 cubic centimeters and generating 18 horsepower. It has a maximum road speed of 50 km/h.
Development history[]
Industrial development had long been a goal of Trabzon's military regime, although the region possessed almost no skilled workforce or heavy industry prior to Doomsday. In 2010, Altan Sahin directed the army general staff to look into the procurement of an entirely home grown utility vehicle to replace its ageing fleet of prewar M151, M38, and CJ jeeps. These had mostly been produced during the 1950s and 1960s either in the United States, or under license at the Türk-Willys Overland Company in Istanbul. The Turkish and later Trabzonian armed forces had used them for decades, and the fleet had dwindled over time due to age and wear.
Although numerous design proposals were floated by the military workshops in Trabzon, the production of a new vehicle from scratch was not seen as cost-effective, and Trabzon needed both parts and technical expertise which were sorely lacking. As an interim measure, Soviet UAZ-469 jeep-like vehicles were purchased in neighboring states such as Georgia and Armenia, but there were insufficient numbers available to fulfill the army's need for general transporters and staff cars.
The domestic utility vehicle project was shelved until 2023, when Sahin's erstwhile successor, General Cengiz Akyüz formed a semi-private entity, Trabzon Otomotiv Sanayi A.Ş. (Trabzon Otosan) to service government automotive vehicles. Trabzon Otosan performed services namely for the armed forces but also civilian buses as well. It soon opened offices, repair facilities, and depots in the capital and three of Trabzon's other major cities. Aside from repairing the vehicles in service, the company also specialized in procuring auto parts from international suppliers, mainly in Central Asia and the Caucasus. It also formed a research and development arm which inherited most of the drawings and technical reports from the army workshops for the proposed utility vehicle. The team was staffed by self-taught machinists, students from Karadeniz Technical University, military engineers and workshops personnel, and foreign technicians recruited on contract from an unknown country that had previous automotive manufacturing experience (rumored to be Georgia, where the Kutaisi Auto Mechanical Plant was located).
Willys jeeps in storage in Trabzon during the 1990s.
Trabzon had scores of unserviceable ex-Turkish military M151s, CJ-3Bs, and M38A1 MD/M38A1C jeeps in storage, and the decision was made to make use of these in setting up a new production line. While most of the power plants had already been stripped or could not otherwise be salvaged, chassis parts like the frames and axles could be refurbished, inventoried, and reassembled to produce the new vehicle. The vehicle bodies were made of newly cast steel and produced to order by foundries all over the country. These bodies were produced with a much lighter gauge of steel than the originals, significantly reducing the Kalesi's weight compared to the M38A1 and M151. The development team also proposed its own engine, a very simple bare bones two-stroke two-cylinder design that was designed for maximum fuel efficiency - a particular concern in Trabzon, which suffered from chronic fuel shortages - and could run on the low octane petrol which made up the bulk of the country's erratic fuel imports.
In April 2024, the first of the newly dubbed Kalesi utility vehicles was rolled off the assembly line amid much public fanfare. While Trabzonian officials claimed it was an entirely indigenous design, auto enthusiasts were quick to point out that it was basically a refurbished 50 to 70 year old American prewar chassis coupled to an engine made up of recycled parts. However, the vehicle's fuel efficiency was widely praised. Trabzon Otosan executives claimed that once production was streamlined, each Kalesi would take only 25 hours to assemble, and pointed out that it was increasing the number of staff on its assembly line. There were also reports that Trabzon Otosan was looking to replace the cast steel body with a molded fiberglass one to further reduce weight and production costs, although this was dependent on locating a foreign supplier for the correct thermosetting resin.
On June 22, 2024, Trabzon Otosan declared that once the initial military order was fulfilled, production of the Kalesi would continue for the commercial market, and the vehicles would become available for purchase by civilians. Many in the capital's civilian elite were said to have preordered Kalesis for personal use and recreation.
Technical characteristics[]
Local casting of the Kalesi's body. The work was outsourced to several foundries, each of which produced similar bodies with slight variations.
Each Kalesi is assembled by hand on a recycled M151 or M38A1 chassis. The donor vehicles were originally taken from the Trabzonian Army's storage depots and later salvaged from scrapyards and former Turkish military facilities around the country, where many had been abandoned after Doomsday. Bodies to fit the specifications of both chassis types were custom ordered by Trabzon Otosan for the assembly of up to 200 new vehicles. The Kalesi is powered by an extremely compact two stroke, two-cylinder engine rebuilt from refurbished commercial parts and paired to a conventional three-speed manual gearbox. The transmissions were close copies of the originals, rebuilt or cloned by various artisan machine shops contracting with the manufacturer.
Two-stroke engines are relatively common in Trabzon in agricultural equipment, motorcycles, and smaller outboard motors, and are economical to recycle and rebuild. They are also quite reliable by virtue of having fewer failure points, needing only a minimum of five moving parts. The Kalesi's engine is an air-cooled design which weighs in at 40 kilograms, making it easy to remove in the field for maintenance. The engine runs off an oil/petrol mix and the fuel tank and carburetor are located high above the rest of the engine block, allowing the oil/petrol to circulate by gravity. This eliminates the need for a fuel pump (or a separate oil pump).
One major tradeoff of the two-cylinder engine is its limited power-to-weight ratio. The Kalesi's engine is relatively underpowered for the weight of its body and chassis, and the vehicle has a maximum road speed of 50 km/h. Off road, its speed is roughly 10 km/h. This performance was deemed adequate for the Kalesi's intended role as a utility vehicle, and for limited use in civilian agriculture and off-road recreation.
Trabzon Otosan's design team has stated that the notion of placing such a small engine into a jeep body and chassis was inspired by a similar pre-Doomsday Japanese vehicle known as the Suzuki Jimny. During the 1970s, the Suzuki Jimny was offered with a wide variety of powerplants, including a two-stroke, two-cylinder engine that found favor with niche enthusiasts on the international off-roading scene.
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