Proving ground

A proving ground (US), training area (Australia, Ireland, UK) or training centre (Canada) is an installation or reservation where vehicles, weapons or other civilian or military technology are experimented with or are tested, or where military tactics are tested. Proving ground is an area where the performance of such vehicles and objects is being tested.

For other uses, see Proving ground (disambiguation).

Proving grounds often encompass large and remote areas.

Types of Proving Grounds

There are several different types of proving grounds, depending on the type of vehicle or objects being tested. We can classify them as:

• Aeronautical Applications
• Military Applications
• Vehicle Testing
• Marine Performance Testing
• Aerospace Applications (For test-firing missiles and drones)

Vehicle Testing and Development[1]

Proving grounds are used by R&D engineering teams in vehicle development process for validation or verification, inspection, and certification or homologation of the vehicles. They are an efficient means of qualifying the durability and the performance of vehicles and their components.

Proving ground facilities are used to expose industry prototypes to the conditions that the final product will experience either in extremes or during its whole life-time. This is achieved by accelerating damage accumulation rates, so failures are detectable in a short period of time.

Typical applications for vehicle proving grounds are:

• Durability testing
• Corrosion testing
• Functional performance
• Brake testing
• Ride and handling (Vehicle Dynamics)
• NVH - Noise, Vibration, and Harness
• Powertrain testing

Military and Government

Asia

Republic of Korea

• Anheung Proving Ground, Taean County (36.680° 126.200°).[2][3]

Australasia

Australia

• (Shoalwater Bay Military Training Area) Shoalwater Bay, Queensland (4545 km²)

Europe

Austria

• Allentsteig, Lower Austria (157 km²), largest training area in Austria
• Bruckneudorf, Lower Austria
• Glainach, Carinthia
• Großmittel, Lower Austria
• Hochfilzen, Tyrol
• Marwiesen, Carinthia
• Lizum-Walchen, Tyrol (50 km²)
• Pöls, Styria.
• Seetaler Alpen, Styria

Czech Republic

Military Area Boletice, Czech Republic

There are five proving grounds in the Czech Republic with the total area of 1296 km².

Denmark

• Borris Skydeterræn (47 km²)

Finland

• Rovajärvi proving ground near Rovaniemi in Lapland is the largest proving ground in Northern Europe.
• The Artillery Brigade in Niinisalo, currently houses the Finnish ordnance R&D center (established 1921).

Germany

• Bergen-Hohne Training Area, Lower Saxony (284 km²), NATO facility, largest training area in Germany.
• Grafenwöhr, Bavaria (229 km²) a US facility
• Hammelburg, Bavaria (40 km²). Hammelburg features a complete artificial village for training purposes of the German Army
• Hohenfels, Bavaria (160 km²)
• Heuberg Training Area, Baden-Württemberg.
• Munster Training Area, Lower Saxony.
• Sennelager Training Area, North Rhine-Westphalia, managed by the British Army.

Ireland

• Glen of Imaal (27 km²), an Irish Army artillery, live fire and tactical training area.

Italy

• Salto di Quirra (120 km²), an Italian interforce proving ground located on Sardinia.[4]

Poland

• Drawsko Pomorskie (340 km²) belongs to the Polish Army and Air Force (since 1946), and has also been used by NATO since 1996. This facility is internationally known as DPTA - Drawsko Pomorskie Training Area. It is also an important site of archeological excavations.
• Ośrodek Szkolenia Poligonowego Wojsk Lądowych Żagań (about 34,000 ha) in Żagań County and Bolesławiec County; belongs to Polish Land Forces also used by NATO

Portugal

• Alcochete (75 km²) - artillery and air bombing range. Established in 1904, it was managed by the Portuguese Army until 1993 and since then is managed by the Portuguese Air Force. It is the largest closed military facility in Europe. In 2008, it was chosen to be the site of the future New Lisbon International Airport.

Spain

• Chinchilla, Albacete. (CENAD Chinchilla) 232 km²

• San Gregorio, Zaragoza. (CENAD San Gregorio) 340 km²

United Kingdom

• Salisbury Plain Training Area, United Kingdom (380 km²)
• Stanford Training Area (STANTA), Norfolk United Kingdom 120 km²) - established 1942, includes an "Afghan" village
• Otterburn Training Area, Northumberland, United Kingdom (242 km²)

Russia/former Soviet Union

In Russia a designated area is usually called a "polygon" (Полигон).

• Kapustin Yar - aerial weapons/rocket test range, North Caucasus Military District
• Totskoye range nuclear tests - test range in the Urals where nuclear tests were carried out in 1954
• YakutiaChallenge - winter test proving ground in Yakutia, Eastern Siberia

North America

Canada

• CFB Suffield, Alberta (2690 km²) - training base for Canadian Forces and British Army
• Canadian Forces Base Wainwright, Alberta (609 km²) - home to Land Force Western Area Training Centre (LFWATC) and the Canadian Manoeuvre Training Centre (CMTC)
• CFB Shilo, Manitoba (400 km²) - Home Station of the Royal Regiment of Canadian Artillery
• Land Force Central Area Training Centre Meaford, Ontario (68 km²) - Training center for the 4th Canadian Division
• Garrison Petawawa, Ontario (307 km²) - home to 2 CMBG and 4th CDSG
• CFB Valcartier, Quebec (28 km²) - home to 5 CMBG
• CFB Gagetown, New Brunswick (1100 km²) - Primary Eastern Canada training area
• Land Force Atlantic Area Training Centre Aldershot, Nova Scotia (11.4 km,²)

United States

In the United States, there are several military facilities that have been designated as Proving Grounds.

• Aberdeen Proving Ground is a United States Army facility located at Aberdeen, Maryland, and is the Army's oldest active proving ground, established on October 20, 1917, six months after the United States entered World War I. It was created so that design and testing of ordnance materiel could be carried out in proximity to the nation's industrial and shipping centers at the time.
• Dugway Proving Ground in an active facility operated by the United States Army Test and Evaluation Command in the Great Salt Lake Desert of Utah. Dugway's mission is to test U.S. and Allied biological and chemical weapon defense systems.
• Fort Belvoir Proving ground, in Fairfax County, Virginia.
• Indian Head Naval Surface Warfare Center located in Indian Head, Maryland, at one time called the Indian Head Proving Ground.
• Jefferson Proving Ground located in Madison, Indiana, was principally a munitions testing facility of Test and Evaluation Command of the United States Army Materiel Development and Readiness Command. The facility was ordered closed in 1989 as part of the Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process.
• Pacific Proving Ground is an inactive U.S. Department of Energy area in the Marshall Islands that were established by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission in 1946 for detonation of nuclear devices for testing weapon design and effects. It mainly consists of Bikini Atoll, Enewetak Atoll & the surrounding area. Deactivated in 1963.
• Sandy Hook Proving Ground, at Sandy Hook, New Jersey was the nation's first such facility. It was created in 1874 and was used as a proving ground until 1919.
• Scituate Proving Ground, a former proving ground in Scituate, Massachusetts, operational from 1918 to 1921.
• Yuma Proving Ground is a United States Army facility situated in southwestern La Paz County and western Yuma County in southwestern Arizona, U.S., approximately 30 miles (48 km) north-east of the city of Yuma. The proving ground is used for testing military equipment and encompasses 1,307.8 square miles (3,387.2 km²) in the Sonoran Desert.

Automotive proving grounds

Automotive proving ground[5] or also called automotive test track serves automotive industry for road vehicle testing. In automotive development process, vehicle manufacturers typically test the behaviour of the vehicle in various environments and traffic situations. Conventional vehicle test cases are usually focus on the dynamic properties of vehicles. Test tracks generally compass the engineering tasks of vehicle testing, validation and proving. By the advent of autonomous cars, new proving grounds specially dedicated for self-driving cars appear as well as traditional test fields are transformed for highly automated or autonomous vehicle tests.

Automakers

• Chrysler Corporation - See Chrysler Proving Grounds
• Ford Motor Company - See Ford Proving Grounds
• General Motors Corporation - See General Motors Proving Grounds
• Mazda Motors Corporation - See Mazda Proving Grounds
• Nissan Motors - See Nissan Proving Grounds
• Porsche Engineering - Nardò Ring
• VW Group - Ehra-Lessien test track

Independent automotive proving grounds[6]

• Digitrans Automotive Proving Ground, St. Valentin, Austria
• ZalaZone Automotive Proving Ground, Hungary
• fr:UTAC CERAM, France
• Applus IDIADA, Spain
• de:Automotive Testing Papenburg, Germany
• HORIBA MIRA, United Kingdom
• Bruntingthorpe Airfield & Proving Ground, United Kingdom
• Millbrook Proving Ground, United Kingdom
• TRIWO Automotive Testing Center, vehicle testing proving grounds close to Frankfurt and Saarbruecken, Germany[7]

Footnotes

1. "List Of Automotive Proving Grounds [Updated 2020] | Dewesoft". dewesoft.com. Retrieved 2020-07-31.
2. Lewis, Jeffrey (June 28, 2017). "Anheung Proving Ground". Arms Control Wonk. Archived from the original on June 28, 2017.
3. Lewis, Jeffrey (June 24, 2017). "South Korean President Moon watched a missile test. We don't pay enough attention to South Korea's missiles. 1/". Twitter. Retrieved June 28, 2017.
4. Poligono Sperimentale e di Addestramento Interforze del Salto di Quirra
5. Szalay, Zs.; Nyerges, Á.; Hamar, H.; Hesz, M. (2017). "Technical Specification Methodology for an Automotive Proving Ground Dedicated to Connected and Automated Vehicles". Periodica Polytechnica Transportation Engineering. 45 (3): 168–174. doi:10.3311/PPtr.10708.
6. Szalay, Zs.; Nyerges, Á.; Hamar, H.; Hesz, M. (2017). "Technical Specification Methodology for an Automotive Proving Ground Dedicated to Connected and Automated Vehicles". Periodica Polytechnica Transportation Engineering. 45 (3): 168–174. doi:10.3311/PPtr.10708.
7. KFZ-Testcenter, Triwo. "Teststrecken-Kalender | Triwo KFZ-Testcenter". www.triwo-testcenter.de (in German). Retrieved 17 January 2018.

Further reading

• Edwin A. Martini (ed.), Proving Grounds: Militarized Landscapes, Weapons Testing, and the Environmental Impact of US Bases. Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press, 2015.

External links

• Finnish ordnance center at mil.fi (in Finnish)
• YakutiaChallenge
• Drawsko Pomorskie Training Area
• Otterburn Training Area