Army officials have not yet committed to buying any of the vehicles, whose frames and bodies are made of a combination of Fiberglas, balsa wood, foam and carbon reinforcements held together with resin, said Steven Lockard, president and CEO of Warren, R.I.-based TPI Composites Inc., which built the prototype vehicle.

"Every pound of weight we save, that weight is being added back to the vehicle in armor and mine-blast protection," Lockard said Tuesday.

The vehicle is the result of an 18-month research and development program with AM General Corp. and the U.S. Army Research, Development and Engineering Command, a laboratory for military automotive technology.

The body of the tan composite prototype has a sandpaper feel. The fenders are pliable and can be easily bent by hand, flipping back into place when released.

"We can put the strength where we need it," Lockard said.

The chassis, for example, has extra carbon for added strength and stiffness, while other composite parts of the vehicle are lighter and more pliable, he said.

Matt Ociepka, a spokesman for the Army research lab in Warren, Mich., confirmed that the Army will test the vehicle.

"We need something that's going to be thick but lightweight," said Crystal Cockerell, 39, of Gahanna, who was injured in Iraq on Aug. 10, 2004, when a dump-truck-like vehicle in which she was riding went over a roadside bomb.

Adding armor weighs a Humvee down and makes it ride lower to the ground, Cockerell said. A lighter vehicle that rides higher even with added armor might have a greater degree of protection if it runs directly over a bomb, she said.

Loren Thompson, a defense analyst with the Lexington Institute, a Virginia-based think tank that follows military issues, said composite vehicles would have some advantages but would be more costly to make.

The composite vehicles would indeed be slightly more expensive than conventional Humvees, Lockard said, declining to specify a figure.

If the Army commits to buying any of the Humvees, they would be built at the company's plant in Springfield, Lockard said.

"We could ramp up pretty quickly to most any volume that would be desired," he said.

Republican Rep. David Hobson, a senior member of the House Appropriations defense subcommittee whose district includes the Ohio plant, said he would like to see the vehicles on the battlefield if they work as envisioned and improve soldier safety.

The Springfield plant currently employs 40 workers. TPI plans to add 300 production and engineering jobs at the plant over the next three years to produce a range of composite products for the military.

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