Jump to content

Old Git

Members
  • Posts

    321
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    7

Everything posted by Old Git

  1. Found a wee bit of footage on IWM which shows several Cromwells from, what I believe to be, C Sqn, 2nd Northants Yeomanry, Troops 1 and 2. All of them are sporting some form of Zimmerit on the Turret. There are at least three indentifiable Cromwells; Achilles T187676 and Agamemnon T187714 (from 1 Trp) and Galahad from 2 Trp (no Census #). Seems as though naming their tanks after ancient warriors was a thing for C Sqn and 1 Troop appears to be all names beginning with A so we can probably assume 2 Trp had a Cromwell named Gwain. Link below...Have grabbed some stills from this and will try to upload them to the post. Lookout for the ant-magnetic wainscotting in the last couple of frames, 😉 https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/1060008139
  2. Hi All, looking for pointers on whatever mods\configs were made to the WSC when in British use, especially for NW Europe in 1944. Have had a look around the forum and can't find anything definitive? Ideally, if anyone's got a pointer to a book, or file at the National Archives etc. which covers this topic I'd be most interested to hear of it. I can see from period pics that in some instances the skate rail was removed completely, Pip Roberts Command version of the WSC being a good example. Incidentally does anyone know the full Census number for Roberts WSC, from the famous pic it looks to be Z 495533? Anyone confirm or deny? Also, what radios other than the WS 19 would Roberts have had in the back of his WSC. The following bit of film shows several attennae...and a spare wheel on the back. Any ideas? https://fa9e73e865f29caec390-2a80cf171f3b8b56b3a148be08287271.ssl.cf3.rackcdn.com/0x060A2B340101010201010F1213000000E51D7F0E9FEBE2390000B4B52F563190.mp4 Also, any info on the WSC in RE use? I think they also used them in the Recce / Radio role and I have a note from the RE office who scouted the Bailey bridge build for Putanges in 1944. His diary notes that he took two WSC's with him and left one on the hill outside of town as his rear radio link. Anyone aware of anything specific about RE configurations of the WSC?
  3. Thanks Adrian, yeah wasn't a pleasant experience but it just confirmed what I already know to be true, that I'm far to old for heavy lifting and far too young to be gardening! I only get involved in Gardening because the wife talks in her sleep and she tends to say things about me being a lazy arse git and not helping enough in the garden and you know how powerful a motivator guilt can be. if it wasn't for that I'd as soon just ignore the damn thing! The plan was to have most of it laid to lawn with a few beds to keep the old girl distracted...sadly the Rotavator was having none of it that day! Have a copy of Son of Sherman here and working through it, trying to cherry pick what I need without reading it all from cover to cover, if you know what I mean. Been looking over the TNA archives for Sherman stuff and there are a few files on the subject, with drawings, next time I'm up I shall endeavour to copy a few of them and see what they tell us. I've never really tried to bone up on Sherman variants until now and I have total admiration for anyone who has. Just getting a particular type of Sherman down is not enough. I have found a pic on IWM which shows, what appears to my untrained eye, and M4A2 with the type of Hatch hoods, above the Glacis plate, that I am looking for. This tank is clearly in use in NW Europe in 1944...now all I have to do is find a tank with these hoods and a different gun mantlet and so it goes on. Consistency would have been nice, c'est le vie THE BRITISH ARMY IN NORMANDY 1944. © IWM (B 6167) IWM Non Commercial License
  4. John, thanks for those photos mate, they're fantastic. I've now got a much better idea of this area. Adrian, thanks for the tip re the idler brackets. Haven't yet got to the point of trying to understand various types of suspension yet but I think that my second photograph (see above) of the French M4A2 demonstrates your point exactly. Hadn't really noticed that detial until you pointed it out, so thanks a lot for that! By way of explanation of what I am up to, I am laid up at the moment having lost a fight with a Rotavator hell bent on chopping off my right foot. Put the damn thing in neutral, as I turned it by a stone wall, only for the linkage to skip forward into reverse and the damn thing jumped back on me (why do they always go much faster in reverse). Anyways, it pinned me against the wall, handle under my rib cage and pushing me higher up the wall whilst I tried to keep my feet on the ground and wrestle it under control, but I'm now too old for that kind of nonsense and it was winning before I realised I was still gripping the dead man's handle too tight. By the time I regained enough sense to hands-off it had my right ankle pinned and was beginning to chew up my boot! Sharp edge of the cover plate did bite into the bone though so ankle is kind of buggered right now, but will be serviceable again.... if I can be persuaded to stay off it for a bit!! So with nothing to do but watch TV (I'd rather cut my wrists) I decided to get down the large 1/6th scale plastic model kit of the Sherman M4A3 that Dragon released a few years back. This thing is bloody huge and I wouldn't have bought it except for the fact that the supplier was selling it off, (on the Net late at night, the bastard) at a ridiculously low price and I had a couple over my regular allotment of vino! It's been laying in the rafters of my Garage for years so now seems the perfect time to tackle it. Of course I don't want a US tank (no offence to the cousins across the pond) I want something that was used by our lot in Normandy, so I'm investigating the possibility of back-porting it to an M4A2. So far, the lower hull is a straightforward thing to do, with absolutely minimal modding. The upper Hull will require a bit of judicial cutting to remove and replace the Glacis plate and perhaps some of the front deck detail. But that's a relatively easy thing to do...I think. The engine grill on the rear deck needs looking at too but as this is already a separate piece it shouldn't need any cutting of the existing deck plates in this area. I'm leaning towards the FTA type Hatch hoods as they are squared and easier to fabricate, just need to track down some evidence that these were seen in British use in NW Europe and with which units (I think 8th and 27th Armd Brigade's fielded Sherman III's in NW Europe but need to research that further). If this isn't doable then I'll have to go the more common type Hatch hoods which will require a bit more skill in fabricating! Outside of that I also need to find evidence of Sherman III's in British service that use the M34A1 Gun mounts for the 75mm and then of course there's the loaders hatch in the Turret to deal with. All-in-all there's a wee bit of work in making it come out as a Sherman III but I don't think any of it is impossible...Just need to finish the research before I can be 100% happy that it's worth doing. I've been pulling references off the bookshelf and it occurs to me that there isn't a decent reference book for Sherman's in British use. Yes there's a few titles that show pretty pictures but they all seem to avoid trying to identify various Types or variations or going into any kind of serious detail. What we need is a whole new volume, like Son of Sherman, but devoted to Sherman's in British use, it can be called 'Cousin of Sherman' and be the definitive edition. So, when do you think you can make a start on writing it Adrian?
  5. Things like Lance-Jack, Dropshorts, etc. have been around since at least WWII as has, I think Buckshee, which is an old Arabic phrase meaning tip/gratuity. You still hear it a lot in Egypt, where they're always following you around asking for backsheesh (bqshysh). Incidentally, Egypt is where the term Gippo comes from also, short for Egyptian especially the begging / backsheesh kind. Then there's mucker which is pretty universal but is very much an Indian Army (WWII, and earlier, era) phrase. One of my favourites, which has become wildly misinterpreted is Bint! In the WWII Indian Army Bint was Hindi for Pretty Girl. Today, especially up North, it seems to have taken on a new meaning which is closer to slag! I was in the centre of Oxford one day when I came across a Blue Mercedes with the number plate Bint 1 or something very similar. My friend spotted it first and said, "oh, that's a very unfortunate number plate", to which I replied, "probably not, it most likely belongs to an Indian girl and was probably bought for her by her Dad". To say he was incredulous at such a suggestion would be an understatement and even when I explained the background to him he was highly dubious. A few years ago there was a re-print of 'Service Slang', a WWII era book produced by a couple of regular's Army and RAF, I think, https://www.amazon.co.uk/Service-Slang-Flying-Officer-J-L/dp/0571240143/ref=sr_1_fkmrnull_1?keywords="Service+Slang"&qid=1554246330&s=gateway&sr=8-1-fkmrnull
  6. John, thanks for the reply mate! Re the lower hull's being almost identical I am coming to the same conclusion but good lord these Sherman variants are confusing! Re the Muffler system I have managed to find a few photographs which give some good views of this area and they are below, but I'd love to see a good drawing/s for this muffler arrangement if anyone has one? Use of photographs for discussion purposes only. These next few images appear to show the same area without the muffler attached and I assume that the welded in blanking plate, is the original exit point for the exhaust system before it joined up with the Mufflers? Or was there something else here?
  7. Can anyone explain, or post pics/drawings showing, the differences in the lower hulls between the M4A2 and the M4A3? From what I've been able to ascertain the lower hull were of similar lengths and there was no rear engine access doors on the M4A2. Can anyone advise if the idlers were mounted differently between the M4A2 and the M4A3? Were there any othe major differences?
  8. Thanks MatchFuzee, exactly what I needed to see...although I must confess I wasn't expecting to see standard slot head screws. Don't know what I expected but it wasn't that!
  9. Thanks Chris, I was pretty sure someone has posted pics of them before but they seem to have been lost in the great Photophuket hissy fit!
  10. These ground anchors were used quite a lot in Bridging operations with the RE, they are indeed WWII and immediate post-war. Interestingly enough Bassett-Lowke reproduced these in 1/6th scale as part of the Bailey Bridge training models that were made between 1944 - 1962
  11. Anyone got any photographs of the CWW boots (Korean War era)? I'm especially interested in the soles and how the commando soles are screwed on. Before and after shots of soles would be fantastic and a quick shot of the uppers.
  12. Here ya go, all you need now is a readers ticket... http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C2193043
  13. Well I can't say either way. What I do know is that when the RAC finally got a good look at the Morris LRC they were not too impressed with it for the Armoured Recce role and, following some recommendations for some slight uparmouring in the floor area (for mines), they passed the entire fleet over to both the RAF and the RE. From my own research into the RE it seems that they liked it a lot and did use it for site recce work. Whenever you see them in the NW Europe photo record they are almost exclusively in the use of RE. The RAF seems to have utilised them as armoured cars for perimeter patrols at airfields, this 'Stlll' is the only one I've ever seen of a Yellow Morris in the RAF role and it's possible that it was used as you say, but I always thought the Crash Tenders were a different colour and only Follow-me vehicles were Yellow, but then the RAF is not my area. I suppose somewhere in TNA there is a file with all the answers!
  14. I knew I saw it somewhere and whilst I thought it looked like a still I had no idea of where ti came from until now, so thanks for that. The Documentary is on Youtube...
  15. Found it, but now questioning the date. Maybe post-war?
  16. I'm pretty sure I've seen a Morris LRC painted yellow and used as a Follow Me vehicle, by the RAF, during the War. I was collating references for the LRC a few years back so I may have saved the photo, let me have a spin through my NAS and see if I can turn it up. EDIT: Just had a spin through the NAS and can't turn it up. Have found a few pics of the LRC in use by the RAF but not that specific photo...beginning to doubt myself now! If I turn it up I'll post it.
  17. Just turned up an email address for the Army Historical Branch, thanks for that RAFMT, sometimes it just needs a different set of eyes! I've now fired off an email to thm asking if there is a complete repository of old WO publications and where I can access them. Let's see what happens!
  18. Can't believe, that in a society of red meat eaters, someone actually posted a link direct to the bleating heart of the Guardian 😖 😉
  19. Interesting comment this, in as much as I actually rang the MOD main switchboard number this morning and asked if they could put me through to the MOD's Librarian/Archivist. I was asked which Base, to which I replied Whitehall. Only to be told , we have no listing for that. Common Sense tells that the MOD, at Whitehall, should have a reference Library/ Archivist but as there's no mention of this on their website and the receptionist didn't seem to know of one either then how is one supposed to get through to them. I suppose the opacity of 'Open Government' is neither as contradictory, nor surprising, as it sounds! Just off now to put "MOD Reference Library" into Google to see what happens...! Failing that does anyone have any contact details for the reference library! EDIT: As suspected it turns up next to nothing, in fact Google returns only one, truncated, page of hits. .....and whilst the last entry on this page looks intriguing I think I shall have to give it a miss as it sounds too much like the typical Russian Hacker Honey-trap.
  20. Just received a note from the Australian National Archives, who do not have a copy either, but they've been able to give me the WO Number for it, WO 6386.
  21. Thanks for that, will certainly give it a try. I guess this is the voice of experience talking... Ever tried getting information out of NAM...like getting blood from a stone. Don't answer the phone and never, ever reply to emails!
  22. I doubt they'd still be in use by the 90's. REVoS replaced VAOS and was in turn replaced, eventually, by CREM and then we went all Ladidah-NATO.
×
×
  • Create New...