AlienFTM

If it were a Sherman, I have suggested "I've been working on the railroad." Since it isn't, how about, "Watch the lad at the front of the vehicle jump when I shout, 'Boo!'"

You'll only need one glove. It might snow: on the other hand it might not. And you'll probably only need one welly: I don't expect there to be more than one foot of snow.

I had the pleasure of watching Danish Cents fire in 1982. Our regiment took Scorpions to the Oxbøl ranges and training area north of Esbjerg (rather appropriate as that is we had finished the Second World War on the Danish / German border) and exercised with the Danes. I seem to recall they were a very old version of Cent, maybe with 20pdr guns and I suspect they were looking at Leopard to replace them. Come to think if it, that's where I was the day the Belgrano was sunk.

I seem to recall that collapsed fuel bags did happen periodically in service and even in the 70s when REME VMs were generally slimmer, it was a job they'd all swerve to avoid. As crew, it was an occasion where I'd gladly keep him provided with liquid refreshment and otherwise maintain a low profile.

And yet, I read a recent report that in the Sandpit, a stupidly high percentage of rounds (well into the high 90s?) get nowhere near the target because squaddie simply selects auto and lets go. Ammo discipline is a long-lost concept. Tangent. Look in Wikipedia for Right Arm of the Free World for a few interesting minutes' read.

There is a very good reason for this. Whenever we sized by height ("Tallest on the right, shortest on the left, in single rank SIZE"; "From the right NUMBER"; "1", "2", "3" ... "42 last man SIR") I was reminded of Soviet conscription policy. Because BMPs were compact and bijou, any draft of conscripts was sorted by inverse height. I imagined: "Shortest on the right, Tallest on the left, in single rank SIZE"; "From the right NUMBER"; "1", "2", "3" ... "100,000 last man COMRADE" The shortest X percent went to the infantry simply because they would fit inside a BMP: nothing else mattered. The next X percent went to armour to fit inside a T62 etc. At six feet, the Red Army would simply not have accepted you in an armoured unit. For similar reasons (sources suggest 1m55 - 1m57) Yuri Gagarin was chosen to be the first (successful) cosmonaut. See http://humanheight.net/famous_people/sources/height_of_gagarin_source.html : I read once that, since accidents did not unacceptably afflict Soviet spacecraft in space, to get more cosmonauts inside, rather than increase the size (and hence the payload) of the craft, they stripped stuff out and used small cosmonauts.

I seem to recall that DDs would have been a solely British production but it was far too slow and there would never have been enough until, following a demonstration early in 1944, the Americans took to them, joined in and started cranking them out in far greater numbers.

I cannot certainly remember where I read the following. Might have been Mallinson's history of the Light Dragoons or the official history of 15th/19th The King's Royal Hussars during the Second World War (latter is a free download, PDF 21MB, from: http://www.lightdragoons.org.uk/downloads.html ) or somewhere else. As we probably know, Hobart raised 7 and 11 Armd Divs before raising 79. The story is told of Hobart inspecting the regiment (I am sure it was 15/19H) about 1942 and being well impressed at the nice shiny Covenanters until he told the drivers to jump in and start them up. Oh dear. Heads rolled. Covenanters were most definitely not the world's greatest ever tank and while troops overseas were getting spares and shiny new tanks, those slaughtered in Belgium were having to make do with whatever could be spared.

The Navy polo neck came in about 1980. When you took your scarf off and put it back on, it automatically adjusted and looked as suave and sophisticated as only cavalry do (remember the main purpose of cavalry in warfare is to bring style and panache to what would otherwise just be an ugly brawl). When you wore your polo neck for a week at a time, the neck stretched like a wizard's sleeve and was a CENSORED disgrace. I did NOT forget the navy polo neck, I deliberately omitted it. ;o)

In our Rebro Ferrets in BAOR we had (needed) two times 353. Have to say I never saw any other combination, but that's because I wasn't there all that much longer or in any other role. Come to think of it, the RSM's Ferret and AFAIK the LO's Ferret both had 2*353. TBF the LO's Ferret only ever saw light (as in all four Command Troop Ferrets went out at the same time) on Ex Javelin / Spearpoint / Crusader 80, and then not in its intended role. Rest of the time it served either as a spare vehicle or a temporary cannibalisation victim. Find someone who crewed an SSM's Ferret, he might tell you it had a 353 and a manpack. I couldn't say.

Herein lies the difference between the British and the American experience with DD Shermans. Some years ago when DRAC was raising money for the (now complete) new building at Bovington, as one who was giving to the fund, I was invited to Tankfest as DRAC's guest (in fact the then DRAC had been a young subaltern in my regiment when I was a Lance Corporal). Over drinks in the mess I found myself talking to an ex-13th/18th Hussar (which regiment had amalgamated with 15th/19th at Options for Change, so now we were members of the same Regimental Association) Sergeant who had commanded a 13/18H DD ashore. He told me to ignore what the history books said: his experience bore no relation. Late arriving at their launch position, the landing craft skippers took the decision to get closer to the beach before launching. As a consequence, 13/18H were ashore ahead of their scheduled arrival and were comfortable by the time the infantry arrived that they were to support. wrt numbers of tanks landed (elsewhere in the thread). 13/18H landed two squadrons of DDs floated ashore. All the Fireflies (barrel too long for DD conversion) were grouped into the third squadron and landed by landing craft later. Because the role of the DD component was infantry support, they'd be loaded with HE rather than armour-defeating rounds since the Panzers were held deep on Hitler's orders. The Firefly's 17-pdr gun having no HE capability, this was entirely in order.

Federal Riot Gun (FRG) was reputedly an excellent tool for the disposal of dead green army-issue torch batteries (C type? Whatever, they hold next to no charge and died just when you needed them.) I was told the following in the late 90s, nearly a quarter of a century after my time in Omagh, by someone in our consultancy team who grew up there. He made allusions to streets littered with green army batteries after riots. It seems that after loading a baton round (rubber bullet) into an FRG, dropping a dead battery down the barrel in front of it doubled the payload and the battery was a lot harder than the baton round, So I am told ... But they never rioted in my presence, so this is pure hearsay on my part.

It also depended on what you had left after yesterday's operations and what the A Echelon had on board when they came round to replenish you. Looking at the ammunition specified. Shell (HE) is good for making a big bang and flattening an area full of infantry. It can also blow lumps out of soft-skinned vehicles but the best you'll get out it against armour is to destroy optics or break a track. You may get a "mobility kill" ("it's out of battle but it isn't destroyed") but it can be repaired and brought back into service. HESH (High Explosive Squash Head) is the perfect compromise: it carries nearly as much HE payload as Shell but its design gives you an excellent chance of destroying a (contemporary) tank by causing massive spalling inside the vehicle (if it doesn't penetrate outright) and trashing everything inside including crew). In Scorpions (essentially the same gun, same ammo, same role as Saladin), we could spend whole days on the ranges firing nothing but HESH (actually normally HESH Prac, identical but without the HE payload so we didn't trash the targets, hard and soft). Of the 42 rounds carried on Scorpion, the vast majority would always be HESH and we rarely saw Shell (or HE-Prac). I did once spend maybe a quarter hour feeding a smoke screen on a ridge, but truth be told if the battlegroup wanted smoke, it could call on it's artillery component for whom smoke was part of the day job. Canister was a one-off to keep Chinese hoards at bay in Korea when the coaxial MG would burn out. (I recently reread http://www.amazon.co.uk/Assault-Crossing-River-Seine-1944/dp/1848845766 - which coincidently featured my regiment, part of the first battlegroup across the Seine in 1944 in what became the de-facto standard for an improved divisional opposed river crossing. This gives a good description of the first Sherman troop of 4/7 DG across the river fighting off a counter-attack and burning out all the MG barrels in a desperate attempt to keep them from being over-run.) By the time we came across it, the manufacture of canister rounds had been outlawed by Geneva. However, they existed and under Geneva rules, we could use them, we just couldn't make any more. Same with flame throwers. I saw flame thrower pits at Hohne ranges in the early 80s even though they were by now sanctioned. But the canister round (a glorified 76mm shotgun round for those that didn't know) destroys gun barrels. We'd have a demonstration of the effects of a single canister round fired from the oldest barrel in the squadron (soon to be replaced) every time we went to the ranges. We knew they existed and we had the stocks to use up, but we never expected to use them in action. Oh they they were seriously heavy. So to sum up. You could expect your vehicle to be entirely loaded with HESH unless they were short, in which case you'd get Shell. Smoke on an as-required basis, Hope this helps.

Until the 84/85 pattern combats, combat trousers were always "generously" cut (don't wear them with braces, the gusset drags around your knees unless you wore them with braces). Not a problem in our regiment: combat trousers were only ever worn on guard duty, otherwise lightweights (or barrack dress if appropriate). No problem.

New RSM, JC, encouraged the regimental powers-that-be to re-introduce the brass cap and beret badge. Unlike the obviously tatty Sta-brite badge, brass could be shone up to GLEAM. Then somebody discovered Silver Dip. Park your silver cutlery in sliver dip and the tarnish vanished in the blink of an eye. ("Yeah right, as if squaddies had silver cutlery.") Then somebody discovered that it also worked well on a brass cap badge and suddenly it became a NAAFI best-seller. THEN somebody discovered that Silver Dip also worked on working parts. We never put enough rounds down our Small Metal Guns to require Silver Dip to get them to gleam again, but when we fired the coax (GPMG, L43A1), we could put down box after box of 7.62mm disintegrating link, one ball, one trace. But the working parts (more than thirty years on I can still picture the gas rod) got filthy beyond words. Huzzah for Silver Dip!

Actually I forget. In the absence of a working I/C circuit, there was, for Scorpion, an Emergency Crew Control, a separate handset that allowed the commander to talk to the driver. It was battleship grey and looked like something out of 1950s TV football commentary or, as I put it, a grey toffee apple. I remember our C13 was out, the commander would talk to the driver (getting nothing back), then switch mike to speak to the troop on the B-set (B47). But we were new to CVR(T) and he had been a corporal in NI, posted to B Sqn on promotion and given troop lead while Rommel went through Sandhurst and his Crew Commanders course, so he was under a lot of pressure without an A-set on the Squadron Command Net. He regularly tried to get the driver to turn using the B-set, which necessitated the ECC, but he used the Larkspur mike, telling the whole squadron to turn right here. Because as operator I was working the only set we had, I'd hear him next to me, tap him on the arm and gesture to swap mikes.Or he'd send LOCSTAT or SITREP to the driver via the ECC, which I couldn't hear, then curse furiously when he realised that he had been wasting his breath. When we pulled over, I'd have to remind him (carefully: he was a sergeant and I was the New In Green member of the crew) to use the toffee apple (holds ECC aloft) to talk to the driver and the Larkspur mike (candy floss - okay it didn't look like candy floss but it was the best analogy I could come up with at the time) to talk to troop and squadron. In the end it came down to my nudging him and shouting (over the ambient noise) "Candy floss!" or "Toffee apple!"

All Larkspur intercomms require a radio to be included in the set up. This is your key. Clansman saw I/C built into the harness, but for Larkspur, I/C was a function of the A-set radios (C42, C13 etc). I only caught the tail end of Larkspur and it was over 30 years ago, so everything is hazy. On Ferret I don't recall there was any difference between a commander's and crewman's headset. There was only one. Function came via the J2 junction box (2-set). I believe there was a J1 and a J3 for 1-set and 3-set configurations. The only Larkspur commander's harness I recall was for Scorpion. Scorpion was designed for Clansman, but in the 1970s UK plc could not afford both CVR(T) and Clansman, so MOD were offered a choice of either/or. They chose CVR(T) and Scorpions (and I presume any other CVR(T)s in the field before the advent of Clansman) were fitted with a hybrid harness that gave an approximation of Clansman function from Larkspur radios. Key to this on Scorpion was the (iirc) RSB2 Radio Systems Box 2-set which allowed crewmen to work one set through the left ear and monitor the other through the right. Live I/C was optional, again through the right ear, when using a Clansman helmet with a boom mike, which was compatible with the hybrid harness. Both Clansman and Larkspur harnesses provided the commander's function via a long, thick umbilical cable that attached to a breastplate slung from the neck, but all these years down the line I honestly cannot remember which was which and what function each provided. Hope this helps a little.

HTH = Hopes this helps. Neil A = Alien backwards

Correct me if I am wrong. I think you have the wrong end of the Practice Round stick. A Practice Round (PRAC or PRAC-T to indicate that it has a trace) is a fireable round that looks and behaves like a service round (HESH, HE, etc) and flies downrange in exactly the same way. Used by crews to execute gunnery drills for real, against real targets, but with no HE, etc payload to damage the target apart from the kinetic energy in the round at impact. Filling is entirely inert. These rounds are painted a standard light blue to indicate that they are PRAC. A direct hit will still probably trash a B or light A vehicle. You may be thinking of a Drill Round. Looks and feels like a live round but when you pull the trigger, it goes "click". Useful when working in a CIM (Classroom Instuctional Module), etc indoors - a big bang would NOT be useful. A bit (but not much) like the difference between blank and drill rifle rounds. HTH

I stand to be corrected but I don't believe any helmet would be appropriate for Ferret with Clansman. When Clansman went out to the armoured divisions around 1980, Ferret's role amounted to being officially the rover for the CO and in fact the rover for the RSM, because whereas both had given their career to the regiment, the CO had the final word and could swap his Ferret (giving a degree or armour protection whilst visiting the sabre troops at the sharp end) for the RSM's more comfortable Land Rover. There were also Mark 1s used as rebros in RAC and I imagine other combat and combat support units. As far as I can recall after 30 years, as Regimental Signals Storeman, I never had helmets on the books for Ferrets: crews used (and believe me we preferred to use) beret and headset (unless I am very much mistaken, the nicely comfortable Staff User Headgear). These were all Mark 1s: the only requirement for Mark 2s by then being the UNFICYP Force Reserve Squadron and the Sovereign Base Armoured Car Squadron and Northern Ireland. In NI, the helmet would serve no ballistically-protective purpose: we wore our regimental navy blue berets. In UNFICYP we wore the UN blue beret for obvious reasons and whenever we met our colleagues from the Sovereign Base Areas, they also wore their usual regimental berets.

I crewed Sultans for a couple of years when they were new. (At a Regimental Association weekend a handful of years ago, I made a bee-line for a display of Command Troop Sultans set up to run Battlegroup HQ just as I had done 30 years ago: the penthouses - this is indeed how they are referred - did not appear to have changed in the meantime.) Istr (could be wrong - it's 30+ years) that the "canvas" (we all know it isn't canvas) was press-stud connected to the Sultan's hull rear. From erect, we'd fold the canvas back over on itself until it was about 2 feet wide, then fold the sides up until it was something like a 2-foot cube, to be stowed in an XPM bin (local mod) occupying almost the entire roof bar the commander's hatch, as seen on Ferrets but MUCH bigger to hold the cam net etc, tables, chairs, 500W generator, etc to run the BGHQ. Then we'd slide the penthouse poles onto the roof and flush with the hull rear where istr they were strapped secure. Deploying the canvas was the reverse operation. Then hessian went over anything that needed shape, shine, shadow etc camouflaged, then the cam net was rolled out in a similar fashion to the penthouse canvas and then poles to lift it off the shape of the Sultan, otherwise it just looked like a Sultan with hessian and cam nets draped. The far end from the vehicle had overlapping flaps to minimise light escape. BG HQ had three Sultans, Zero Alpha and Zero Bravo, main and alternate BG Command Vehicles and Zero Charlie, the NBC / Int Cell CV. As I try to remember, there were two overlapping curtains, each the width of the penthouse and a cover sheet which hung down. In theory they backed on to one another to form a T. If there was an attached command element (usually artillery or ATGW, but it might conceivably be infantry or armour), its ACV could back on to form a cruciform. In fact we rarely had an attached HQ (it might be a 432 which didn't fit as tightly into a Sultan penthouse set-up anyway) and because 0C was not vital to the running of the HQ, we occupied a far smaller footprint with just Alpha and Bravo back to back. Charlie was configured similarly to Alpha and Bravo and was perfectly capable of running the BG Command Net. In truth it tended to be a spare vehicle and crew (commander and operator providing control signallers, an officer or WO if present - rarely - as duty officer and a driver to take his turn guarding the complex). Set up in a cruciform, the cover sheets covered a square the width of the penthouse between the four penthouses. The curtains could be extended to cover an empty side if there were only three vehicles. However many vehicles in the complex, it was normal to allow only one entrance / exit via the penthouses so that wall and door space could be used as floor space, not door space. Combat Team (Squadron) HQ only got two Sultans, Alpha and Bravo but were used as described above. I only discovered a very few years ago that armour did not at the time get ACVs on the Order of Battle. Theirs was a true Fighting HQ (FHQ) - though the term FHQ was used universally by the RAC even though Recce HQs did not fight. The CO and Squadron Leaders got tanks to fight and command from. I have heard of Saracen and FV432 Ambulances usually being kitted out as ACVs. It's all so long ago. Apologies if I am wrong but this is how I remember it.

May be worth commenting that into the 1980s 15th/19th The King's Royal Hussars' (3 Armd Div Recce Regt in BAOR) rebroadcast and sergeant-majors' rover Ferrets (Mark 1s) were all still using canvas-belted ammunition in the Three-Ohs as opposed to disintegrating link as shown here. Likewise the Mark 2s we had in UNFICYP in 76-77.

Not a lot of people know this. I was watching something on the TV a year or so back. Eamonn Holmes was on. He told how about 1940 his Grandfather was certified on his death certificate as having died of wounds received during the Great War. Istr a gut wound that never ever healed and he just faded away for over 20 years.

Might the problem lie with Flash Player? Both my Windows 7 machine at home and my work machine (RHEL Linux) AND its Win7 virtual machine, all three systems stopped showing Flash graphics a couple of months ago after a Flash update. Another Flash update a week or two back seemed to cure my work machine (but I am now using Chrome instead of Firefox for preference both on Linux and the Windows VM) but it brought the home machine to its knees as Windows went into a loop trying to find a fix for a problem. Eventually managed to kill all Firefox processes and Google was my friend. It seems that there are major issues between Firefox and Adobe over Flash Player for Firefox and a lot of people affected. Investigations found me a set of instructions on how to remove Flash Player then run an install of Flash 10.3, the last stable back-level. HTH ... it might not.

Until CVR(T) and the Clansman bonedome (per your first picture) that plugged into the hybrid Larkspur / Clansman harness to achieve a degree of Clansman function from a Larkspur harness, helmets were not worn. (I'll not say they had never been worn, but AFAIK in previous years any helmet worn, if any, would be the standard issue helmet.) The first issue Clansman bonedome was not popular. There was a velcro-retained strap outside the helmet's ear protection which allowed the user to adjust the pressure of the earpieces on the ears. They did not work: after about ten minutes' wear the user's head felt like it was trapped in a vice and any excuse was found not to wear it. Beret and Larkspur (subsequently Clansman SUH - or HIB if SUH not available) was the preferred headgear in the RAC until the helmet was replaced sometime after I left with another without earpieces that fitted over a headset (see subsequent pictures) coming into service. Besides, until the general adoption of Clansman at the end of the 70s, the bonedome was as common as rocking-horse droppings even within the recce regiments on CVR(T). Any excuse was used to hand in a "broken" bonedome. As a Regimental (later Squadron) Signals NCO, I spent a lot of time soldering the press-to-fit connectors in place to correct reported problems to avoid the bonedome. I never saw helmets worn in NI whilst working vehicle-mounted Larkspur radios. In fact I never wore a helmet in NI except whilst attending my NIRRT course on arrival in theatre.