question Jeep smoke generators

[gazzaw]

Hi

 

Does any knowledgeable chap have infomation about smoke generators fitted to British used Willys/Ford GPW jeeps? There is mention about them being fitted to his jeep and used in Italy by Vladimir "Popski" Peniakoff in his book Private Army.

 

Mainly looking for any articles, drawings, photos etc of this and how they worked etc. Presumably may have been a tube feeding Diesel/oil into exhaust system to generate smoke but not sure what it looked like.

 

Didn't want to post this in either the American or British Vehicles sections as it was a US in UK etc, lol

 

Thanks in advance

 

Gary

[Adrian Barrell]

British tanks were fitted with smoke generators. These used the standard No 8 generator converted to electric firing. Two were fitted in each box and fired by the driver. They were intended to lay a local screen to hind behind or retreat through and were fitted to the rear of the tank though I have seen pictures of them fitted to the front but this was not official.

 

The same No 8 generator, as a Mk III or IV was fired from the 4" bomb thrower fitted to tank turrets, these pre-dated the 2" bomb thrower. This allowed laying smoke away from the vehicle.

 

It is quite possible that Popski had some tank generators fitted to his jeep, they probably were not voltage sensitive and 6V would likely set them off.

 

I have examples of the boxes and have made some repro generators for my Sherman. I can post pics tomorrow.

[gazzaw]

Thanks for that, sounds more plausible but what size/weight were they and would they fit into rear of jeep that was pretty full of kit/ammo etc as well?

 

Gary

[Adrian Barrell]

Gary, no problem with fitting them to a jeep, they are quite compact. As you can see, the bottom drops to allow fitting/replacing the generators. The original No8 Mk V had wires that connected to the terminals on top.

[gazzaw]

Thanks Adrian

 

getting a better picture now - the only ones I had seen before were the diesel ones direct into exhaust system. The pots look similar to ones we used in 70s where they had to be lit with a portfire slow burning match/wand or else sitting an elect detonator on top of the ignition hole.

 

My curiosity is now fanned and am going to trawl internet and army museum to see if anything on the ones used by Popski (apparently they were experimental then so poss similar to yours) next thing is making up a jeep in that configuration and testing it lol.

 

Regards

 

Gary