M4A1(76mm)W

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As you see fellow builders, almost half isn't even gonna get used!!




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What's with this annoying number on top of the turret, was it found on the real thing?
A real stupid place if not!













Btw Terry, a 1/32 Wildcat is on its way to you, with FoX decals and all, enjoy!
 
Read a story by a guy who was crewing an m4A1 sometime before December of 1944. Said he got a Panther broadside at about 1000yds, hit it a couple of time and damaged it. But he couldn't kill it, rounds would not penetrate. Then an M36 pulled up next to him with the 90MM gun and blew it away.

76MM was better than the 75MM for AP (not so much for HE) but it wasn't a be all and end all of the Sherman series. Still somewhat undergunned.
 
Cheers mate! Thinking of getting the AFV M36 later on, and maybe 'Easy Eight'...

....and being me, I need to try and find some '13's for these!
 
If I remember right, some of the 76mm armed Shermans were issued to the UK forces in Italy as they didn't get any 17pd Shermans and needed some extra support
 
Glider said:
If I remember right, some of the 76mm armed Shermans were issued to the UK forces in Italy as they didn't get any 17pd Shermans and needed some extra support
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Read that too. A whole class of 76MM Shermans went specifically to Italy. None served anywhere else. But I can't remember what the model number of the M4 was.

Have a book on the Sherman, great honkin' thing, that covers the M4 from developement to Korea and Israel. Glance through it from time to time. One of the rather neat things they did, which seems like a winner but they didn't carry it through, was to put the Turret of an M36 on the Sherman. Seems a like a brilliant adaptation. Again, memory fails me on why they didn't make it standard.
 
timshatz said:
Yeah, that sounds about right. There was an M36, and then a few subvariants. it was one of them. Good idea, wonder why it didn't catch on.
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It wouldn't have gone down well in the UK. Items such as the M10 and M36 were treated as anti tank weapons but Shermans with armoured tops as tanks.
As they were anti tank weapons M10's went to the Royal Artillery as would the M36's and not to the Royal Tank Corps, stupid or what, but true.
 
M36B1
90 mm gun turret on Medium Tank M4A3 hull and chassis. (187 produced/converted).
M36B2
90 mm gun turret on 3" GMC M10 hull (M4A2 chassis, diesel). (287 produced/converted
 

No offense to the Brits, and while they weren't the only Army doing stupid things, but they had a couple of head scratchers that still bug me. The 3.7" AA gun in Egypt was one of them. While British tanks are being chewed up by German 88s in the desert 200 miles west of them, these guns are stuck in the AA role because that was what the doctrine said they should do.

Can only wonder what they'd done if they were allowed to be used against the Africa Corp in a ground role like the Germans did with their 88s. True, the crews weren't trained for it and there probably wasn't a supply of AP rounds, but that could've been rectified fairly easily.

When you look at the damage that a mere 40 of the German 88s wreaked on British Armor at El Alamien, it can only make you wonder who was in charge back in Cairo.
 
Lucky13 said:
M36B1
90 mm gun turret on Medium Tank M4A3 hull and chassis. (187 produced/converted).
M36B2
90 mm gun turret on 3" GMC M10 hull (M4A2 chassis, diesel). (287 produced/converted
Click to expand...

That's it. Read stories about the gun on the M36 taking the turret clean off a Panther. Probably a lucky shot, but that was one serious gun.
 
Lucky13 said:

Just what is this number??
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D82081 is the Ordnance Department part number for the turret casting.
The H in a C is the foundry mark of who cast the turret, in this case the Continental Foundry and Machine Co.
The LO is thought to indicate the casting has been heat treated, and the rest should relate to the serial number of the casting itself.

All the best,
PB
 
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I thought at first that the number moulded on the turret top was supposed to be the casting from the factory, where the 'real' tank was built. But, apart from it being rather large, it also has a 'D' at the beginning (for Dragon?) and the 'R' registration mark, so I think it's a model reference! Stupid place to put it if it is!
Check the 'D' number against any similar reference on the box, and / or the printing data on the instruction sheet. The latter will probably be at the bottom of the last page, in small type.
 
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