1/16 Tamiya FO US Firefly with HVSS

Discussie in 'Tanks / Rupsvoertuigen' gestart door karel47, 22 jun 2013.

  1. karel47

    karel47

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    wat geschiedenis over de 81 US Firefly's een gedeelte werd verscheept naar UK verder nooit meer van gehoord

    about the US Firefly conversions :

    A series of three tables listing the US conversions, by production number, then by serial, then by shipping date. Version 1, to be checked and updated.



    What does the new information not reveal:
    If the US conversions were included in the total conversion number of 2139 recorded in British documentation.
    What happened to the 80 issued vehicles post war.
    What if any operational use the vehicles were put to.
    How a unit apparently on the Italian front came to be issued with some.
    Modelling US Fireflies.

    This new information opens up some new possibilities from available kits:

    M4 rolled plate hull. This can be modelled using Tamiya's quite acceptable M4 kit with one of the many available Firefly conversion sets or scratch building.
    M4 Hybrid, including the option of the late high bustle turret. This can be modelled using either a conversion set or the Dragon IC Hybrid kit.
    M4A3 dry ammunition stowage hull. This can be converted from the Tamiya M4 kit with deck details from the M4A3 kit.
    M4A3 wet stowage hull. This can be converted from the Tamiya kit or from one of Italeri's issues. If the late hulls were used, then it seems feasible that late VVS with the upswept return roller bracket can be used. As I typed this up I have just got my Vol. 31, No 15 Dec 2001-Jan 2002. Military Modelling. This has a review of the new Tamiya M4A3 kits. The revised turrets may help with the conversion and the opening loaders hatch is a nice bonus. I hope that the kits have been revised with the thickened turret cheek armour that is essential to a depiction of the late turrets, but if not it will be easy to add. A simple option one way or the other is for the new Castoff Models late high bustle turret to be used, when it comes out in the new year.
    M4A3 wet stowage HVS. This can be made using a Dragon M4A3 HVS model or with a conversion set and a Tamiya or Italeri hull.
    For all of the above the rectangular top deck tool stowage bin developed for the Sherman IC conversion can be used, but the rear plate blanket bin (the greatcoat bin shown in the Tank Museum stowage diagrams?) was not to be used on the US conversions. That said, in the only photo the bins do not appear to have been fitted. In fact I have only seen one or two photos with the greatcoat bin visible. For details see Phil Dyers 2001 article in Military Modelling on the Dragon ICH. The conversion will be a little easier than British ones as the US vehicles do not need the British rear deck fire extinguishers. The small increase in the radio box is not really noticeable, given the tolerances most modellers work to (me included!), but some suggestion can be given by revising the joins of the boxes plates and adding the two handles to the lid (these may have appeared on some British versions). From the single photo some vehicles had the late US commanders cupola for another variation.

    Bandai's kits can also be used as they made a series of Shermans including a late hull M4A3 105mm tank along with 76mm versions, so this should be possible for the dedicated model maker in this scale, especially if Frog/Fuman issue the appropriate kits. The M4A3 US conversions making these kits far more useful as well.
    In the smaller scales Esci's little gem in 72nd/76thish comes into play. This is a nice little kit and its rather nice that it along with the rather similar Tamiya model can be used for a representative Firefly at last. The HVS can come from Matchbox's M40 GMC kit. MMS's great little M4A3 75mm W can also be used (kit number 936). Cromwell's solid M4A3 76MM W HVS can also be used with a high bustle 75mm turret from MMS as another option. Hasegawa's old kit is not very good, but could be used at a pinch, with a new turret.
    In the larger scales the £45.00 21st Century Models M4 in 1/18th (similar, but twice the size of the Tamiya M4) can be converted. If one can do the VVS then a 1/16th scale model is not out of the question from the big and pricey Tamiya kit. The HVS examples make the kit very easy to use, however. Now if only someone would donate one to a good cause!
    This means that much of the book will have to be rewritten in detail, but the above provides the basics of the new information. As time allows I will type up the material along with the appropriate quotes so that readers do not have to take my word for the above statements and this will appear on the web site.
    Summary. This is very significant and Mr Zaloga has done a great service to researchers and modellers for putting this into the public domain. It shows that this old story many thought was done and dusted is in fact still very much alive. I don't think it invalidates my book, but shows, as I suggested that in archives I did not have access to, that there was significant new material out there. The old books of thirty years ago are now shown to have been correct in talking about M4A3 conversions, but for the wrong reasons! One point is what do we call these. I think that Sherman IC, Sherman IHC and Sherman IVC are wrong as this was a British designation system. M4A3C does not sound right, so I intend to stick to the name in the documents of Sherman M4 and M4A3 (17 Pounder) and variations. Now has anyone got the photos!
    The information contained also helps with some of the other mysteries about the Firefly. The fact that M4A2's do not seem to have been desired (not a US standard version, except for the USMC in the Pacific) ties in with the MOS letter to K A Usherwood unearthed by David Fletcher at the Tank Museum in 2001. This letter stated very clearly that 17 Pounder conversions must be on a petrol engined Sherman. The point about the M34A1 gun mount and the Oilgear traverse gear may offer a clue to the vexed issue of M4A1 conversions (the fabled and Unicorn like Sherman IIC, so beloved of model makers and writers from the 1950's onwards). What if the only available 75mm M4A1's (we know that 76mm T23 turret tanks were excluded as the turret layout precluded the installation of the 17 Pounder gun, within the time-scales and industrial capability available in 1944-45) only had electric traverse and or M34 mantlets. The earlier mantlets do not have the holes in them as the M34A1 does, this could be the reason it was required. There must have been some sort of shortage as many Shermans in US and Allied service kept the ealier mantlets and mounts until the end of the war. Showing that it must have been a major upgrade. If so this offers a simple solution to the issue of why none seem to have been converted. Add in the small number of 75m M4A1's given to the British and we have a series of good reasons, plus the interior hull space problems identified by D P Dyer for them not being converted. What also if the M4A2's available were of the wrong type. Perhaps that was a factor. I doubt if we will ever know, but Steve's discovery gladden's my heart and perhaps some where the facts are lurking in a dusty file!
    Below is a conjectural model of a possible US M4A3 HVS Wet stowage 17 Pdr conversion. This model is to about 1/76th using an Esci hull and turret as the base. The HVS comes from Matchbox's M40 GMC. The 17 Pdr and mantlet from Matchbox/Revell's VC Firefly, with details from MMS (MG), US cupola (Hasegawa) and stowage from Skytrex. The base is the Matchbox SdKfz 251 with a wall cast in plaster from a mould made using brick pattern plastic. The idea is to suggest the possible use of US conversions in occupation duties as suggested by the new documents. If this happened I don't know, but it gave an excuse for the little base and the authentic Nazi graffiti. I apologise to anyone offended by the Swastika, but I do not think it is appropriate to let political correctness get in the way of historical accuracy. The abomination to humanity that was Nazi Germany will not be prevented from occurring again by trying to hide its symbols and images. T66 track is more likely for this period, but I did not have any around in this scale. Note the .50 HMG stowage brackets on the radio box, a sure way of identifying a US conversion if any should by some miracle survive into 2002. Keep looking everyone!

    This first list is ordered by what I presume is the production order, which as you can see does not entirely match the order in which the tanks were shipped to France from Southampton. One should also add M4 Hybrid 30100371 that is visible in the photo, that may have been taken at Hayes. But this tank does not seem to have been sent and was it seems one of those to be given to the British, if the information in these documents is accurate.


    bekijk deze list is

    Build Number

    hieruit blijkt dat op laatst van de oorlog toch M4A3's met HVVS ophanging werden geconverteerd tot Fireflys ... met de T84 tracks, bijna dubbel zo breed als de gewone shermans ... hebben nooit front gezien maar net als de Panther II zouden ze geduchte tegenstanders geweest zijn voor de terugtrekkende duitse legergroepen
     
  2. karel47

    karel47

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    Background

    The US Army considered a British offer to convert some Shermans to the 17 pdr. "Firefly" in the summer and autumn of 1944, but gave up the project for a variety of reasons.

    Following the Battle of the Bulge and the continuing complaints of the poor anti-tank performance of the 75mm gun, the plan was revived. A total of 80 M4 and M4A3 tanks were converted in the UK and shipped to the ETO in April-May 1945, with 40 each allotted to US First and Ninth Armies.

    Although there is a substantial amount of documentation on the conversion program, no photos of these tanks are known to exist. There was one photo on the cover of AFV News many years ago of a tank yard in England with a few converted M4 with composite hulls, but these were part of a batch of about 20 that were still in the pipeline when the US cancellation order was issued and they were turned over to the British Army even though built to US specs.

    There is no information if any of these Fireflies were issued to US units in the ETO after arrival from the UK.


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    op deze afbeelding staan zelfs de late T81 Tracks sherman tracks afgebeeld ... dus meer dan genoeg info voor een 1/16 US Firefly

    aldus missing links
     
  3. karel47

    karel47

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    de T84 tracks houden zich goed op het terrein ... hier paar fotos in de ninoofse bossen ...

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    tot de volgende ...
     
  4. karel47

    karel47

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    nog wat foto's van de vorderingen van de US firefly, alle gaten werden eruit gecut met modelbouwmesje, met wat geduld verlies je zo het minste materiaal

    de hatches en de commendants luik wisten jullie al ...
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    vandaag ook de optionele pantserplaat van de koepel verwijderd ... de US Firefly had er geen op de koepel
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    vandaag het motorluik uitgecut en de boegmitrailleur afgescherm, ook de US Firefly heeft géén 0.30 in de boeg wel in de calliotte
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    na alles weggevijld te hebben kon de pantserbobbel over het gat van de boegmitrailleur
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  5. karel47

    karel47

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    er moest véél aangepast worden maar dat is de fun he, bij de tamiya kits zit alles erin ... je verbeelding is de limit ... deze staat al 6 maand te wachten, de torro VVSS bogey's zagen er goed uit maar werken niet scale ... daar een tamiya goed gemoteriseerd is zouden ze tevlug sneuvelen of vastlopen ... gelukkig dook de amerikaanse firefly op, kende al lang van zn bestaan af maar zijn zo goed als géén foto's van ... dat heb je met studies he weinig documentatie ... toch komt hij goed ... word geduchte kattenjager lol lol lol lol lol lol lol lol lol :shock: :roll: :raar:
     
  6. Tiger I

    Tiger I

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    mooi project Karel en veel foto's en achtergrond info veel succes :)
     
  7. mikeman

    mikeman

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    Hoi Karel, zoals je ziet wordt je project fire fly nog steeds gelezen. Ben je nog actief op dit forum en zou je mij wat info kunnen geven over de lengte van de loop?
    in 2013 was de loop al moeilijk te koop...nu in 2022 nog lastiger. Betaald en besteld maar waarschijnlijk moet ik er toch zelf 1 gaan maken.
     
  8. johannesw

    johannesw

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    Klik op zijn profielfoto en je ziet dat hij in 2020 hier voor het laatst is geweest.
     
  9. mikeman

    mikeman

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    ok helder. Kan iemand anders mij helpen aan de juiste lengte vd loop van een Fire Fly??
     
  10. sesjo

    sesjo

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    Karel, waar heb jij die mato VVVS boogies gekocht?
     

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