# tanks that i found in southsea / portsmouth



## historyman09 (Oct 20, 2010)

i found these two tanks and anti air craft gun in portsmouth / southsea the other day when i was out and about with my girlfriend i hope you like them

and a bonus picture of a statue that was of a soldier from the war!

on with the pictures







Anti Aircraft Gun











and the bonus statue






thanks for looking

p.s could anyone tell me what type of tanks these are please thankyou


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## night crawler (Oct 20, 2010)

Good to see some permanat display well kept , The second tank is a Sherman but the first looks like a Churchill, no doubt some one will put me right.


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## historyman09 (Oct 20, 2010)

thankyou for the quick reply there


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## hydealfred (Oct 20, 2010)

night crawler said:


> Good to see some permanat display well kept , The second tank is a Sherman but the first looks like a Churchill, no doubt some one will put me right.



You are correct on the tanks NC. Oddly "some" Shermans were powered by a radial aircraft engine. The anti aircraft gun is of 3.7 inch which was as good as the German 88mm.

Unfortunately Shermans were no match for the German Tiger - it is worth reading the exploits of a German tank commander called Michael Wittman -

[ame]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Wittmann[/ame]


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## El Supremo (Oct 21, 2010)

hydealfred said:


> - it is worth reading the exploits of a German tank commander called Michael Wittman -
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Wittmann



Whilst i disagree with the mans politics, there is no doubt he was an outstanding soldier. How brave were our lads going out in "Ronsons" to face them.


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## night crawler (Oct 21, 2010)

hydealfred said:


> You are correct on the tanks NC. Oddly Shermans were powered by a radial aircraft engine. The anti aircraft gun is of 3.7 inch which was as good as the German 88mm.
> 
> Unfortunately Shermans were no match for the German Tiger - it is worth reading the exploits of a German tank commander called Michael Wittman -
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Wittmann



My son and I watched some program about rebuilding tanks and one of them was a sherman, the engine did look small in comparrison and reasonbly easy to change though I think the Tiger was the easy one, whole lot came out as one unit.


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## penance (Oct 21, 2010)

Is indeed a 3.7" HAA gun, not quite as good as the 88mm tho.
When used on super charge with solid AP rounds the trunion mounts started to suffer excess wear due to their position being more or less under the breach.
The 88 had trunions further along the barrel and that help distribute the forces more, it was used in the AT role to great effect.


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## Caveman (Oct 27, 2010)

I'm pretty sure that the picture of the Churchill tank is in fact a variant called a Crocodile, which towed an armoured trailer full of fuel that would be projected from the front hull position that replaced the Besa machine gun. I found this on PB of the same vehicle...









The reason I mention this is because of the attachment on the rear.

I actually visited this museum when on honeymoon 26 years ago when the D-Day museum had not long been opened. The Sherman was at that time indoors. The Pickett-Hamilton fort was there back then as well (see elsewhere on this forum).


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## penance (Oct 27, 2010)

Caveman is spot on, same tank here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/117485472


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## Mad Larkin (Oct 27, 2010)

dam those germans and their sneaky weaponry... using medusa on a battlefield is hardly fair


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## Ramblin Jack (Nov 2, 2010)

*Tanks for the memory.................*

The American tank (with '30' on front) is a Sherman; not sure about the other but think it might be a British Churchill tank.


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## Caveman (Nov 16, 2010)

This was from when the Sherman (M4A1 on a M3 chassis I think) was located inside of the D-Day museum back in 1984.


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## Caveman (Nov 17, 2010)

After a bit of searching I have managed to find a picture of the armoured trailer that would have been hitched up behind a Crocodile/Churchill tank

http://www.tankmuseum.org/ixbin/ind...XHITS_=1&_IXACTION_=summary&_IXMENU_=Vehicles


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## penance (Nov 18, 2010)

The Sherman is Canadian and not American, it has a maple leaf symbol.

The star is the allied star and not the american star which has a circle around it.


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## Dirus_Strictus (Nov 18, 2010)

It is certainly wrong to infer that all Marks of the M4 (Sherman) tank were powered by radial engines - The initial production M4 was certainly powered by the Continental R975 Radial petrol engine, as were the following two Mks, M4 Composite and M4A1. The M4A2 was powered by two GM 6046 straight six ,7 litre diesel engines. The M4 A3 was powered by a single Ford GAA V8 petrol engine, whilst the M4A4 was powered by what is probably the most complicated tank engine ever produced, the Chrysler A57 Multibank engine. The A57 petrol engine was a 30 cylinder 'radial' engine that was designed to used existing tooling as an aid to fast production. Basically five straight six automobile engines were arranged 'radially' around a large cast box that held a short output shaft at one end - all the five engines being geared to this output shaft. The final production variant of the M4, the A6, was powered by the Catapillar D200A radial diesel.

Reading the various reports and supply logs available the choice of who was issued with and where the diesel variants were used, seems to be down to ease of supply and availability of diesel in that Theatre.


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## hydealfred (Nov 20, 2010)

Dirus_Strictus said:


> It is certainly wrong to infer that all Marks of the M4 (Sherman) tank were powered by radial engines - The initial production M4 was certainly powered by the Continental R975 Radial petrol engine, as were the following two Mks, M4 Composite and M4A1. The M4A2 was powered by two GM 6046 straight six ,7 litre diesel engines. The M4 A3 was powered by a single Ford GAA V8 petrol engine, whilst the M4A4 was powered by what is probably the most complicated tank engine ever produced, the Chrysler A57 Multibank engine. The A57 petrol engine was a 30 cylinder 'radial' engine that was designed to used existing tooling as an aid to fast production. Basically five straight six automobile engines were arranged 'radially' around a large cast box that held a short output shaft at one end - all the five engines being geared to this output shaft. The final production variant of the M4, the A6, was powered by the Catapillar D200A radial diesel.
> 
> Reading the various reports and supply logs available the choice of who was issued with and where the diesel variants were used, seems to be down to ease of supply and availability of diesel in that Theatre.



OK I will amend my post to say "some Shermans" were powered by radial engines.


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