Backstage visit to Ft Benning Tank Collection

More WWI.

Sponson slid in transport position.

 

Heading outside.

Some halftracks including a 75mm GMC M3, a West German armored car from Aberdeen and some Soviet vehicles from Iraq that used to be in front of the old Infantry Museum and a StuG IV all by itself

 

Another of the StuG IV and a Stuart

 

I went to the Infantry Museum this past May while I was attending my niece's graduation from parachute training. Unfortunately I was only able to spend a couple of hours there before everyone wanted to leave, so another trip is in the works. Hopefully the Armor Museum will be up and running by then. If so, that nice new hotel right outside the gates will come in handy.

Maybe we can organize a WW2F convention there.

 

Some Stuart hulks. To me it looked like what might be found in present day Guadalcanal or Corregidor Except for the pine trees, of course.

One had an inline six cylinder water cooled diesel with a turbocharger. It wasn't a GMC 6-70 with a supercharger. I wonder what the story was there.

 

Great idea. I'll be there

 

T4 Medium Tank from 1936.
Photo of it here.
http://dummidumbwit.wordpress.com/2010/02/13/t4-medium-tank-t3-light-tank-christie-suspension/

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Convertible_Medium_Tank_T4.png


http://mailer.fsu.edu/~akirk/tanks/UnitedStates/mediumtanks/MediumTanks.html

 

I'd say that was the 'Liberty Tank' or Tank Mark VIII.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tank_Mark_VIII

 

Looks like they're cracking on with the old lights/rarities:
WW2F - Light tank or Combat Car? What is this vehicle? (M2 snapped by [member='Walter_Sobchak'])

 

Good job. Thanks

 

A new structure they just completed in Aug. Mostly Shermans and Jumbo Shermans on the left, More StuGs and British vehicles on the right

 

Brake cooling fins on some variety of M2 Medium, some more Shermans and two shots of the extra armor on a jumbo

 

Pershing, Lee, Firefly Churchill and a Staghound

 

That's a Grant not a Lee, turret bigger.
There's a Comet next to the Churchill.

Churchill has markings that show it a vehicle from 4th Bn Coldstream Guards , 6th Guards Tank Brigade.
see Gerry Chester's website here.
http://northirishhorse.net/articles-2/Units/6thGuardsTB.html

did it have a name on the side?
list here.
http://northirishhorse.net/articles-2/Units/ColdstreamGuards.html

 

StuG III and a M1906 4.7. There has been one of these in the park of my hometown since 1947. This is the only other example I've seen. I think that is a Chinese Type 66 to the right of it

 

Very cool GMC ordnance van. Needs a lot of work, of course. And towed German AT section

 

I do hope all markings etc. are carefully logged before tarting up. (Grandma sucking eggs, I know, sure they are.)
Lot of Aberdeen vehicles were dumped straight into place - I've some shots from the 50s-70s which look like it was one of the best surviving records of German armour schemes.

 

The Unicorn/White Whale of US Armor

The T28. It weights 90 tons when assembled and Frank told me they couldn't transport it at that weight from Ft Knox so they took the outer set of tracks off. They made a traveling jig for the tracks that holds them face to face. In other words, the outside edges, when they are jigged together, are the sides that mate to the tank

 

More T28