William Marshall Posted March 30, 2017 Share Posted March 30, 2017 Guys I have but a single photo of this beast, does anyone have more detail, pictures or perhaps a drawing? Regards William Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kingsman Posted March 30, 2017 Share Posted March 30, 2017 I guess this is the one you have? Bovington archives might have something. Being artillery, the Rotunda museum at Woolwich might have something. It might even have been built at Woolwich. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kingsman Posted March 30, 2017 Share Posted March 30, 2017 The missing photo. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seahawk Posted March 31, 2017 Share Posted March 31, 2017 It is difficult to see the point of this installation: no ammunition supply, no working platform, let alone protection for gun crew. Maybe New Vanguard 14 gets it right (p.41-2): "The exact circumstances of the conversion are not known but it was probably no more than a test rig, built in connection with the FV300 programme. The gun was mounted in an open well at the front, facing back over the engine deck. The nose of the tank now became effectively the firing platform while the driver was moved back to a position on the offside, right up against the engine bulkhead. His view to the front was almost totally obscured by the gun itself. No doubt to protect them from blast damage, the air cleaners were relocated almost amidships on each trackguard." Just one photo, as per Das Abteilung's, albeit halfpage and nice and clear. HTH Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rio Posted March 31, 2017 Share Posted March 31, 2017 Might be worth a conversion. Have a 5.5 missing its wheels. And have a crusader lying around. Rio 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mig Eater Posted April 25, 2017 Share Posted April 25, 2017 Here is a diagram from a French magazine. You can also view a 3D model from the game World of Tanks here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kingsman Posted April 26, 2017 Share Posted April 26, 2017 At the risk of diverting this thread, the bottom right drawing is actually a front view of the Argentine 105mm post-war conversion with the old Schneider gun: obsolete meets obsolete ....... It's definitely not the 5.5" prototype. There was also a 75mm version with a Bofors M1935 gun. Obsolete meets even more obsolete...... And then there was the MBRL version ....... So proof that the Crusader could really be useful after all, obsolete ordnance notwithstanding! One might have thought that a Crusader 25 pdr SPG would have been a useful thing to have, noting the range and barn door limitations of the Bishop, but I suppose we had access to enough Priest and later Sexton and Crusader's reliability reputation was shot away. I bet you didn't know that the Aussies made a post-war Sexton copy converted from M3 Lees? The Yeramba. But that IS an entirely new thread..... What is perhaps most surprising is the Argentine retention of the notoriously unreliable Liberty engine. Although Greece had that engine post-war too in their Centaurs and apparently got on well with it. One might assume that, if the Liberty and Meteor could be made interchangeable in the A27L/M Centaur/Cromwell, it might be possible to shoehorn a Meteor into a Crusader. And revise the national speed limit accordingly! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seahawk Posted April 26, 2017 Share Posted April 26, 2017 Look forward to seeing the photos upon which those drawings are based. Until then I suspect them of being a little "creative" eg the working platform, the crane and the additional side plates. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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