Amusing Hobby 1/35 FV4005

[junco]

At last a real Cold War beast!

And it still survives.

 

Neil

[Kingsman]

Something British from Amusing that actually existed, Conqueror 1 notwithstanding.  Who would have thought it?  I had no idea it originally had a recoil spade.  I like the Phase 1 with the autoloader.  '7.2 inch, 6 rounds rapid.........fire!'

 

Now they've tooled a Centurion hull I wondered if we might see a Conway too.  But, assuming they got it right, FV4005 was on a 'long' hull with the extended lower rear while Conway was on a short-hull Mk3.  However, a long hull opens up later Centurion Marks not currently kitted in plastic. A flat-mantlet Mk8 or 13 would be nice.

[Troy Smith]

2 hours ago, junco said:

And it still survives.

 

I had too look this thing up...

Quote

The FV4005 Stage II is the only one of these 183mm armed vehicles to survive to this day. The turret is original, but it was mounted on a spare Mk.VIII Centurion hull, not the original it was trialed with. It is missing the recoil spade and travel lock. This “Cut-and-Shunt” representation of the vehicle now sits as a “gate-guardian” at The Tank Museum, Bovington

 

never heard of this before (cold war armour is not my thing)  but bonkers....

Quote

Britain’s Biggest Boom-Stick, the 183mm L4

In 1950, work started on the Ordnance Quick Firing 183 mm (7.2 in) L4 gun. At the time, it was the largest and most powerful tank gun in the world. The cannon was based on the 183 mm (7.2 in) BL 7.2 inch howitzer, a WWI era weapon. The gun itself weighed a mighty 4 tons and when fired it produced the equivalent of 87 tons of recoil force.
The L4 was designed to be chambered for only one type of ammunition, HESH (High Explosive Squashed Head). It was separately loading ammunition. The projectile was loaded first followed by the correct propulsion cartridge. Each shell weighed a combined total of 104.8 kg (231 lbs). A shell of this size understandably produced a substantial amount of fumes and smoke inside of the fighting compartment. As such, a large fume extractor was added to the barrel, a relatively new feature at the time.
The 183 mm was tested in live fire trials against a Centurion and a Conqueror. In 2 shots, the 183 blew the turret clean off the Centurion and split the mantlet of the Conqueror in half. In total, the gun fired 150 shells.

 

from here

https://tanks-encyclopedia.com/coldwar/UK/fv4005-stage-i-ii

 

Glad to see British oddities getting done,  still there really can't be anything left Nazi to kit now ? 

[Bullbasket]

14 hours ago, Troy Smith said:

still there really can't be anything left Nazi to kit now ? 

Don't you believe it. I bet someone somewhere has got some "paper Panzers" ready to go. Just what we need.......NOT!!

As an aside, seeing as my knowledge of Centurions is limited, what marks had the short hull, and which had the long hull? Were any of the short hulls rebuilt into later marks, and retained the short hull?

 

John.

[Kingsman]

The long lower hull with the additional fuel tank came in on the Mk7. Earlier ones, 3s and 5s, could not be rebuilt.

 

The main production marks were 3, 5, 7 and 8. Mks 6 and 9 - 13 were upgrades or rebuilds of those. There was no 4. The Mk8 introduced the flat fronted Metalastic mantlet.

 

I didn't realise that the surviving 4005 was a cut and shut.  So my previous comment seems irrelevant. It seems that it should be kitted on a short hull, which puts us right back into the same territory as the AFV Club kits. But that's assuming that Amusing haven't goofed and just copied the survivor. Ace did that with their 1/72 kit, even down to leaving off the now-missing fume extractor.

[Matt black 1971]

If anyone is interested,a guy called Joe Hewes is restoring this in partnership with Bovington to operating standard .

Check out YouTube channel Mr Hewes

[rickshaw]

On 3/8/2020 at 9:21 AM, Kingsman said:

The long lower hull with the additional fuel tank came in on the Mk7. Earlier ones, 3s and 5s, could not be rebuilt.

 

Australia and Israel and South Africa would all disagree with that comment.

[Kingsman]

Rebuilt with new engines yes.  Something the UK never did.  Australia did not rebuild the rear lower hull on its Mk5s nor install a new engine, but did add an external armoured fuel tank to the rear upper hull.  As the British tried and did not adopt for service, preferring the Monotrailer solution - as did the Netherlands.  You can add Sweden to the new engine list too.

 

However it would have been more correct to say that they were not rebuilt.  It would not have been beyond our engineering capability to modify Mks 3/5/6/11 with the Mk7's longer rear hull and additional fuel tank.  But despite all the other upgrades of armament, armour, IR, RMG etc this was not considered either necessary or viable.

[Tahir]

Hm, I build this one. Amusing Hobby /AFV Club kitbash

The original turret was a left over, ready fur scraping, but SPUD, an employe, at Bovington, decided to let it rest in the children Play Ground at Bovington Tank Museum. Later it was lifted up on a Mk 13 Hull, and placed as a Gate Guard.

Mr Hewes and WOT? found a Centurion hull, used as a testbed for different Tankguns, and wanted to rebuild it to a FV4005. So they contacted Bovington, and this ended in a restoration project. Bovington Tank Museum restoring the turret and Mr Hewes restoring the Hull. I meet them on Tankfest 2024. Great Chaps

 

 

[Kingsman]

Yes, The one and only (and utterly ridiculous!) FV4005 Phase 2 lives and breathes again.  It returned to Hewes after Tankfest for more work on the turret.  If you saw it at Tankfest for real or on line you will have noted that the gun was firmly in the travel lock.  Hopefully the turret traverse and gun elevation will become operable, but that needed more work.

 

Like many experimental oddballs, its survival happened more by accident than by any kind of plan.  The original hull was re-used for something else and the turret put to one side.  Later re-mounted on a different later Mark hull without the recoil spade.  When MVEE/FVRDE at Chertsey was still operating (closed down in 1995) many things like that were given to the Museum, which was then still under Army control.  Others, unfortunately, were scrapped or expended as range targets.

 

I would have liked to see the surviving Chieftain Mk4 hull recovered from the Kirkudbright test range, where it had been converted into a mobile crane, and re-fitted with a turret.  The Mk4 was the variant designed for Israel and then cancelled.  Only 2 were built.

[Tahir]

Beside the chieftain Mk4 in Kirkudbright, was a Centurion fitted with a crane too. I have done a little research, maybe I try building it once I run out of other Centruion Projects

[Kingsman]

I believe the Chieftain version was intended to replace the Centurion, but they may have worked together for a while.  Kirkcudbright closed as a test range some years ago: it was an outstation of Chertsey. Most testing there ended in 1999 with the closure of the UK-US railgun project after about 6,000 rounds had been test-fired.  However, the range was again used for testing in 2008.

 

The range is still in use as a general miltary firing range, now renamed the Dundrennan Range within the Kirkcudbright Training Area.  But I imagine that any need for the Chieftain crane probably also ended in 1999 as there would have been no further need to handle such things as target witness armour slabs etc.  So I imagine it was scrapped.  The principal use of the tank cranes, rather than unprotected cranes, was to work in the impact areas where there may have been UXO and the terrain was rough.