So, where am I?  

Oh, here I am!







The vent on the engine deck that I have filled in should be at the front but it was easier to spin it around to use liquid cement to glue the angle piece to the styrene than to use CA to glue it to the putty.

As you can see, I'm doing the tortoise thing, rather than the hare.

So, onwards & upwards! Back at it!

Coming along well. 

Sounds like the Grants might be some the British used in Burma? Is that possible?
Or did they add the mesh to the Aussie-based ones to stop the local wildlife from prying them open? 

The Grants were, initially, kept in Australia to defend against invasion.

Once the threat of invasion went away they were kept on as training vehicles, because the Matildas suited the role better for the type of jungle fighting we were engaged in (didn't need to be fast but had to be capable of going into all sorts of terrain, able to kill most Japanese tanks & bunkers without too much trouble, & almost immune to Japanese AT artillery).

Any mod's done to them were probably done in anticipation of the potential Japanese invasion, & from lessons learned in the jungle.

As the Armoured Corps shrank the Grants were mostly put into storage, until being sold off after the war.

OK, that makes more sense than being ex-Burma theatre ones.
And Lessons Learnt from that theatre, as you said.

And the Matildas having the same sort of abilities they initially had in the Desert - makes sense, now you mention it.

Yep the Brits did use the Grant in combat against the Japanese...The British M3 tanks performed well as they traversed the steep hillsides around Imphal and defeated the assaulting Japanese forces. Officially declared obsolete in April 1944, nevertheless, the Lee/Grant saw action until the end of the war in September 1945.
Wiki info .
The US used it right till the end of the war with the Japanese ..the Marines used it for a bit but dumped em for M3 Stuarts and later Sherman's.
If I remember right this was one of the few Allied tanks used from the start right till the end of the war ..like the Matildas.

Oh by the way ...lovely work so far Guy 😆 🤣 

Quote from: Wardukw on October 02, 2024, 09:46:51 PMYep the Brits did use the Grant in combat against the Japanese...The British M3 tanks performed well as they traversed the steep hillsides around Imphal and defeated the assaulting
Japanese forces. Officially declared obsolete in April 1944, nevertheless, the Lee/Grant saw action until the end of the war in September 1945.

My Uncle Ian was a Major in the 3rd Carabiniers at Imphal in WWII and was OIC of a detachment of Lees there.

Apparently they wrecked the opposition................. 

Quote from: PR19_Kit on October 02, 2024, 10:37:54 PM

Quote from: Wardukw on October 02, 2024, 09:46:51 PMYep the Brits did use the Grant in combat against the Japanese...The British M3 tanks performed well as they traversed the steep hillsides around Imphal and defeated the assaulting
Japanese forces. Officially declared obsolete in April 1944, nevertheless, the Lee/Grant saw action until the end of the war in September 1945.

My Uncle Ian was a Major in the 3rd Carabiniers at Imphal in WWII and was OIC of a detachment of Lees there.

Apparently they wrecked the opposition................. 

Oh I'm not surprised Kit about that at all..that 75mm gun firing HE would ruin anybodies day if their on the receiving end 😁

Guy the rustoration was great mate 😃
His knowledge going thru the junk pile was eye opening..a twisted chunk of steel or a random piece of cast steel he knew exactly what it was..epic mate ..loved that series 👌

Thanks, Phill! Still plugging away!  

Quote from: PR19_Kit on October 02, 2024, 10:37:54 PM

Quote from: Wardukw on October 02, 2024, 09:46:51 PMYep the Brits did use the Grant in combat against the Japanese...The British M3 tanks performed well as they traversed the steep hillsides around Imphal and defeated the assaulting
Japanese forces. Officially declared obsolete in April 1944, nevertheless, the Lee/Grant saw action until the end of the war in September 1945.

My Uncle Ian was a Major in the 3rd Carabiniers at Imphal in WWII and was OIC of a detachment of Lees there.

Apparently they wrecked the opposition................. 

When you look at what the Japanese had as front-line tanks, Kit, it's not that surprising;

Type 89 I-gō/Yi-Go/Chi-Ro medium tank


Type 95 Ha-Go light tank


Type 97 ShinHoTo Chi-Ha medium tank


There were other tanks that they tried to develop from 1942 which could well have been problematic but shortages of materiel & damage to their manufacturing infrastructure meant that none left the Home Islands & most barely got past the  prototype stage;

Type 98A Ke-Ni light tank


Type 1 Chi-He medium tank


Type 3 Chi-Nu medium tank


Type 4 Chi-To medium tank


Type 5 Chi-Ri medium tank (one incomplete prototype)

In one battle US Marines were attacked with Ha-Ho light tanks and those guys were destroying the Ha-Go's with .50 cal machine guns..so that gives ya dome ideas about how weak those were.
I think it was a air field the Marines were protecting 🤔

Hm, yes, those Japanese tanks don't look in the same league as an M3, do they? And the Lee had TWO big guns as well!

Quote from: PR19_Kit on October 03, 2024, 03:21:36 AMHm, yes, those Japanese tanks don't look in the same league as an M3, do they? And the Lee had TWO big guns as well!

Well, the M3 Grant had one big low-velocity gun (75mm) & one small high-velocity gun (37mm) but both were quite capable of knocking out most in-service Japanese tanks.

The 75mm was for taking out bunkers..artillery with its HE rds where as the 37mm was thr anti tank gun .
Still not getting the ideas that a high velocity large calibre gun was the way to really kill a tank or field gun and bunkers and so on ...but they got there in the end ..so to speck.

To be fair, if the opposition didn't have anything but small arms, even the weakest tank in the inventory would roll right over them.

That said, fanaticism and banzai charges won't do you much good if the opposition has something decent to counter you with.

Still, some of their guns were capable of taking out Allied tanks - I have the Concord Sherman at War which shows a burnt out Sherman that was apparently hit with a Japanese high velocity 47mm round.

Quote from: Rick Lowe on October 04, 2024, 01:08:46 AMTo be fair, if the opposition didn't have anything but small arms, even the weakest tank in the inventory would roll right over them.

That said, fanaticism and banzai charges won't do you much good if the opposition has something decent to counter you with.

Still, some of their guns were capable of taking out Allied tanks - I have the Concord Sherman at War which shows a burnt out Sherman that was apparently hit with a Japanese high velocity 47mm round.

That's the thing tho Rick..in that assault the Japanese forces tried against the Marines the most powerful weapons at the time they had were 50cals..they hadn't gotten any larges guns to play with yet they still wiped the Japanese out ...many banziai charges the Japanese tried resulted in them being damn near annihilated .
In at least 75% of the time the Marines had nothing more than rifles and machine guns .

There was doubting tho that the type 1 47mm anti tank gun was a legit piece of kit ..the US feared that gun for sure.
That's partly why you saw all the thick wooden llanks being used as armour..and any else they could lay their hands on of course 😉 😄