M41 Walker Bulldog, M42 Duster, and everything else based on them

[dy031101]

In the 1970s, the Republic of China Army (ROCA) was looking at ways to boost the number of tanks available.  They had M18 tank destroyers, whose chassis were worn out, and M42 Dusters anti-aircraft tanks, so they combined the turrets of the former and surplus hulls of the latter into the Type 64 (denoting a vehicle created in the 64th year of the ROC calendar, which is 1975) light tanks.

I have no record of how many were produced; here is a scan of its picture.  But it shows how a combat vehicle can be improvised.  Like a what-if vehicle with a Cockerill turret......

[General Zod]

That's a neat looking vehicle The tracks are on backwards The rubber portion is supposed to look like a V 

[dy031101]

The tracks are on backwards The rubber portion is supposed to look like a V

Might be just an honest mistake on the part of the preserving organization. 

Upon closer examination I see that the fenders are from the M41 as well.  Interesting 1/1 scale kit bash.

I didn't even notice that- very observant! 

I suppose that it wasn't hard to locally fabricate just the fenders?

[Henry Yeh]

Interesting enough, even though ROCA have enough Patton to spare, they still chose to retain M41 for cavalry units.

[Jeffry Fontaine]

How about an M41 armed with the British designed 17pounder weapon instead of the American 76mm weapon which would give it that signature muzzle brake.  Replace the turret mounted .50" Browning HMG with a smaller .30" Browning or 7.62 NATO GPMG and add a few other UK peculiar pieces of kit to the sides of the turret and fenders and call it a day.  

[dy031101]

A M18 was experimentally fitted with a 90mm gun turret from M36 Jackson......

Would a M42 hull be able to take the M36 turret, too, and handle the blast of the 90mm gun (something that the Hellcat cannot)?

EDIT: JED Database points out that the turret is indeed from M36 Jackson- and I have no reason to doubt that statement.

[dy031101]

This page has some more pictures of the Type 64 tanks.

http://army.chlin.com/BBS/viewthread.php?tid=43&extra=&page=3

[General Zod]

A M18 was experimentally fitted with a 90mm gun turret from M36 Jackson......

Would a M42 hull be able to take the M36 turret, too, and handle the blast of the 90mm gun (something that the Hellcat cannot)?

EDIT: JED Database points out that the turret is indeed from M36 Jackson- and I have no reason to doubt that statement.

From what I remember reading in the Squadron-Signal book on U.S.Tank Destroyers in Action,the M18 could handle the recoil of a 90mm if a muzzle brake was used If no muzzle brake was used,the M18 was in danger of turning over if the 90mm was fired on the side quadrants

[jcf]

T49, 90mm semi-smoothbore T132E3 on M41 chassis.
The gun fired fin-stabilized projectiles, results were so-so.

Jon

[dy031101]

Question time:

From what I remember reading in the Squadron-Signal book on U.S.Tank Destroyers in Action,the M18 could handle the recoil of a 90mm if a muzzle brake was used If no muzzle brake was used,the M18 was in danger of turning over if the 90mm was fired on the side quadrants

So did the muzzle brake have adverse effect on the 90mm-gun-armed M18, or was the gun simply heavy enough to reduce the mobility of the Hellcat by a large margin?

T49, 90mm semi-smoothbore T132E3 on M41 chassis.
The gun fired fin-stabilized projectiles, results were so-so.

Semi-smoothbore?

[jcf]

Question time:

Semi-smoothbore?

As originally developed the gun tube was smooth, test firings showed excessive dispersion so shallow rifling was added, it helped somewhat.

Info from Sheridan by Hunnicutt.

Jon

[General Zod]

Question time:

From what I remember reading in the Squadron-Signal book on U.S.Tank Destroyers in Action,the M18 could handle the recoil of a 90mm if a muzzle brake was used If no muzzle brake was used,the M18 was in danger of turning over if the 90mm was fired on the side quadrants

So did the muzzle brake have adverse effect on the 90mm-gun-armed M18, or was the gun simply heavy enough to reduce the mobility of the Hellcat by a large margin?

T49, 90mm semi-smoothbore T132E3 on M41 chassis.
The gun fired fin-stabilized projectiles, results were so-so.

Semi-smoothbore?

From what I understand,the muzzle brake reduced the recoil Not sure how much From what the Squadron book said,if the so called M18 super hellcat went into production,it was to gave wider tracks to help with the extra weight of the M36 turret
Not sure how much the weight of the M36 turret slowed it down
Academy Europe has or had the super hellcat in 1/35

http://www.perthmilitarymodelling.com/reviews/vehicles/academy/acd35002.htm

[dy031101]

It would look like that the existence of a ROCA Type 64 tank based on the M41 (as opposed to those produced from M42 hulls) is no mere misunderstanding......

According to the Chinese text, the M41-based Type 64 is equipped with a better fire control system and improved mobility components (520hp diesel), and the co-axial MG is replaced by liscence-produced version of the M60 7.62mm.  The attached photoes also suggested sideskirts and applique turret armours...... the vehicle did not enter service in the end, which is probably why no efforts were made to distinguish between it and that M42-based conversion in terms of designations.

[dy031101]

Inspired by both some up-gunning programmes several M41 operators (to 90mm) had undergone and what that done on Argentine Sherman tanks (to 105mm), I feel tempted to ask if the M41 can actually take the same 105mm gun used by the AMX-13......

The Sherman, IIRC, actually has a smaller turret ring diametre (175cm v.s. 185cm of the M41), and the AMX-13's gun seem pretty compact to me......

[dy031101]

When Brazil developed the Tamoyo tanks from the M41, it at first retained the original transmission: did it continue to perform reliably or did this early development suffer like early M48 did?