Gurth

Two weeks with the Navy did more damage than 70 years underwater

Stansell and Laughling say, "At CDA [Chrysler Defense Arsenal], the glacis [applique] armor was first installed in early August 1943. The exact date of the introduction of the side plates is not known, but CDA's M4 composites starting [sic] getting theirs in late August 1943. It's safe to assume that they were installing them on the M4A4 line at the same time. It's also interesting to speculate that some M4A4s left the factory with front applique only." And later, "Once a vehicle was issued to troops--either stateside or overseas--it was rarely modified. Most, if not all, applique appears to have been installed by the factories or by the tank depots before issue or during a remanufacturing program." Chrysler rebuilt 1610 M4A4s destined for the British by October 1944, so it seems from their research that it might be rare for the applique armor kits to have been installed in Britain. On the other hand, if Chrysler started adding the applique armor in August 1943, over a year of M4A4 production had already elapsed, and 6173 M4A4s had been produced by the end of the second quarter of 1943, which would leave potentially 4563 tanks that were built before the applique armor was added to the factory line and which also didn't get run through the remanufacturing program. So bottom line: who knows?

Will moving pictures of Shermans (these, plus Crabs) coming ashore under fire do? How about of Shermans firing on Germans (hey, that rhymes)? Plus the odd AVRE, more LVTs and M29Cs than you can shake a stick at, and as a bonus, Hawker Typhoons making attack runs?
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIber1VFkn4
 
Edit: why doesn’t it embed the video? Or doesn’t this forum support that?
 
 
You’re not going to say that anymore after you’ve tried fitting the 1/35th scale one by Resicast into a model.
 
 
Thanks

That’s actually the codename of the LCT it was carried in  The number 6 also refers to that — both were on all the Shermans Vs and Crabs carried in that particular landing craft.
 
 
It’s just a generic stowage rack, going by photos of the tanks in use in early November 1944:
 

 

 
“Cock o’the North” is on the right, behind the crowd, in both photos. The other one, “Bramble” (actually another LCT codename) is the tank that’s on the right in the first photos I posted, and also the one shown firing on German positions in the YouTube film I linked to above. All these photos appear to be stills from (the uncut version of) that film, as the picture below shows if you’ve watched the film:
 

 
And a few more, of the tanks supporting Commandos:
 

 

 

Funny/interesting: I came across this thread (and forum) when looking for information on the M4A4 to build a model of exactly this tank a while ago, and by now have managed to read it to the end and find … the tank that started me reading here in the first place.
 
It’s indeed a Sherman V, fitted with (the lower section of) the deep-wading trunks at the back of the hull. I could post more pics of this tank, if there’s interest, and of the other four (one Sherman V and three Crabs) that were close to it, and remained there for several years after the war.