whelm

Some ram clips out of war time videos

Factory work, plane flying over formation of Ram's and then one going full tilt

Kangaroo crews showing how many they jammed into them

small clip after the sherman flail

Small training clip, Rams loaded with guys all over it.

Factory workers examining Rams at Borden

Shermans and Rams saluting with guns in parade.

couple seconds of a Ram driving by firing.

McNaughton looking at Ram suspension.

sons of King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia looking over Ram tank

Rams on landing ships for exercise pirate

Victory bond drive, Ram used as display

Another exercise for d-day with Rams going by

Rams firing smoke, crossing a bridge and the end of the video has the waterproofed ones dropping off the landing ships and lining up to fire on the beach after.

Ram assault bridge

Bonus Captured Italian SPG in use

Looking at the rear dogdodger is correct the exhausts have been lowered quite a bit.

as for the tampering

None of these orders seemed to stop crews, every month or so there's a new order or such in the war diaries about how crews keep speeding heavily and it needs to stop.

18 hours ago, EnsignExpendable said:

75 mm gun with a cast hull, but a travel clamp in the front? If I'm not mistaken, that's a Grizzly!

An M4A1 of some kind for sure, but going by the single piece lower front and the larger rear plate I think it was originally a late M4A1 hull.

Either way should be rocking a Radial in that thing unless they modified it to take something else. Doesn't seem to have an info about what it was using and I tried and failed to see if I could find more on that specific tank but no luck. The video was apparently made to show off the new tracks they had made.

Would be interesting to know if they played around with the engine at all or is it stock to get those speeds. M3/M4's had it governed to 2100 rpm? I believe and 2400 rpm could be done for short periods.

Interestingly the Canadians seemed to like to push the R-975 harder in the Ram then the US did in the M3 and M4, I'm unsure if this applied to the Grizzly as well.

Ram I and early II's

Normal engine speed  2200 rpm   (M3's during this period 2100 rpm)
May run at 2400 rpm in emergency

In later Ram II's the manual (1943) states the engine is now governed at 2400 rpm with a surge of 100-150 rpm allowed. This is backed up with the memo from Oct 1943 stating the Ram was faster on roadways then the M4A1 due to being governed at a higher rpm. Probably also why the manual and other sources state it's sustained cruising speed is 25 mph while in the M4 it's 21 mph. No idea on actual max but probably peaked at about 30 mph if you look at newspaper articles from the period that state 30mph max, a few tests they did like the Horstman suspension test checking deflection (27 mph tested) towing the 17 pdr (28 mph tested) the sexton (governed to 27 mph) Ram M10 spec sheet (30 mph short periods) it's clear it's higher for short periods then 25 mph.

was this one ever posted?

Chase vehicle at 4:34 shows the speed

They can be decent if the image operator at the time knew what they were doing. But most of the time it seems it was just a 9 to 5 and they didn't care.

examples

Shame about the quality.

production end on Ram II gun tank at CT 160193

production ended on Grizzly at CT 164012

production ended for Ram OP tanks at CT 205181

Book apparently claims the late ammo carriers were CT 231070-CT 231097

2 hours ago, EnsignExpendable said:

Which book, Canada's Pride or one of the minor ones?

One of the smaller development books. Someone on the maple leaf up forums posted that I can't confirm as I don't have copies on hand.

They may have had plans drawn up for armouring the sexton in the same way as the M10 with temporary plates that could be removed after they were used. Was listed as a desirable feature for a mod. Never was done as far as I know.

in 1944 they talk about a new order being placed for more sextons and how it would be a good time to look at a bit of a redesign.

https://imgur.com/a/B0ESp1f

good breakdown on the weight difference with suspension type and track used.

Apparently one of the Ram books on the development from service publications states a number of Ram hulls were built as ammunition carriers after production on the Ram and the Grizzly had ended, well into sexton production. So they either converted existing stock into that at the factory or had spare hull tops laying around for use.

This was around when the three piece lower front was phasing out on the sextons and the single piece being used, so the Ammo carriers may have been built with those. Could explain why 1944 and on they make a note to point out the ground clearance on the Ram when it's using a single piece front compared to a 3 piece one.

1 hour ago, EnsignExpendable said:

Yes, the armour thickness changed, and also the casting was variable thickness anyway. I like how people confuse the Grizzly and the Ram and write that the Grizzly had 3 inches of front armour. So many books falsely state that the Grizzly was called M4A5, I think the confusion stems from there.

 

@whelm I write quite a lot about the Ram on Russian sites, may I post the image you cleaned up? I will credit you under whatever name you provide.

Sure you can use it if you like.

Another interesting thing to note on the Ram, most assume It's using M3 medium parts, and well it is and is not.

It used the design as a base but did their own thing with designs from it. This is why the cupola you will notice on the Ram no longer has the vision ports on the side as an example. You may notice the odd M3 in a collection having the same cupola, they are just using a Ram one as they were unable to source an M3 type.

They also thickened them up quite a bit in the casting compared to the standard M3 type. The one spec sheet states 2 1/2 inches (63.5 mm) on the cupola but that may have been for the thinnest area only (rotor shield) A firing test on the Turret front with the 2 and 6 pounder to test shock resistance for the bolts missed the target and a 2pdr AP round struck the cupola penetrating it from the front.

Fired head on from 100 yards and with a striking velocity of 2096 fps, pierced the front but had spent all of it's energy from doing that, as when it hit the inner back wall of the cupola, only displacing the padding around the rim and then fell to the floor.

Cupola

2 pdr chart from the same period, either the casting was exceptionally good quality or that area was a bit thicker then 63.5mm

Another 2 pounder mistake from the same time frame piercing the hull side. , Canada's pride book on the Ram has a photo of the actual damage from the outside of the hull. I used a cleaned up hull wiring diagram I did to show the rough location, this image is interesting as well as it gives somewhat of an Idea on how and where the casting on the hull sides thin out as you head towards the rear.

Drivers Vision door. It was thicker, by how much ? text is to blurry but when you compare photos of them it's easy to tell the Ram's is a thicker casting.

Another thing most sources get wrong, even the spec sheets and the manual as they only list "aprox" figures for weight. All that armour weighs a ton. In many cases the Ram weighed more then some versions of the M4, I have seen them list it weighed as much as an M4A4 a few times.

Highest value I have seen is from 1944 they state the Ram was fully stowed up to 68,000 lbs when using CDP tracks while testing different bogie materials. But on average I see a listing of about 66,600 lbs stowed.

Battle order weight (fully stowed) comparison

In fact the designers knew the weight was so great that suspension springs were cherry picked that could take a higher load then normal. This was before the improved M4 type suspension with heavier springs came out.

The Ram was a Jumbo before the Jumbo existed.

2 minutes ago, Jeeps_Guns_Tanks said:

Nice work on that image clean up. Having done a few myself now, very clean work, it looks great. 

Thanks, but this one was just mostly removing lines for the image.

Start to finish

A line drawing I have been cleaning up from the tank's manual.

1 hour ago, Jeeps_Guns_Tanks said:

There are enough around in Canada( I think), someone should measure one, like the Chieftain did with the T29 Heavy tank a few years ago. 

It would change depending on date the hull was cast. They thinned the armour out in some places then thickened it in others at later dates. We just don't know by how much exactly or where in many cases.

Examples

Around Hull number 321

"Thickness of metal around turret and cupola opening reduced, also at several other points where such reduction does not come below design or service requirements"

Spring 1942

Increased engine protection Ram II tank
"The armour thickness on the sides of the engine compartment has been increased by the change in hull design. Mr. Jamieson can elaborate."

Possible to find photos that show off well how thick some areas are.

I can almost see the roof around the turret and cupola being 3 inches like some spec sheets seem to indicate when you see photos like this. (would also explain why they thinned these locations out on later tanks)

Numerous specs on the Ram's armour from differing primary sources and examples of how even they can never seem to agree.

https://imgur.com/a/oXaeGEs

13 hours ago, EnsignExpendable said:

8:03 shows a neat item, a gun sight added to the machinegun cupola. Before that, the idea was that you would just walk the machinegun onto its target with tracers, which turned out to not really work at all.

Ended up standard for them as far as I know, for whatever reason you hardly ever see it in photos (probably easy to damage or misplace it, so not fitted unless needed)

M6 heavy used the same sort of Idea as well.

a dummy gun for sure, probably an early try at a recovery vehicle or work on the early Command OP tank design.

Lots of nice little clips in the newsreels if you look.

Ready for the day

Example of training getting ready for D-Day, shows waterproofed Rams landing from ship on the beach, blowing off the water proofing and then a line of them firing out to sea.