Besides personal pics is there a go to set of publications that routinely has good interior views? Like the achtung panzer books of the pz3 & 4. Ospreys and books that take a side view, x-ray aren’t really helpful for me. Am I out of luck? Mostly interested in soviet armor so I know that makes it worse but any armor in general is also helpful.
I can only recommend the Hetzer book from Kagro Publishing. It contains A LOT of interior photos of a (I believe) original vehicle.
Then Doyle’s recent book on the M5 Stuart. (Any of Doyle’s books should offer good interior reference but limited to that one specific AFV covered.)
As to US vehicles the original TM’s are a good source. (Many available as reprints.)
I am sure there are many other books that I have not encountered.
I don’t think you will ever find one resource that covers the majority of tank interiors.
It will have to depend on your own personal internet research and just a little bit of good fortune!
Anyone else have other recommendations?
For Soviet armor, look online for digitized copies of the operator manuals. There are a number of vendors selling these as CD sets. Sure, the text is in Russian, but the illustrations are pretty self-explanatory.
I’d highly recommend the Tankograd books for study. Airconnection offers several very good titles (T34 and KV1).
For more modern Soviet armor, Google to find any of Cookie Sewell’s recent books.
Unfortunately, I think you’ll have to gather references by specific tank type, though. I don’t know of any that offer comprehensive interior info across multiple types.
If you can be more specific, say for a particular vehicle, that may help others lead you in the right direction.
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Just a further suggestion: When you Google search for a specific vehicle try wording your searches differently each time.
Examples:
Search M48
Serach M-48
Search M48 Patton Tank
Search US ARMY TANK M48
Search US ARMY Mounted Calvery M-48
Also search multiple times and over perhaps a period of thirty days or more.
I do a lot of online searches for the vehicles I model and it seems almost every time I do a search after waiting a week or two I will find an image I did not previously have in my reference file.
I have been rather fortunate in my searches in the past to find even more information than I had expected.
Hope this helps.
I find the YouTube Channel ‘The Chieftain’ useful. Over many years, he has recorded many dozens of videos where he crawls around and films inside various tanks. Of course they’re all museum pieces, so you have to assume that they’re complete and painted as they were in the appropriate time period.
He’s filmed the T34/85, IS-4, BT-7, ISU-152, SU-100, IS-7, T-55, as well as US, German, French, British and Swedish tanks.
It also depends on the era of the tanks. For WW2 and early cold war tanks you pretty much have to find runners as most museum tanks are hollow shells. The T-34’s and JS-2 at the American Heritage Museum have relatively complete interiors (well, the T-34-76 is complete 100%) but that’s mainly because Jacque Littlefield spent a ton of money on the T-34’s to to do so! Wartime photos are tough to find of Soviet interiors. If you’re looking at T-62’s and later there aren’t many in museums that are intact for someone to document so Youtube videos are really your best bet outside of line drawings in manuals that have been made available.
If you’re looking specifically for photographic info on the T-62 and its interior, I can recommend this book:
Soviet T-62 Main Battle Tank: A Photo Essay
It’s long been out-of-print, but copies can still be found at a very modest price.