The US Army Armor & Cavalry Collection (The Collection) has begun restoration/preservation of the aforementioned vehicle. Initial gleanings from my conversations there are that it should be ready for a celebration of the creation of the US Army Armored Force on 10 July 1940. Also mentioned was a plan to use this vehicle to reflect upon and honor the fighting done after the D-Day breakout during the Battle of the Falaise Pocket.
I grabbed these initial pics, and I imagine there will be questions. Patience, grasshoppers. My next visit is 25-28 April, and I’ll see how the restoration team is doing and what they might share.
NOTE- I do not have (YET) the SN or RN of this particular vehicle. However, several features make it one of the earliest (76)w VVSS built. For reference, I used the Sherman Minutiae website (merci Pierre et vos amis!) to compare and contrast what I saw in my very brief visit.
Your title says HVSS but we know you meant VVSS. This is beyond awesome! to think that one of these things survived after all this time, incredible. If I’m not mistaken this specific version of the M4A1 (76)w VVSS is even more rare than the M4A3E2 Jumbo. I will be following your restoration and can’t wait to see this beauty all dolled up and ready to party
Most of the work was done by young LTs attending ABOLC (Armor Basic Officers Leaders Course) who have spare time between phases, weekends, and their next assignment. The Restoration Specialist is Bob, and he has already orchestrated lots of work!
What version are you meaning, a turret without a rear ventilator?
As far as the Army was concerned, the only “versions” were tanks of different engine types (first and foremost), armament, and the M4A3E2. The suspension was a detail that wasn’t really important in segregating vehicles until well after the war. You can’t go too deep into details or combinations of parts in discussions of “rarity” because there were a lot of detail changes. That, coupled with the intentional interchangeability of components, produced all sorts of combinations that had no significance beyond indicating the parts available for assembly at the time. For example, M4A1(76) tanks could have three brands of engine booster coils and two brands of air cleaners. Would the a tank with a Delco-Remy coil and a Donaldson air cleaner be a different “version” than a tank with an Eclipse coil and a Vortox air cleaner?
The small yellow box is where this tank’s number was, the red boxes are where it’s been seen on others. Sometimes the number is inverted which makes it harder to pick out.
You have your preferences Kirt, I’m sure, and I appreciate your perspective. But perhaps an illustration or two is useful.
At some point in England, late and cold 1942 if memory serves, my Dad (recently a CPT Cavalry) was called to railhead somewhere in England to what he described as “a trainload of M4 tanks that no one knew how to operate”. He’d spent part of 1942 in California and apparently everyone thought he knew about M4 tanks. Well, he didn’t, but he grabbed several friends and subordinates and went to unscramble Humpty Dumpty. He told me that there were several types there, with different engines and operating requirements. They managed to sort it out, properly perform checks and services with the assistance of some depot personnel, and helped move the tank out to staging areas. SO, some gaps in interoperability and interchangeability seem self-evident. And important.
The MA3E2 was night and day compared to the M4A1. Hull-form was the least of these differences. The motors (air-cooled Continentals vs the Ford GAA), the guns (the newer M1A1 76mm vs the 75mm), the gun-turret drives, fire control systems, and a few other things required crews to know, and needed some new equipment training (NET) and transition.
So yes, a lot of things (including spark plugs, fuel systems, and even oiling systems) were different enough. And modelers and armor archaeologists love to find these differences. E.G.: the missing ventilators, the relocated spare barrel mounts, the oddity of the split loader’s hatch (w/ early latches, oh my!), and the all-around cupola, just fascinate us.
But there is a valid reason the US Army tried (but not so well) to have only the M4A3 version assigned to US troops in the ETO. These tanks were twin sons of different mothers, to borrow a phrase.
Don’t let us bother you with our goings on-and-on. Just stand back, and admire them both, and the men who crewed and maintained them.
And hey, I’m just pulling your chain, just a little!
It’s not my preference or perspective, it’s what the Army considered to be distinct versions, distinct enough to assign them different parts and technical manuals. (BTW, the M4A3E2 was assigned a parts catalog of its own.) We modelers like to distinguish the vehicles by other characteristics, which is great, but we shouldn’t go crazy inventing new names or labels for the vehicle as a whole based on functionally irrelevant details.
I mentioned this not because of what you wrote but in response to someone following you who said that “this specific version of the M4A1 (76)w VVSS is even more rare than the M4A3E2 Jumbo.” I wondered what he was considering a “version”, and offered a caution about cutting too finely with that label.
Please let me know how to describe that small batch of what was it, 186 initial production M4A1 (76)w VVSS? I’ll be happy to use whatever terminology is appropriate. From reading the Zaloga books and what folks post on these forums that sub group(?) had a unique set of characteristics for reasons that elude me right now. I’ve only described them as a sub group as an attempt to distinguish the different features that they had from the rest of the production M4A1 (76)w VVSS. We also know that only 256 M4A3E2 were produced but due to their survivability (?) it seems like there a few out there either being restored or already have been restored. This tank that Ted is posting about is the first time I’ve read anywhere of anyone restoring one of these initial M4A1 (76)w VVSS that took part in the breakout from Normandy late July 1944. So I have no idea really if they are rare or not, there might be a lot more out there that I just don’t know about. Just speculating because I don’t recall of any other restorations that specifically claimed to have one these tanks.
Is it incorrect to distinguish these vehicles as “slightly unique” only because the Army saw them as functionally the same as the rest of the production run back in 1944?
I’m not sure what you are thinking about them that sets them apart because I don’t know what your 186 quantity references.
My point is not to be pedantic or restrictive on what people say, but to point out that the exact look of a tank, including all details, was not a constant thing. For example, there was no “early batch” of M4A1(76) tanks at PSC. There was a continuous stream of tanks coming out of there throughout 1944 with changes and alternate parts added as production allowed. If you mean “turrets without blowers”, it’s probably most helpful to say just that because there was nothing stopping everything else on the tank from changing while those turrets were getting installed.
You don’t want to get in a situation where you read that such and such “version” had some particular set of features so you grind off the molded-in kit parts to replace them, then you find out that about half of the real tanks looked like kit did originally.
I get your point, changes were implemented at odd stages and the Army saw them all as the same type. Thank you for sharing your knowledge, it’s always much appreciated and respected👍
The “385 units” number seen in publications refers to tanks, not guns. By production numbers there were around 4,200 M1A1 guns made before M1A2 production or M1A1C conversions started.
Did any of the M1A1 barrels ever get threaded later on? I remember reading that some were swapped out from their original tanks for the M1A2 and later used on some M4A3E2s.
