Hi John,

Dont'cha just hate it when photos pop up at the wrong moment? I feel your pain, but glad to see you've got a solution in hand! (I trust the hull with late nose will get used in another build?)

So many Shermans, so little time...

Tom

Nice build so far. I also have this kit in my stash and may build a late M4A1 as well. However, I ordered the late final drive housing from Tasca's site as they offer the individual sprues for sale. They are a good price too.

I suscribed to this build and hope to see you back on action soon John.

Hi John
Incredible, so perfect results.
Thank you to share


Cheers
Blackwater

Tom,

I had so much more done to the hull than what was pictured, so it will not go to waste. I will use it in a later build. Just the thought of having to start all over on the hull killed my mojo on this project. It’s a good thing I didn’t glue the bogies to the hull yet, or I would have to start all over with them as well.

Dave,

IF you build a Normandy vehicle, I would stay with the early final drive housing.

Hi John ...If you look at that picture close ,it looks like the turret is the late type low bustle without the pistol port ... That means a bit of work to add the the built up cheek armor ... Also you can see that in the picture there is no gun crutch ..but some spare tracks instead..That front cover drawing has more than a few mistakes .

hth
Rick

Hi Rick,

Yeah, the cover artwork is full of inaccuracies. If you look under the soldiers foot, it looks like the outline of the pistol port, and you can see the top corner of the check armor just on the other side of the gun mantelet. I need to hold my turret up in the same angle and study it to confirm this.

I will be building it with out the travel lock and installing the spare track as shown in the picture.

John,

in case you haven't already please check out the following sherman site:

http://the.shadock.free.fr/sherman_minutia/index.html

It has a lot great information on the Sherman, the various manufacturers and variants and can be of great assistance in avoiding confusion which can happen when building various shermans.

For instance the Tasca sherman with the angled rear transition plate is unique for a Pressed Steel Car Sherman while the rounded plate which you modified your sherman to is consistant with a Lima Locomotive or Pacific Car Foundry Sherman. It seems like PSC was the last of the M4A1 manufacturers to transition to welded hulls in 1943.

Hi John ...You could be right but it seems to me to be kinda far back for the pistol port ..I thought that was just a shadow from the soldiers foot..but I do agree that that might be the add on armor on the other side of the turret..

Rick: I took my turret and held it up in the same angle in front of the picture and both pistol port and check armor line up perfectly with that on the image.

Dave: Thanks for the link, I’m looking through it as I type.

cool ! Can't say I didn't make you sweat there for a second.... (didn't mean to though)

I have to give thanks to Dave for posting that link and reminding me of the site. I have seen that site before, but never really dug into it in depth. It may just save a bunch of work on the hull rebuild.

There were 3 manufactures that produced the M4A1.

Pressed Steel Car Co. produced 3700 M4A1s. (Not including the large hatch 76)

The rear hull plate was angled like the Tasca kit. From that source, they claim that Pressed steel didn’t change over to a welded hull until the spring of 1943.

Pacific Car & Foundry produced 926 M4A1s

Lower rear hull plate is rounded, and lower hull is welded.

Lima Locomotive Works produced about 1655

Lower rear hull plate is rounded, and lower hull is welded.

It appears that Tasca represented the most common variant of the M4A1 as Pressed steel out produced the other 2 manufactures combined.

I think the hull rebuild will be based on the pressed steel variant and I may just leave it as a riveted hull.