What are the differences between the 2?

Hi Rick,

I'll start this off and I'm sure others will add stuff.

The M26 was fielded in WWII and both the M26 and the M26A1 were fielded in Korea. I can't remember who used which, Army or Marines. One of the essential differences is the M26A1 had a single baffle muzzle break and a fume extractor on the gun tube.

Another difference is a telephone/intercom was attached to the right rear for infantry to talk to the tank commander. It's a small box and was either mounted on the right rear fender or rear hull plate.

That's about all I can think of, as I'm not an expert on the Pershing.

Steve

From the PMMS review of the 1/48 Tamiya Pershing;

Tamiya released their 1:35 kit of the M26 Pershing (kit #35254) back in 2002 which was actually the T26E3 as first deployed to NW Europe in early 1945 and this new kit in 1:48 scale is based closely on that kit having the same features of T81 track, no fender turnbuckles and initial style barrel travel lock.

....added to the panel is the central mounted towing hitch and two side tow hooks as well as the cast exhaust outlet at the top. This is nicely contoured but lacks any surface texture or foundry cast numbers and includes the early style barrel travel lock that is attached to the sides of the exhaust.
This was changed later to be mounted directly to the rear hull and this feature indicates you can only make an early M26E3 from the kit. Also added to the rear plate is a nicely moulded tow cable that includes the mounting brackets and the two side mounted tail lights are included with the rear panel moulding which fits neatly to the rear of the metal tub.

Also included is the rear mounted interphone box but this was not fitted to the initial Pershings sent to Germany only being fitted later so it’s best to leave this off for this model.

Just a quick note; to use the later double pin T80E1 steel or rubber chevron track would require different drive sprockets than those used with the T81 track and you can’t just throw on a set of T80E1 tracks to make a later Pershing.

The later blower was also thicker at the front with a flat profile instead of the curved as with the kit which further indicates you can only build the early M26E3 from the kit.

There are also the two periscopes located either side of the blower bulge which again is an early feature with these being deleted from later M26s as well as having a plug welded in place on earlier models as this was identified as weak spot allowing deflections from the mantlet to enter the hull.

Most early Pershings used in WWII still had these periscopes but you will have to add bush guards from thin wire as well as to the hatch periscopes as they were nearly always fitted.

As mentioned the front and rear fender support turnbuckles are not included in the kit which again limits the time period for the model to WWII as these were fitted to all later M26 and M26A1 Pershings and would be tricky to make convincingly in this smaller scale.

There are also the mountings for the track connecting tool and brackets for the hoisting device intended to lift the power train, these brackets were fitted to early Pershings but were removed and blanked off with square plates on later vehicles.

http://www.perthmilitarymodelling.com/reviews/48/tamiya/tam32537.htm

The kit I am working with is the 1/35 Dragon/DML Korean Pershing, someone talked me out of my WW2 Pershing by the same Maker

If you mean the M26A1 kit, you'll need to replace the gun tube and add the turnbuckle supports for the track guards front and rear, and find a set of T66 single pin tracks, as the double pin chevron style tracks were seen on only one World War Two Pershing, as far as is known (and it was knocked out by artillery almost immediately). Delete the telephone box on the hull rear. As I recall, the kit depicts the later production hull ventilator (which had a 1,000 CFM fan instead of the 500 CFM fan seen on the early tanks). It's between the drivers' hatches, and the insert in the glacis is larger and more square than the original Pershing. These were built during the war, but I'm not sure if any reached Europe before VE Day. Dragon/Cyber Hobby's newly re-released Orange Box M26A1/T26E3 Pershing kit includes all the parts in one box, including two different sets of tracks. It apparently has only the early hull with the smaller blower, though.

Ok, my gun tube has been replaced, are the turnbuckles in the kit are wrong? some are included in the kit.bt the telephone do you mean the one rear left fender?

@ Gerald,
When were the final drives strengthened ? During M26 production,or was that an M26A1 improvement?

ok, kit sprockets (Korean version I guess) are on kit and track sprues are marked "T26 E3" and the two will not fit ,
any clues????

Why do people waste there time giving detailed replies if the poster is not going to read them?

Whoever talked you out of the T26E3 did you no favours. The M26A1 from DML has quite a number of differences from the WW2 T26. As a result of the Zebra Mission to field the T26 in action a number of changes were proposed as a result of combat experience. The now standardised M26 got a few of the changes such as the deleted inner hull periscopes, turnbuckles for the fender supports, Tank Telephone, reinforced diff housing and the larger Blower housing (although 500 odd had the smaller one still).
The M26A1 got some more of the recommendations in the Gun and fire control although the major compalint had still not been addressed - The Powerpack was underpowered. The M46 was the full delivery of all of these and should have been fielded postwar as the production M26. It was only due to the Korean war that it was fielded as quickly.

The M26A1 and the T26E3 from Dragon are good representation of what they are and not a mix of features as is the Tamiya kit and to a lesser extent the Hobby Boss kit. IMHO the DML T26E3 is the most accurate of the available pershings although it is not without faults but these are mainly confined to buildability.
I'd suggest just building the M26A1 as a Korean War M26A1 (Marines) and getting the orange Box T26E3 for a WW2 one or converting the Tamiya or Hobby Boss ones as these are both Post WW2 M26s (The Hobby Boss one has the early T26E3 hull though.
Cheers
Al

because some of us do not know the difference from a "t-80 track" and "T26E3" track because we primarily build GERMAN armor 95 % of the time.
Ask me the finer points of a Fries crane I can tell you, but the nuances between sherman and pershing models, I have no reference material.

T-80 to me represents a Russian tank.....

Sorry, thought you could add 1 + 1 and get 2. You were told the T26E3 was the WWII Pershing and used the T81 track. You were also told the M26A1 was the Korean War Pershing and used T80E1 track. You were also told said tracks used different sprockets. So I don't get where the disconcert is. It's not a matter of knowing the finer points, guess it comes down to reading comprehension.

Rick,

Hi. As you may have guessed from the posts it looks like the Dragon M26A1 (Korean) cannot easily become a WW2 T26E3. The tracks used in WW2 were single-piece steel links (very similar to Panther tracks), while the Korean-era ones rode on the wide twin-padded rubber tracks as seen on Sherman "Easy Eights" and most post-war US tanks. I haven't looked, but it makes sense the drive sprockets might be different. (Is it the width of the teeth compared to the holes in the track?) If yours was meant to be the Korean model then Dragon really ought to have put the right combo in the box...

The turnbuckles talked about are those diagonal braces at the ends of the track fenders that run to the hull corners to hold the fenders up - the WW2 tanks didn't have them. (And as a result most pics show droopy fenders...) And yes the telephone box was a metal box on a rear fender with a phone handset in it that allowed infantry to talk to the tank crew when buttoned up, pointing out targets etc for a quick artillery bombardment. Again, it was not found on WW2 examples.

Sorry to see you're getting "flamed" in this thread - I always thought the whole point of Armorama was for like-minded folk to help & support each other with useful advice. Needless to say, while I am confident offering more detail on the M26 and other US tanks, I know I'd certainly look like an idiot if I tried to get technical about most German armour - we all have our knowledge gaps. Hopefully this thread will stir your interest in researching US armour the way you've learned about German stuff!

Hope your build goes a bit smoother!

Tom

If I built US tanks I would probably know the difference between the 2 types of track.

Now if I KNEW THE DIFFERENCE between the two types of sprockets and track, I would have known NOT TO USE the included sprockets because they didnt fit..

So that said, I have put an add in the "parts needed" section.

So put your condecending remarks back into your keyboard, since not all of us build what you do.

To Tom, the korean kit came to me with a turned aluminum barrel and correct muzzle brake. The tracks included were the correct ww2 tracks but they didn't include the correct drive sprockets so going by what little picture evidence I found I built it up to the track install stage (after the major sub assemblies were done) THEN is when I found the problem, lol

Rick,

Your track problem sent me looking at reviews, and it seems the Cyberhobby m26A1/T26E3 "2 in 1" kit (#9107) came with both the WW2 and post-war tracks, as well as both types of drive sprocket, so there is a chance somebody out there has the WW2 ones as spares. Again, shame on the makers for not including both in yours!

I suppose you could get the part numbers and contact Dragon for spares?

(I have the Tamiya kit in my stash, so the DML one is something I have only seen on internet build logs...)

Good luck!

Tom

I have a ticket open with dragon so we shall see

Tony....in case you haven't noticed this is a modelling site dedicated to helping folks..not putting them down. If you have issues with the way someone posts questions here.....ignore it and go to another topic or post your reply in a courteous and friendly manner. It's not your job to host the forum (although that seems to be what I'm doing now)...we already have people in those positions.
Please...this is not one of those snobbish sites where you go popping off at those with, what you perceive to be, lesser knowledge or skills.
Personally.... I'm offended by your series of posts here. Lighten up.

Jeff