I am building a M5 Antitank gun, building it under tow rather than deployed.
Question is, what should the towing vehicle be ?

M2A1 Half Track
M3A1 Half Track
M5 High Speed Tractor
M4 High Speed Tractor
or is there another vehicle that would be accurate for Northern Europe WW2

Thanks
Ian

Go with either half track. Even the M5 HST was overkill for the M5 3" AT gun. Certainly not the M4 HST.

Hi Ian,
This photo from Wikipedia Commons shows a half-track towing an M5 AT gun.



Wikipedia states that the M3 half-track was used as a prime mover.
Cheers

jjumbo

Nice picture. I wish someone would do a plastic M5 3" AT gun and crew.

Darryl

Hey Darryl,
My best guess is that Dragon will produce one.
The M5 used the carriage and other parts of the M2A1 105mm and Dragon already has one of those released.
We can only hope !!
Cheers

jjumbo

Like roy said, the m4 and m5 HST were used for bigger artillery and gun pieces, the m5 would usually be towed in a halftrack along with its crew or seperately towed with ammunition inside the other half track

I would have thought that it would be the M2 or M2A1, but everything that I have seen on the net says M3A1. Maybe crew size caused the larger capacity M3 to be used. The HST were for bigger guns.

I had seen the photo of the M3 half track towing the M5 however I did not know if this was typical as I could not find anything in my references (Hunnicutt's book for example).

I am building my model using the Warrior conversion kit intended for the M101 and applying it to the Dragon M2A1 kit.



I suspect that one day we will see a Dragon M5, however this will be after we see a model of either/or a M2A2 or M101 as the majority of the needed parts are already included in the M2A1 kit (fwd gun shield, shield supports, traverse mechanism etc) . I found several of the "unused" parts to be useful for my conversion, such as the brake levers and parts of the traverse mechanism.

I am going to use the wheels from a Tamiya M8 which are the correct size for the M2A1 replacing the Dragon kit wheels which are too small. The M2A1 wheels are however the correct size for the M3 half track, replacing the hollow / bulged ones in that kit.

Ian

Hello, Ian!
Quick question? Where did you find a kit for the M5? I have been looking, without success!
Thanks, and Cheers!
Bill

Hello, again!
OOPS! If I had read the entire thread I would have had my answer!
Thanks for starting the discussion.
Cheers,
Bill

Osprey's Battle Orders #10 U.S. Tank and Tank Destroyer Battalions in the ETO 1944-45 lists the towing vehicle as the M3 Half Track which also carried the crew and ammunition. A platoon consisted of 4 guns, 4 half-tracks, 1 2.5 ton truck with trailer and 4 Jeeps, 2 of which would have machine guns.

anybody need photos of the real thing, let me know as I have one parked about twenty minutes south of me
gary

Gary, next time you're down that way, why don't you take some photos and post them here as a walk around. Be interesting to see.

I'm just curious as to what the M2 actually towed. The 105 and 3 inch are out, the bigger stuff was towed by the HSTs, the 75 pack was towed by a jeep or a weapons carrier. The 40mm was towed by a 2 1/2, so was it the 37mm and 57mm? I know that really early we still had some French 75mms (mainly our versions) but I don't know if they got into combat except in the Pacific.