Hi All:(First timer, here!)

Based on all of my references and the Dragon Elephant and Ferdinand(Kursk)kits - it would appear that the large round hatch on the rear of the superstructure(Is it for pulling the gun out without having to lift off the structure???)had some nice external hinges on the Elephant but the manner of attachment of the door to the Ferdinand is unknown to me.

I'd like to model the big hatch off of my Kursk Ferdinand -for interior viewing- but then the manner of attachment must be modeled. Was there a metal framework inside of the Ferdinand to which the eight massive bolts in the door were turned to seat the door? That's all I can guess given what little I can gather.

Any help would be appreciated!

Regards,

Greg Hill

Hi Greg
The big round hatch on the rear is normaly refered as an escape hatch for the crew. Maybe the gun also could be "dragged" out of it, too, but it's possible. The small round hatch, which is located in the middle of this hatch, is for getting rid of spend shell casings.
I can't really tell you anything about the big tool box on the rear of the superstructure, because I've never seen it in any pictures, maybe Dragon knows something we don't. (or Frenchy's got some pictures )
Hope this will help you on your project.
Best regards
Jacob

The orginal hatch was to remove the gun with a small hatch to dipose the spent shells. The crews complained that the hatch took too long to open to be used an escape hatch, only two hatches on the roof for the crew.

The hatch was held inplace by four large bolts and wing nuts on the inside. Once the wing nuts were removed the hatch would have been lifted with a crane or pushed out and allowed to fall to the ground. This was not the fastest way to get out of a gun compartment that had been hit or a vehicle that was on fire. There was no quick way to close the hatch once you opened it

I think there were one or two Ferdinands late in the war that had a modified hatch installed. The hatch was cut verically and hinges installed on the sides. It might have been in 1945, the vehicles were used for training and then sent to the 614th Co as fighting vehicles.

Hi Greg,

Jim beat me to it. I can get you a shot of the rear hatch of a Ferdinand that has been removed (the survivor in Russia) and some pics of the Jaguar resin interior, to give you something to work from. I'm not aware of any period or contemporary interior pictures or any good shots of those modified Elefants with the split hatches. Unfortunately, this will have to wait after Sandy blows through.

I also have some pictures of Ferdinands with the rear tool box, but it seems to be far more commonly seen on the Elefant.

Nate

Hi Greg,

I have dragon kit #6311 Elefant premium edition and that comes with a bonus of the hatch with hinges.If you want to build that hatch I can scan and email the instructions to you. This will have to wait until after Sandy blows through and hopefully does not keep us down for to long.

Andy

Thanks for the input,guys.I want to build a Kursk Ferdinand so the late split hatch option isn't a possibility. I guess I was hoping that somebody had some pictures of the hatch hardware on one or both of the two surviving examples. The Kubinka vehicle was actually pulled off of the Kursk battlefield. The one at Aberdeen was,perhaps,captured near Nettuno in'44 yet appears to have used the unmodified rear hatch, as well.

I doubt that it was ever considered an escape hatch by the designers - or crews. That might explain why at lease a few of them even mounted work boxes over the closed opening! For obvious reasons, many AFVs have floor escape hatches. I wonder if the Ferdinand was so equipped. I've never read that it was.

Greg,

I have some photos of the Kubinka Ferd in the AFV Super Detail Photo Book Vol. 3. Sadly, the rear hatch is sitting on the roof with all of the bolts and the smaller inner hatch removed. The rear hatch opening is cover with a piece of sheet metal. Here is a shot of the rear area from the Jaguar interior:


Nate

That looks pretty close to the picture I had seen, but large wing nuts on the four bars.

The gun compartment sat on top of the drive motors, so no floor escape hatch was used. The driver's compartment had one.

Nate and Jim:

From what you two are saying, the Ferdinand had one difficult fighting compartment to escape from. That seems like a ridiculous oversight!(Panzerwaffe arrogance or just a rushed gestation period???)

Thanks for posting the Jaguar rear interior, Nate. Hopefully that arrangement wasn't an "educated guess"on the part of the kit designer because I have the Museum Ordinance Special which also features a "hatch on the roof" shot! So, I suspect that it's been left up there at Kubinka for years and years.(Well,the damned thing must be really heavy!)

My Ferdinand won't be modeled "destroyed" so, I'll make four simple "steel attachment plates" from sheet styrene, drill out the holes, add some stock bolts and wing nuts to leave handy inside the fighting compartment and drop the drilled out (Dragon) hatch on the ground behind the vehicle.

This leads me to another stupid question. Would there have been any overhead electric light installed in this or the roof of any other German AFV with a closed fighting compartment? I'm thinking someone insane enough could do something really sick with a grain of wheat bulb in there!

All my best!

Greg