Hi all! I'm working on a dio of a British Sherman (M4A1 - late war with 76mm gun). I have two questions for you British Tank buffs...

1. What is the best paint color to reflect British colouring during the Normandy invason? Did they repaint from the US Olive Drab or did they just leave it?

2. What tank corps or units used the M4A1 with 76mm guns?

Want to make sure I get the look right. Thanks for your help on this!

~Scott

the colour used by British forces were scc 15 which is lighter than US O/D white ensign does a good rendition of this colour or if you want to mix it yourself try here as for 76mm which kit are you building italeri's or dragons? as bwe never used any with the hvss suspension and I think most of the 76mm shermans were used in italy although there was some used by the guards div and one was called ballymena which does the UK milltray shows these were painted in a grey colour I had a look but couldnt find any pics of it sorry

Thanks for the info. I have an OOOOOOLLLLLDDDDDD Italeri/ Testor's kit. No HVSS suspension on this one. It's got the cast hull and sand skirts. The tank is a Spring '44 version (See picture). I'm building it for the Commonwealth group build, but I don't have many resources (or, more correctly, any resources) for British variants of this particular tank.
I know they used 'em. Just not sure who used them or where!

The old Italeri kit isn't too bad. The hull is fine, and although the turret ahs some issues it isn't unusable. For Commonwealth Shermans there would NOT be HVSS suspension. Very few cast hulls had it until rebuilds after the war. A lot were used in Italy as noted; Monty preferred the Firefly as a hole puncher. But attrition of Fireflies led to the issuance of M4A1 76mm tanks as replacements. The Poles in particular seem to have been recipients of these, and they could be seen festooned with lots of spare track welded on and with the barrel countershaded just as on the Firefly. HTH,

Greg

Hi Scott,

Theres a few pictures of Sherman IIA as the M4A1 (76) was called in British terms in the Ian Allan Tanks in Detail book on Sherman 76mm & Firefly, and also photos of Polish ones in Steve Zalogas New Vanguard book on 76mm Shermans.

I do know that the Queens Bays used them in Italy when part of 2nd Armoured Brigade, 1st Armoured Division, there is a reference to them on the Regimental Museum site, see here :

http://www.qdg.org.uk/armourment.htm

Hope this helps
Ant Phillips

Scott

The only reference I can find regarding 76mm at the moment is that of Steve Zaloga (Osprey). He mentions 4 main users (units) all in the Italian Theatre:

British Units
6th Armoured Division
2nd Armoured Brigade
7th Armoured Brigade

Commonwealth
6th South African Armoured Division

Polish units also received M4A1 76mm as did French units, also many French units also received M4A3 76mm Shermans.

The ‘step’ in the barrel of the Italeri M4A1 76mm (Sherman IIA) needs to be removed.

The Italeri kit comes with T51 tracks, problem is that most British and Commonwealth units used T54(E2) tracks, with some using T48 (Rubber Chevron) tracks. Also lose the sand skirts.

You could do it in US colours as the typical practice of the british was not to repaint anything until it needed it. This why there is a lot of variation when looking at pics of armored units.

Thanks for all the great info so far. I'm wondering if anybody has reference photos or illustrations for markings on these tanks. So far I'm having trouble finding a "template" on which to base my markings.

I'd like to find British markings for the Italian Campaign late '44 to '45. Gothic Line through the liberation. Any help would be greatly appreciated!