I'm building the ICM T-34/76 1943 kit for a fun quick build. I was hoping someone could point me in the right direction for images of these tanks with non standard configurations of wheels (or missing wheels). Cheers

You could probably quickly find some by Google-ing Soviet T-34 tank and looking at the many pics and images you'll get.

There were, best I know, 3 different general wheel-styles seen on T-34 - the solid disk early wheel with rubber tire, the later "spider" wheel with rubber tire, and the all-steel wheel. Almost any combo could happen. Among pics that I saw in a quick lookie-see, I found tanks with 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 steelies on a side with the balance being early solids, same-wise with "spiders" being the balance, steelies in any station (but mostly the front and rear stations were rubber-tired if such were available, because of wear issues and ride problems with all-steelie sets), solids combined with "spiders", combos with all three styles on one tank, etc.

In part, the combos available to you depend some on "when" your tank is. All early T-34 came with solids. Steelies came out in later 1941, with some '42 and early '43 production tanks having all steelies (but most with at least 1 rubber-tired on each side - front station usually). The "spider" lightened perforated disk wheel with rubber tire came along in '43. Solid wheels came on new tanks throughout the war (and post-war), but "spiders" were increasingly common later in the war. Steelies were only produced for about a year or a bit more - but persisted in use throughout the war, often as replacement wheels.

There appear to be very few pics showing an operational T-34 in use missing a wheel, but this doesn't mean it didn't happen. A missing wheel could likely only be functional if the lost wheel was mid-tank. An end-station loss would result in the track needing to be shortened, and likely could not be effectively driven on anything but a level road.

Hope this helps!

Bob

Hi Bob. yes that's really helpful. I did a Google search but wanted an expert's input too...much appreciated

You could hardly go wrong with any choice except for the late solid tire variants for the SU 100 and T34-85 lates. There are around 13 different wheels for the T34... not including the Panther ones

Chris

13!! where do you guys get this info.....

The most common setup for a Model 1943 Factory 183 tank as depicted by the ICM kit would be rubber wheels on the 1st and 5th station and steel wheels on 2nd to 4th. Later M1943 tanks started to appear with a full set of rubber wheels and by the time the commander's cupola was introduced it had become standard again. Full steel wheels were only used for a relatively short period during 1942 because the vibrations were unbearable even by Red Army standards.

As the others have mentioned there are of course almost unlimited possibilities when it comes to field replacements.