Can anyone clear up a question for me - I've ordered Tamiya M4A3 kit no 35122 under the description M4A3 Early thinking it would be the 'small hatch' hull. Searches on google have come up with various opinions, many of them pointing to it being a 47degree 'large hatch' hull. If this is the case I have a problem - the kit has already been despatched and I want an M4A3 dry stowage hull!!

The later wet stowage was used for the 17 pounder conversion, but the majority that most likely saw action were on early hulls.

Dave, I'm not sure which one you have ordered but I can tell you three you didn't. M4 Sherman (early production #35190, M4A3 Sherman 75 (late production) #35250 M4A3 Sherman 105 howitzer #35251

Mike

Hi Dave,
Tamiya #35122 is a large hatch, wet stowage version.
Reagrds,
Joe

Here is a very good article on the kit you ordered.

http://www.usarmymodels.com/MANUFACTURERS/Tamiya/tamiya35122.html

Thanks guys. I can still do the conversion, just won't be exactly as I first wanted it. The wet stowage hull was preferred for the later of the 80 completed 17 pounder equipped tanks as apparently the water/glycol protected ammo bins would take the 17-pounder round without modification. Just that few or any of this later conversion saw action so far as I can ascertain.

The small-hatch, dry stowage M4A3 was a very rare tank in action. Most were kept stateside for training and testbed pupooses, but some apparently made it into the war late as replacement tanks.

The best way to make one is to use the out of production MP M4/M4A3 hull conversion combined with a Tamiya M4 kit for the turret and lower/rear hull (the M4 kit has both the M4 and the M4A3 rear parts).




Dave -- Where did you get this info? From what I know about Fireflies and early M4A3s, this combo seems extremely unlikely.

Considering the US gave away very few M4A3s to their allies I'm not sure such a combo would exist except in a test role.

Here is a link to a site where this variant is mentioned

US Fireflies.

MC

Hey, I actually have this set.; I bought it to make an M4A3 that looked a little different.

Dave, is this what you are looking for?

Thanks for all the help on this guys, I guess we've about covered it now. I'll use the late wet stowage version - it'll look cool with the radio box on the turret rear and the 17 pounder.
Dogloads link was my inspiration for this model, and states clearly that the late hull took 20-30% less time to convert, so that's what I'll be building.
Wonder how many people that haven't read these posts will come back and tell me 'it never existed' ?

Read the article. Very interesting. So from what I gathered 100 M4A3s were converted for the US by the Brits. A few were allocated to US units in Italy but were recalled in favor of the 76mm before any action. Then they sort of just faded away.

Shermie, how long before one of these appears amongst the 'last 29' LOL. :-) That'd be a surprise for the Tigers!

If Dragon re-released a 2 in one Sherman Ic I can build the 75mm version and have a spare 17pdr! I think I have enough leftovers to build one after that!!

Well, there were a lot of things that "existed" but never saw operational use. This sounds like one of them to me.

But, hey! Have fun building it Dave! Who knows, perhaps as soon as you're done building one, a photo of a real one will appear.