What are your thoughts behind your rankings,accuracy,details,ease of build ?[/quote] I noticed a problem with the markings. The "Bandits" had 3▵1▵32AR and not 3▵32▵. I could be wrong for the period prior to 1977. I was in the battalion from 1/1977 to 12/1979. (The A2's were replaced by A3's in 7/1979.) Outside of that, the kit looks nice. It looks like AFV Club did their research. The top-loading air filters are correct. Personally, I do not remember "Aces Wild" but a few tanks in Alpha and Bravo companies had names. None of Charlie's tanks had names (outside of the "This Piece of Junk" but we could not paint that on the bore evacuators). [/quote] THAT's GREAT!!! "This Piece of Junk"!!! I HAVE to model THAT one!!! Might you possibly have any info on that particular vehicle? I.E: "early" or "late" -A2, serial number, or any other details to distinguish it from the other Tracks in Charlie?

Just as a comparison of reviews of this kit, if any of you guys are interested, check out the review of AFV's -A2 over on the "Missing Lynx" site... (by Cookie Sewell, I think..?)

Every M60A2 was a piece of junk. It was an unbeatable weapons system when it work but there was always something wrong. There were only a few good things about that tank. One, gunners were very good with the choke sight (because the laser range finder was broken more often than not). Two, you never had a hangfire with the conventional combustible cartridge. You just switched to "Missile" and "burned that sucker out". (Conventional mode caused a very short, high voltage charge to the electrical primer in the cartridge. Missile mode sent a long (i.e., more than 3 seconds) low voltage (I believe 24 volts) to the firing pin. That heated the firing pin which in turn ignited the cartridge. On the way! Unfortunately, firing a conventional round in Missile mode could throw the missile trackers out of alignment. In 1977, C16 had its T-97 put on backwards. (It happens when you change track in the dark.) In the middle of 1977, the battalion replaced the T-97 tracks with T-142. We were always losing track pads on the autobahn. That would go flying thirty feet in the air and then bounce three or four times. I am surprised that we never killed a German motorist. In 1977 or 1978, the battalion itself repainted its tanks. It took about a month to do all 54 of them. At least half of the tanks did not have bore-evacuators and those which did had theirs disabled. The CBSS was incompatible with the bore-evacuators. In 1978, one of the battalion's tanks sheared its drive sprocket when it threw its left track at Hohenfels. 1977 was the last year that we used "real" HEAT rounds. Beautiful rooster tails at night when you hit a hard target. After that, the rounds used during gunnery had inert warheads. In June or July 1978, Charlie Company's XO walked to the tent during gunnery and exclaimed that he could not wait to be in an M1 going down range and the hard target would be an M60A2. I had a bad time trying to keep them running through gunnery. In 1978 or 1979 at Hohenfels, Gen. Nutting climbed on A Company's 1st Platoon Leader's tank in the middle of the night. The General saw a full trash bag on the back deck. He asked the 2LT, "When was this trash was made?" The lieutenant had completely forgotten about the trash bag. So, he thought the General was referring this particular M60A2. He answered, "I believe in March 1974, sir." That should give you some ideas for some things that you could do with model.

Gary we all lost track pads back then. That's why you always see period pictures with spare pads all over the bustle racks. I remember seeing an article in PS magazine stating that they had a bad batch of pads made over several months with defective bonding to the back plate. Who knows how many thousands were made that way. My unit ordered them by the pallet load. As a TC of an A3 in the late 80s I hardly ever saw a track pad fail. Tom

OK, so the M60A2 was "a piece of junk". The vaunted German Tigers and Panthers weren't really as "great" as the Panzer-heads make them out to be, either. One can't fault the US Army for "trying". Whether the -A2 was "a piece of junk" or not, this new kit, IMO, will help to round out AFV CLUB's M60-series kits, what with an -A3 coming "soon". Hopefully AFV CLUB won't just let the -A3 slide into "Limbo", like they did their M8 HMC, (75mm Howitzer on a modified M5A1 Chassis)...

Only one who has been there can tell funnies the the ones above. I was on a -A3 and we replaced road wheels more then we replaced track pads. NTC was the worst place on tracks; both on our A3's and 113A2-----B trp , 2/9 CAV

The "Aces Wild" vehicle is the one that was at the MVTF in Jacques Littlefields' collection.

I think you guys must be talking about the M551 Sheridan when you list all the problems on the A2--oh wait! They both had the same gun system didn't they? Strange how many of the same problems occurred on the Sheridan. I was at Graf in 1978 when the CID shut us down and made us do a tool layout in the middle of gunnery. They were looking for accountability on our sight adjustment screwdriver, which had about a 2 1/2 foot blade. Someone had murdered the librarian at Graf the night before with one. Even the tools had to be specialized. Turns out it was a mechanic in an A2 DSU unit. I agree, the entire gun system was a piece of electronic crap-- up more than down. The recoil of the 152mm conventional round was something to experience-- shearing of one final drive? It was a common occurance to shear off both on the Sheridan-- usually during gunnery, just from the effect of the recoil. I have to admit though, using the A2 as a target downrange would have been more satisfying than a Sheridan-- the round would have just gone through the M551 and kept going! Now back on target so to speak-- I'm glad AFV club is finally doing justice to these dinosaurs. VR, Russ

Thanks for sharing the stories on the M60A2 and M551. It gives "life" to a otherwise cold and technical thing. So now excuse me, I have to kill a Sherman or three with my Panther.