L60 Fake News

[John Clarke]

Thank's Stephen.

Many books say access was difficult to the power pack and GUE, from what I've seen from pictures this appears to be true. I suppose this wouldn't help if a lot of time was wasted just trying to get at stuff that needed maintenance or inspection.

I think there is an access plate on the belly plate, were there any other access plates on the belly plate to access other area's?

Are there any good pictures for future reference?

[Stephen White]

Best I can do at the moment John.

I may be able to do manufacturer's drawings sometime in the future.

[Mark Heaps]

My understanding was that the Leo was not designed for or intended for slugging matches. The Chiefies would have been the blocking and delaying force and the Leo´s would have done alternating flank attacks to disrupt the lines of communication.
The Leo recovery vehicle had one jump seat for the commander of the tank they were recovering, the rest of the crew would be left at the side of the road to be recovered by their version of the landrover or they would blend back in to the population if the area was over-run. They had enough trained tank crews in reserve, the experienced commander and the vehicle had to be saved. That is the explanation I received from a german crew when I questioned the lack of extra seats.

If we had to tow a tank, we had the whole crew with us. It was cramped but we kept the crew with the vehicle. If need be we could then have abandoned the tow at any time, the tank was then a static pillbox untill we could get back to it and get it mobile, recover it again, or it ran out of ammunition and the crew had to abandon it.

[Mark Heaps]

As far as I am aware, Chieftain did not have access plates underneath, Challenger did to get to the gearbox filters and replace them.
The plates on the Chiefy belly were drainage points to get rid of any water or oil build up in the hull.

[Mark Heaps]

Plate 2 is the only one that could be accurately described as an access plate. Remove it and then reach in and recover any tools that had been lost during any work on the pack.

[John Clarke]

Thanks Stephen and Mark.

I've seen this picture of the belly plate, but it's not very accurate. There'll be only a few that will check underneath of the Cheiftain models but it would be nice to get it right before the model becomes a tad heavier than "hernia" level.

So I'll wait and see what you come up with, Cheers Stephen.

Mark you seem to describe the German Bundeswehr had little concern for the tank crew's welfare other than the commander, driving round in something akin to Whippets of the first world war.

It's always interesting to note that sales of the Leopard 1 in numbers (other than an odd few) went to country's who had little or no chance of meeting a Russian tank spearhead of AFV's, Seemingly just wanting a civil defense lump that looked like a tank with a voracious name siting outside city hall like a Neubaufahrzeuge Type VI.

It would be a good political ploy to blame and exploit weakness of the L60 early on, so that you don't have to train conscripts to higher levels that would be normally be required, Hummm that's a nice little sales patter.

The British army with it's volunteer recruitment would and should always have the highest quality personnel to operate a far more technically advance equipment than the local defense force, that same force that needed our support. Something that is sadly short lived in some Governments memory's.

[Mark Heaps]

Hi John,
I only relayed what the commander of a Leopard Bergepanzer ( recovery vehichle ) told me when I questioned the lack of extra seats although the vehicle had more internal space than we had.
I was not suggesting that they treat manpower cheaply, just that they had a different set of priorities.
With at the time the Bundeswehr being a conscript army, they had a lot of recently trained reserves that could be called on. All their crews were only recently trained.
Our crews were highly trained and highly experienced.
Their crews could have hidden their weapons, donned civilian clothing, blended into the background, remained undetected and then later acted as a guerilla infantry force behind enemy lines.
For us, the crew were more valuable than the tank. We could fix the tanks and get them back into action but what use is a tank without a crew for it ?.
Mark

[John-Heaps]

Hi Gents,
i have only just joined the forum so this is my first post so please bear with me, i crewed on Chieftan (of various marks) Chally, Chally 2, and CVRT,
so do know a little about them with 23 years service.

Point one, Chieftan did have access plates in the hull for an assortment of reasons and these were always refered to as belly plates, one by the gear box was required so a crewman could undo the bolts connecting the engine from the gear box which were connected with a Tyflex cupling oterwise you could not seperate the two.
Others allowed access to other parts.

Point Two. The main reason the L60 got a bad rep was lack of use, when i was in Demo Squadron in Warminster we were out on the area 4 days a week most times in silly season, if the tank was in use and well maintained it worked well, if left to sit for months on end and then expected to take a thrashing what could you expect, seals that had sat idle for months would leak, lines (fuel, oil, coolant,) left without being under pressure can harden, engines that had not got to working temp for months do not take well with sudden demand, please look at it this way, if you had a classic car and would only take it out on a dry summers day (1 out of 365 in UK) and just started it and put your foot to the carpet how would it fair, answer is badly, same for the tank.

Point Three. Chieftan was built at a time when it was designed to slow the massive wave of enermy thrown against it, a job it could do well, the more kit that was piled on it as upgrades increased its weight with no thought as to upgrading the powerplant so something has to give, the tank was not bad so to say and with all the fall back redundencey built in it could be fixed with little kit (seen battle field repairs to get the engine back on with little more than Don 10 and black nasty.

Point Four. Engine is under powered, i have seen Chieftain ARV pull tanks out of bogs on engine alone without using the winch and ground anchour and have seen a Cheiftan ARV tow two Chally Two in tandem, ok it was slow but it did it (hats off to REME).

i have crewed this bit of kit and think for its era it was pretty good with its age, and of course with good REME back up.

My two pence worth from someone who did it not read it, i will await incoming.

Cheers
John

[Stephen White]

John, firstly welcome aboard. Secondly, no incoming from my direction, I think you're spot on with all your points.

It's fashionable to knock British (and to a lesser extent) US armour and conversely, there is widespread misdirected and ill-informed reverence for the Tigers and Leopards, which extends to a reverence for panzers in general. For all round effectiveness, the two outstanding tanks of WW2 were the Comet and the Sherman, the former because it had by far the best balance of firepower, mobility, protection and availability and the latter because it was designed for mass production and high availability was achieved through numbers. The Tigers were superb as defensive weapons but were flawed in many respects, Leo 1 was ineffective for lack of armour and firepower and Leo 2 is underprotected and has some issues with its fire control and battlefield management systems. Challenger 1 was good but was really an interim solution, Challenger 2 when if first came out was the most effective tank in the world. The acid test is whether you would feel confident crewing a tank in a shooting war. I would have no qualms about Challenger 2 or the latest Abrahms. I might have some reservations about Leo 2 and I definitely wouldn't wish to be at the receiving end in anything else. As you say, stand by for incoming.......

Oh,also never to forget that Chieftain and the Challengers had (have) boiling vessels. No civilised tank can be effective without one. Otherwise, you have to get out in the rain to make the tea,

[John Clarke]

Hats off John, It's great to hear a new voice trumpet the awesome Chieftain. I hope to hear more about the slugger which served our and other countries so well.

From is very conception in the early 1950's, the British tank building industry raised the bar of AFV design, The Chieftain became the first real MBT.

In the mists of political turmoil, cutbacks and fuel control and shortages, it's difficult to understand these day's why certain decisions were made. It becomes easy to ridicule Idea's that seemed sound at the time.

The country had only just come away from rationing, The Suez Canal conflict had taken place showing our vulnerability to changing political moods. Our armed forces were being stretched as usual while helping to look after the world.

When your best tank is guzzling a gallon of petrol to the half mile, the L60 seemed to be the answer, small, light, powerful. It was all this once used and funded correctly.

A picture starts to appear that we had technically superior AFV knocked by those who wish to field tin foiled armour with crews drafted from an ordinary population.

The Great thing about the Amourtek Chieftain Model is that Chieftain will once again cement it's position as one of the greatest AFV's of all time.

[Mark Heaps]

For any-one spotting the similarity in names, John is my younger brother. Stephen White met both of us with our father at Tankfest.

John crewed the Chiefy, I fixed them.
And now he can take some incoming, he is used to it and expects it from me. I ordered the Chiefy kit. He has ordered a King Tiger.

[John Clarke]

Oh Mark ...........oppertunitity missed.. Once he see's your's Chieftain running rings round the old plodder with the L60 roaring away leaving him in a cloud of smoke.

[John-Heaps]

Gents,
people love to knock British tanks as being rubbish, ask yourself this, Leo 1 had a British gun(L7 105mm) as did the US A1, they then went for the German 120mm Reinmettall smothebore which has less range and is not as capable (look up how the IDF fared with the L7 against multiple forces in the Yom Kipor) , they also use variants of our composite armour.

Look up how many Abrahams were knocked out by enermy fire and compare it to British CR2, no contest.

all this aside, please ask yourself why do the IDF still use Cents( yes with lots of upgrades), the crew love them and feel safe in them, if the IDF had a fleet of Chieftan what would the result have been.

The Chieftain 120mm was and still is an awesome weapon in a tank with thick effective deflecting armour, i have had discussions (shouting matches) with German and American tank crews about which was best, i suggested we sit 10km apart and advance shooting to see who died first, seeing as the RM120 could not match ours and we had better punching power they declined to take up the offer, enough said.

Chieftan was built to do a job which it did well, would you want to be on the wrong end of the punishment it could deal out.

My brother( REME) put it well," i fix the tanks so i dont have to do the fighting" its my job.

As i have said before, keeping a Chieftain on the road was a dance between the crew and REME.
Would i go to war today in its newer brother CR2 yes as its got all the bells and whistles to keep you alive, would i have done it then in Chieftain, well yes i was sat in the seat ready to do what was needed.

as said before, i have done it, not read it.

Cheers
John

[John Clarke]

I think you should swap the Armortek boxes with brother Mark when they start arriving on the door step.

The 120 mm will always out gun the 88 mm

[John Clarke]

Squish that imp.
All down hill, reminiscent of Clarkson with a Range Rover on Top Gear.

(Didn't Rootes group begin the early development of the L60 with the TS3 supercharged horizonal opposed engine?)