Landships II

Pierantonio · Lieutenant-Colonel

WIP - Wire Puller Tank

T140 · Lieutenant-Colonel

The brass rods running from either side of the drivers cab gack to the anchor block, what were they for on the actual tank?

Tonys · Field Marshal

To anchor the anchor block.

I've been wondering about the fixing detail at the front, but this method now clears it up - the steel rod is anchored to the block, runs up to the turret, enters through the pistol port, passes through the ear holes of the driver and commander, out the other side, and back to the anchor block - easy!!

Pierantonio, is the unditching rail's support level with the middle of the silencer is new to me. Is this part of the kit or do you have some reference to is existence?

Lovely job made of the build so far - what colours are you going to use to finish it off?

Regards,

Tony

Topoff · Sergeant

Lovely work going on here for sure, are those brass rods ? & where did you get the nuts & bolts from, there cracking

This is a pic I took a few years ago is this the same as what your doing if so when you print yours up on the 3D printer then how much would you charge me for one too

(or is that to cheeky)

Any how look forward to the next instalment

Rich Reid

Topoff · Sergeant

Tonys

TinCanTadpole · Legend

T140 wrote:
The brass rods running from either side of the drivers cab gack to the anchor block, what were they for on the actual tank?

Those are tie rods, they take tensile loads. Any load pulled by the tank will apply forces to the towing block at a different angle from the block's mountings, trying to shear the bolts. The block would twist against its mountings and either tear off on its own, or rip part of the roof off with it. The tie rods absorb the pulling force, because they run in roughly the same direction, so the load is spread out and any attempt of the block to twist against its mountings are resisted.

Pierantonio · Lieutenant-Colonel

Many thanks for your comments.

TinCanTadpole explained very well how the Top Towing worked.

Here the PDF file for the rail extension I made

http://www.ferreamole.it/images/modelli/mkiv_wire_puller/rail_extension.pdf

Nuts and bolts come from Meng sets

http://www.meng-model.com/index2ss.php?id=205

I took as main reference this pictures of FW3.

She had some unditching rail's support level (I forgot that near the towing block but I will add it tomorrow) but I saw the some arrangmet on other tank during Cambrai battle. I really don't know their purpose but I suppose they were connected to the fascine perhaps to avoid rails' bending under its weight.

Landship site reports FW3 as a Wire Puller (W) n. 3 of F company during Cambrai battle but she was a reserve tank and problably she operated only from 23rd as a supply tank.

So I will use some other decals for my model. I saw the well known pictures of a Wire Puller with a WC (Wire Crusher) painted on the rear gas tank plate. Fletcher identify her as Euryalus of I company so her ID wuold be IWX but I don't know if iot was painted on the front horns.

I will paint her in brown. I tried some mixes starting from Tamiya suggested paint adding some other colors but finally I choose the "Service Brown" suggested by Micheal Starmer. To achive it with Tamiya colors mix 5 parts of XF68, 4 parts of XF3 and 1 part of XF1 (I mixed XF69 Nato Black instead of pure black).

Many thanks also to Topoff for the anchor's pictures. I had only one small pictures I grab from a Youtube video and another from a the Heynes book.

-- Edited by Pierantonio on Sunday 20th of December 2015 09:30:13 PM

Pierantonio · Lieutenant-Colonel

Looking at Lyric's picture Topoff published I think I made a mistake on block dimension.
On the right side the tie rod pass between the rear hatch and the rail support so in this side my model would have a correct alignment.
On the other side I note the upper part of the block ends aligned with the roof pistol port so my block seems to be much more larger then original.
Now I think the block was not symmetrical and the anchor point mount was put on the left and not in the center of the tank as I believed.

On the other side I can't understand why they may have done this since the rear roof was free of obstacle. It is not so logical having an asymmetric towing point or any reason to save wood.
Any opinion about that?

-- Edited by Pierantonio on Sunday 20th of December 2015 10:10:32 PM

Lothianman · Colonel

This is an interesting thread because I want to do a Tadpole Top Tower myself.

I don't think it's asymmetrical. It's just the angle and the hatch that make it look that way. Have a look at an older thread if you haven't seen those photos -

landships.activeboard.com/t46810901/mkiv-top-tower-supply-tanks/

Note that there is a thick bar across the upper part of the rear face of the wooden block which confuses the visual perspective when one is looking from an oblique point of view (you don't seem to have this on your model, sorry to point that out).

It wouldn't make sense to have it asymmetrical as that would surely cause a permanent drag on the steering to one side and the tanks were hard enough to steer. It's just possible that this was deliberate to make the sledge deviate to one side in a known way for some reason to do with stability or control, but I can't remember reading about that.

TinCanTadpole · Legend

I think it might be slightly offset to the right, but not too much. Since the right tie rod passes very close to the raised hatch, my guess is that any asymmetry is simply to keep the rod clear on that side. If so, the block could have been made symmetrical by making it wider, but that would have used more wood and added unnecessary weight.

argonne64 · Captain

Great job !
Just 2 points that can help:
_ the grapnel should be with 4 arms for a wire puller at Cambrai ( at least the one recovered on Cambrai battle field near by Ribecourt have the 4 arms patern). refer to picture in Gorczynski book page 40
_there should be one more re enforcement for the rails near by the " spud box" , Under the extra rails to have the beam passing above the top towing Anchor point ( You can see on the picture of FW 3)
About the WC ( Euryalus) as "wire crusher" , some people are talking about " wire clearer"

Impatient to see the model finished!
Best Regards
Olivier

T140 · Lieutenant-Colonel

When I saw the title Wire Puller Tank I assumed this was used to lay comminication cables or wires. However having seen the big grapnel hooks now I assume these tanks were used to rip through the German wire defences. Is that right?

Pierantonio · Lieutenant-Colonel

I looked again to pictures I have and in my opinion TinCanTadpole is right. The block is asymmetric because from the middele of hull the left side is shorter then right.
This means in my model the right side is OK but the left would be at least 2 mm shorter.
With these dimensions the hook still sits in the center with no problem so there would be no grabbig problem.
I think I will not rebuilt the block. Too much work on the finished tank and now I'd like to start the Mk I.

Lothianman and Argonne64: you are right. I add a bar on the rear and two other renforcement for the rails near by the rear box.

T140: lookat the follwing link for full description of wire puller job

sites.google.com/site/landships/home/narratives/1917/cambrainarratives/cambrai-wire-pulling-tanks

Tonys · Field Marshal

Where were these stowed before deployment - in the stowage box?

Tony

Topoff · Sergeant

Really like this thread, its a tough one with the towing block, such a shame that we are limited to the few pics out there

Keep up the great work

Rich Reid

Tonys · Field Marshal

How were the grapnels deployed - just slung over the sides, having a fixed spacer behind the tank, or just trailing along behind?

I would have thought that they would have been slung over the sides once the wire was reached - any ideas?

Lothianman · Colonel

This has been a very interesting thread and very useful for me with a Tadpole Top Tower planned. It will have an asymmetrical wooden block setup!

Gwyn Evans · Legend

Thought I'd post another photo of a Top Tower just so you can see the arrangement more clearly from the rear. This is FS1 at Cambrai, by the way.

The comments about the photo of Euryalus concern me a little. There is a well known photo of a Mark IV Female (actually I think it's a film still) of soldiers observing from the top - I attach it here. This tank is identified in "Following the Tanks" as Euryalus but this has now been proved to be wrong. It's actual identity is uncertain.

Gwyn

TinCanTadpole · Legend

Excellent first pic, Gwyn. That nicely shows that the towing block was indeed offset - but only by a little. The attachment point for the load does appear centralised on the block, so it would be slightly offset against the hull, but not significantly.

argonne64 · Captain

Hello

I made FW3 with a TAKOM kit

Best regards

Olivier