[Ed Storey]

Leopard Figures

1978 Purchase – 128 Vehicles but only 127 according to allotted CFR numbers.

6 x Bridgelayers (Beaver)
8 x Armoured Recovery Vehicles (Taurus)
113 x Leopard 1A3 (C1) Main Battle Tanks

127 Leopards

C-30-731-000/MA-001 Data Summary Tank Leopard C1 MBT from 1980 states 114.
C-30-731-000/MA-001 Data Summary Tank Leopard C1 MBT from 1996 states 114.
C-30-732-000/MA-001 Data Summary Armoured Vehicle Launching Bridge Beaver from 1997 states 6.
C-30-733-000/MA-001 Data Summary Armoured Recovery Vehicle Taurus from 1997 states 8.

I have a discrepancy of 1 Leopard C1 MBT that I cannot account for which is carried over into the C2 upgrade..

1996 Upgrade to C2

114 C1s to be upgraded to C2 by replacing turrets with German 1A5 turrets but retaining Canadian L7A1 105mm guns.
123 German 1A5 Leopards were purchased for the conversion and the chassis were retained by the German firm contracted to do the upgrade work on the turrets, and they sold them as spares.
Australia bought 55 C1 turrets and some surplus C1 hulls.
Only 66 Leopard C2s were converted when the project finished in 2001.
Of the remaining C2 turrets, five were used as training turrets, two as complete spares for the EMES18 fire-control system and two as maintenance test beds. I don’t know anything about the fate of the remaining 48 1A5 turrets.

C-71-345-000/MA-001 Data Summary Turret Leopard C2 Tank from 1999 states 114.
C-30-731-000/MA-001 Data Summary Tank Leopard C2 MBT from 2006 still states 114.

Driver Training

In October 1992 DND recorded that 37 Leopards had been converted to ECC 116104 – Driver Training yet Canada apparently only had 5 cabins.

Two Questions

1. So when D&M tanks went in for rebuild were other Leopard C1s converted to D&M status thus accounting for the 37 recorded?

2. The 24 hulls, I have nothing on these, where they given their own individual CFR numbers and if so, what were they?