Quote:
Originally Posted by Colin Alford
While I was aware that during 1944, the British started fitting Infantry telephones to some tanks, I did not know the details of the installations.
I stumbled across this information while researching a different piece of equipment.
The March 1944 instructions for the Churchill II through VII installation can be found here: https://heritage.canadiana.ca/view/o...eel_c5818/3312
The April 1944 instructions for Sherman V (missing some of the drawings) can be found here: https://heritage.canadiana.ca/view/o...eel_c5818/3308
In August 1944, an instruction was issued to extend the modifications to Sherman I, II, and III: https://heritage.canadiana.ca/view/o...eel_c5818/3306
A few years ago I saw a “Microphone and receivers headgear assembly” which had been modified into a rather crude looking handset. I now realize that this was the approved modification to provide a tank-infantry telephone.
There is currently an example for sale on eBay.uk which seems to conform exactly to the instructions:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/175307176...=&toolid=10050
Attached are an image from the modification instruction, and a couple images from the eBay listing. |
I've got the remains of one of those modified headsets - someone cut through the wires to render it unusable and I don't want to scrap another headset to restore it.
I've also got (somewhere) the power microphone version, for earlier tanks with insufficient slip-rings in the rotary base junction.
Neither of them are easy to use - the earpiece is too close to the microphone so you're continually juggling the handset between speaking and listening.
A later Tank Telephone had a spring loaded extension reel and a proper handset, plus a call buzzer to attract attention from the crew. This stayed in service well into the 1960s, the only changes being a transistorised buzzer to replace the electromagnetic one, and later plastic (green or black) handsets with the later sealed inserts.
Best regards,
Chris.