T-16 Questions, some silly

[Stewart Loy]

Silly questions are the best questions, but ...

I was gonna scribble something down, but then I thought that some T-16 driver would make fun of me ( a poor old Universal Carrier owner) for saying the wrong thing. Then I went on a parts chasing expedition and forgot to reply. These are the times when my MTV attention span is not a help, but a hinderance.

The T-16 and my Universal Carrier look the same ( some might even say that a blind man would be happy to see either one ...) but they are very different, mostly steering wise.

My Universal Carrier, using technology from the 1930's propels itself with little effort from the Ford V-8 flathead. You cower behind the thin armour plate with both hands on the steering wheel. This wheel is connected to 2 steering systems. The initial steering works to slide the whole mass of the Carrier sideways on the massive cross tube. This action warps the track and allows for minor steering corrections, and manages the camber in English roadways.

When the steering wheel is turned more than a little the second steering takes over. The initial steering is overcome with a cam, and metal rods hooked up to the rear brakes apply the binders to one side or the other. This makes for a near neutral turn, but brake wear is appreciable, and all of the power from the flatty is required to turn sharply.

The Americans who devloped the T-16 upgraded the steering system of the T-16 by using a steered differential. With a bunch of extra gears in the rearend, one can bypass the flow of power to either track ( instead of braking the drum, as in the UC). This allows the other track to keep going, and affect a turn.

Quicker turns can be accomplished by grabbing one of the 2 seperate brake levers in the drivers compartment. There is also a parking brake. And a clutch, and throttle, and shifter. ( This is why I have a UC - that I can't seem to shift right ). The 1 ride I had lead me to think the park brakes are outboard and the steering levers are inboard. The park brake is under the nose in the middle.

You cannot really do a pivot turn with either - you really need seperatly powered tracks for that. The M113 and FV432 units do this, but are much more complex than these WW2 vintages boxes.

The fine pitch of the steel track, as Sean indicated, coupled with hard pavement equals quick spins around, with little chance of throwing a track. ( Which is good, because I bet all of your friends are somewhere else when this happens. ) Nice grass can be chewed up ( If you try a bit).

I guess that you need to get up here for a ride.


Stewart

PS - are you the same fellow that I wrote to a year or so ago about Bren bits?