There are a few things that surprise me about the M151

a place to discuss anything of interest to owners of M151 jeeps

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gcbennet
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Re: There are a few things that surprise me about the M151

Unread post by gcbennet » February 20th, 2018, 11:52 am

I agree 100% with what TJ was saying above about 'less is more' when it comes to kit in vehicles. One mistake many people seem to make when doing vehicles up for static display is over-accessorizing. Some to the point of being ridiculous. We didn't hang everything all over the outside like you to tend to see at shows everywhere because it would get damaged or completely torn off when going through the trees and bushes. We made the mistake of hanging our rucks on the outside of our tank once (and only once) during a live-fire, combined-arms ex. The crunchies thought it was tremendous fun to shoot our kit full of holes while we sat doing overwatch as they cleared nearby trench lines and bunkers. Another favourite was popping open our tank phone to watch it drag behind the vehicle. Damn grunts. Jealous we got to drive everywhere. lol On tours overseas we also had to contend with local kids snatching everything that wasn't nailed down, some ballsy enough to even grab the watch off of your wrist or personal items off of the seat next to you in the soft skins. We even had to padlock our jerry cans and pioneer tools to the vehicles because they would always go walking. So, we learned to either store everything neatly inside the vehicle, or leave all but the mission essential kit safely behind and RV with it later. The Dutch were the funniest though. Their solution was to either fashion short clubs out of liberated mop handles, or buy the big Maglite flashlights at the PX to bash knuckles as they breached personal space. One guy even used a slingshot and fired hard candies at the kids when they came too close.
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1985 M998 HMMWV
1986 Bombardier Iltis
1977 M151A2

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Re: There are a few things that surprise me about the M151

Unread post by halftracknut » February 21st, 2018, 8:34 pm

My cousin which passed away january a year ago at age of 94 was in pattons 3rd army 253rd armored field artillary bat.. drove a sherman and caught an 88 round in side of tank...it penetrated the tank but was a dud....he said they had 70 rounds of HE in the tank...he said it took all day to remove the round and weld up the hole and put on new boogie wheel...
slowest mutt east of the missippi..

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Re: There are a few things that surprise me about the M151

Unread post by rickf » February 21st, 2018, 9:49 pm

I would have become an Infantryman right then and there!!!! Somebody was telling him that was his one freebie! I can't believe it penetrated and didn't kill anyone just by getting in, hell, there is no room for anything else in a Sherman BUT the crew.
1964 M151A1
1984 M1008
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Re: There are a few things that surprise me about the M151

Unread post by m3a1 » February 27th, 2018, 12:09 pm

Rick, inside the Sherman was like a convention hall, particularly when compared to the Abrams.

Many years ago we took our local museum's Sherman up to Fort Hood (where it now resides permanently...another story) and displayed it. We were the first to get on the display line and a short time later one of the early Abrams rolled up and took up a position to our right. Tankers love to check out everybody else's digs and soon, we were all stepping over, introducing ourselves and climbing all over each other's tanks.

(Now, imagine a somewhat muffled voice coming up through an open hatch of the Sherman) "Dang! There's a helluva lot of room in here!" Meanwhile, I was sitting in the gunner's position of the Abrams and it was like wearing a bloody straight jacket! Every available space inside of it was occupied by some infernal device. The one thing that I recognized immediately was a 10cap detonator (almost exactly the WWII model but with mounting tabs added) mounted as a redundant firing mechanism for the main gun (which fires electrically, rather than mechanically.) Hard to improve on that design, apparently.

Anyway, it seems tanks certainly did not get more spacious over the years. But the rule generally seems to be, when a vehicle is gunned up, the crew is there to serve the vehicle, not the other way around and providing creature comforts pretty much goes right out the window. I dare say even the cool suits provided by the Abrams are there only to sustain the crew during protracted periods of high temps or being buttoned up ONLY because the tank needs it's crew to operate.

When it comes down to having extra space, even the much larger HMMWV, when fully kitted out and filled with troops who now carry far more bulky kit, seems not to have improved much over the M151. Extra space is wasted space.

Here's an example of space (or lack thereof) where form follows function. I was a truck commander on almost all of our convoys and my cab over engine truck was a large, commercially produced "thin-skin" with an aftermarket armor kit installed inside the cab. Mine was a troop transport and we kindly referred to them as "shake & bakes" so you might get the idea that no one was getting a warm fuzzy feeling when out and about in that. Anyway, that up-armor kit ate up a lot of space and with all my kit on, I barely fit in there and I quickly found I couldn't unholster my side arm when seated. (I won't go into why I needed my side arm available to me) So, in order to solve that problem, I ended up with a crazy thigh holster that could be unlocked and rotated back to vertical when seated. I hated the chest holster that was often cherished by others, chiefly because it had what we referred to as a high CDI factor (CDI = Chicks Dig It). I didn't like it because what I carried on my chest was all about feeding my M4 and a chest holster was in the way of getting to my ammo. Anyway, my thigh holster was the dumbest looking thing you'd ever seen, but it worked, and I needed it. Form follows function.

Cheers,
TJ

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Re: There are a few things that surprise me about the M151

Unread post by GerryM » March 8th, 2018, 1:08 pm

Rick Not all of them had windshield heaters.
Heat of any kind was rare in Germany.
I see the photo is of a command vehicle IT has the plywood doors that were made of plywood at the motor pool, and more then likely that officer had a heater in that Mutt.
nice photo remind,s me of my time In Germany in the 3rd Armored division

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Re: There are a few things that surprise me about the M151

Unread post by m3a1 » March 8th, 2018, 3:01 pm

Belive it or not, I have a set of those NIB on the shelf! Don't remember what their voltage was tho. :roll:

Each comes in a tin storage box and attach to the windshield with suction cups.

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