Two Days at The Tank Museum

I wish I had time to put up all of the stuff I shot while visiting The Tank Museum. Plus, if Armor Journal is ever published (it's on hold pending economic developments), much of the other photos will be used in that, so I don't want to burn them up here. However, cruise through these and you'll get an inkling of how expansive and throrough this museum is. It's absolutely hard to believe and well worth the trip.

The Tank Museum at Bovington includes a recently constructed main building and a half dozen huge, hangar-like buildings closely linked together . Click Here.

They have an entire building filled with these WWI monsters. One of the more interesting facts about them is that more troops died from carbon monoxide poisoning in them than from combat . Click Here.	Right after WWI the UK government gave a group of WWI tank designers one more chance to catch up with the times. This thing is HUGE. It's the heaviest tank in the museum. The top of the treads are head-high. TOG II stands for The Old Guys . Click Here
Probably the best tank of WWII, the German Panther. This one is brand new, having been assembled by the Germans under the watchful eyes of the Allies after they captured the factory. Click Here.	The Panzer IV is one of the rarest machines on Earth and one of my favorites. If you run across one at your local used tank lot be sure to drop me a line, would you? Thanks. Click Here.
Tanks started as various versions of armored "cars" and trucks like this Peerless . The Tank Museum has a wide ranging inventory of armor from that pre-tank period. Click Here.	The US Pershing is often mentioned as "best WWII tank" along with the German Panther. Notice the ghost of someone walking through a ten second exposure. Click Here.
The German Jadgpanther, essentially a Panther fitted with a more powerful gun and lighter armor so it could move quickly and kill tanks. This clearly shows the muliple road wheels designed to spread the weight and make German tanks better on soft ground. Click Here.	Same thing done on a Tiger chassis: Jadgtiger. This one appears to be missing the outside roadwheels, which were often removed to install a narrower track for shipping. Click Here.
The legendary King Tiger. like the smaller Tiger, very few were actually built and the reliability was poor, but they scared the bejeesus out of other tankers as they could blow a hole right through virtually any Allied tank. Again, outside roadwheels are not installed. Note the steel R/C model. It's from Armor Tek. About $6.5k. It's gorgeous. Click Here.	UK modification on the Sherman, the Firefly, mounting a bigger, more powerful gun. The armor was still easily penetrated by most later German armor, but at least with the 17-pound gun, it could fight back more effectively. The Germans called the Shermans "Ronsons" after the lighter because they were so easy to set on fire. Click Here.
The French actually had some pretty good tanks, but this isn'tone of them. More of a scout vehicle. Notice the tracked trailer. Note the tiny vision slots in the "bubble" turrets. The Tank Museum is loaded with unusual vehicles like this one. Click Here.	It's hard to believe how many different armored vehicles the Germans produced. And The Tank Museum seems to have them all. I'd love to show up at the drive in Saturday night with this little thing. Click Here.
In theory, this is a Swedish tank, but it's hard to not notice the Panzer I and II similarities. That's because the Germans were building research tanks in Sweden to circumvent the Treaty of Versaille that effectively stopped military production. Click Here.	A remote control bomb and cable carrier. This would be ideal for your next R/C meet. Click Here.
The Chaffee is a gorgeous little US light tank that came in at the end of the war to replace the Stuart. Very few have been located and restored. Click Here.	A Brit Chruchhill Mk. III. You'll notice that most of their WWII tanks were chunkier than those from the US but they usually mounted bigger guns. Click Here.
The Brits saw a need for amored vehicles long before we did and tried everything. Click Here.	A Crusader. Read the sign and you'll know as much as I do about it. Click Here.
How would you like to be the one to have to cut a tank in half lengthwise? They had lots of educational stuff like this. It is matched with a big screen video presentation. Very effective. Click Here.	Here's the other side. I couldn't leave you with just half a tank, now could I? Click Here.
This is Little Willie, supposedly the world's first tank, 1915, UK. Click Here.	If there is a mechanical representation of the word "gauky" this has to be it. Matilda I, 1935. Click Here.