Richard "The Challenger" Cutland

The M47 Patton

Welcome to the Muckleburgh Collection...

...in Norfolk, on the East Coast of the UK.

Today, we’re going to look closely at a major tank of the Cold War...

...which, even though it saw plenty of action around the world...

...was in fact never used on the battlefield...

...by the Americans who built it.

It’s the M47 Medium Tank, known as the ‘General Patton', named of course...

...after the most prominent American armoured commander of World War II.

Background

The original ancestor of the M47 was the M26 Pershing...

...created as a Heavy Tank very late in World War II.

In the limited action it saw, the Pershing proved itself a match for the Tiger II...

...and the Panther, with its 90mm gun, but it was plagued with reliability problems.

To cure these, a new engine and transmission were introduced...

...along with improved suspension.

There were so many changes that it was decided to redesignate it the M46...

...and to formally name it after the most famous general – Patton.

But although the M46 acquitted itself well in Korea...

...it remained essentially a stopgap...

...and parallel developmen on a totally new tank was already underway.

As it happened, this experimental new tank performed badly in tests...

...but it did have a better turret.

So it was decided to mount the new turret on the existing chassis...

...and call it the M47 Patton.

Let’s examine it more closely.

Turret

The turret is without question the most striking feature of this tank...

...so it’s probably a good place to start.

It was obviously very different...

...from anything which had gone before it in the US Army.

It is much more sharply angled at the front and sides...

...and has this very large ‘bustle’ at the back.

On top, the M47 is conventional...

...with a commander’s cupola at the rear right...

...and a loader’s hatch on the other side.

At the front there are still two crew positions and hatches...

...the driver on the left...

...and the co-driver, who also doubled as the radio-operator...

...and machine gunner, on the right.

It is worth noting here that the M47 was the last US tank...

...to have a machine gun in the bow.

Armour

The turret had 101.6 mm of armour at the front...

...and 63.5 mm on the side and rear.

The hull front also had 101.6 mm...

...with 76.2 mm on the hull sides.

Gun

It mounted the 90mm gun inherited from the M26 and M46...

...although by now its performance had been significantly improved and...

...coupled with an optical rangefinder, proved highly effective.

It could penetrate up to 160mm of armour with APDS ammunition...

...or 190 mm with HEAT rounds.

Whilst this gun in the Pershing had been more than a match for the T-34-85s...

...used by the North Koreans and Chinese forces in Korea...

...it would have been hard pushed to defeat the frontal armour of the IS-3s...

...which emerged in the late 1940’s.

It carried 71 rounds of ammunition...

...11 of these were carried on the left side of the turret...

...with the rest in racks under the turret basket floor.

Secondary armament consisted of a .30 calibre machine gun in the bow...

...a .50 calibre coaxial mounted machine gun in the turret...

...and a further .50 calibre on the turret roof.

Engine & Suspension

Under the engine decks is the Continental AV-1790-5B engine...

...already used in the M46A1.

One of the M47’s drawbacks was the fact that the engine...

...like all US engines to that date, used gasoline and not diesel...

...which resulted in a small range of about only 160km...

...compared with a Diesel-engine T-54’s range of 700km.

The M47 inherited the compact torsion bar suspension...

...from the M26 and the M46...

...with a drive sprocket still at the rear, along with a transmission.

This made an enormous difference to the amount of interior space.

Inside

Here inside, the layout was conventional for US tanks.

Where I am at the moment, on the right-hand side of the turret...

...was where the commander would sit.

Directly in front of the commander was the gunner’s position.

And across the breach, on the left-hand side of the turret...

...was where we would find the loader.

To the left of the loader, you can quite clearly see the turret ammo racks.

The gunner controlled the traverse, elevation and firing, via these controls.

Turret traverse was fast, thanks to a new hydraulic system...

...as opposed to the electrical one that had been used up until then.

The M47 had a very effective range finder, but it was tricky to use.

When properly used, it could deliver...

...a first shot hit-probability of 50 percent...

...which was amazing for its time.

Perhaps the driver was the biggest beneficiary of the improved technology.

Although the Cross Drive transmission was more complex than the old sort...

...it proved reliable and much, much, easier to operate than the old lever systems.

A single control lever to the driver’s right operates the gearshift...

..forwards and back, and the steering, left and right...

...a far cry from the sweat and effort needed before.

In Service

As I said before, the US Army never actually used the M47 in anger...

...but other nations did.

It was used by Iran, in the Iran-Iraq war...

...with captured examples being recycled into the Iraqi forces...

...and the Pakistani army used it in the war with India.

This one is in the Iraqi markings, but was originally in service in Italy.

When handled well they came out well...

...in the 1967 war between Israel and Jordan...

...the Israeli’s stated that they lost a total of 112 tanks, mostly to M47s.

For a tank which had such a troubled past and hurried creation...

...this ‘stopgap’ proved itself a very useful weapon.