Centurion MBT

[onecat]

The Centurion MBT, I know there are few one there who can help with this question. I‘ve doing research on the Centurion, but would like to hear from people who have used it, or seen it in action. What was it like, did it proform well in Canadian service. I know people are always bad mouthing British stuff for being to hard to fix, and having too many mechical problems; but was this case with centurion?

Thanks for all the input.

 

[John Nayduk]

Ask RECCE GUY, he loves to tell Centurion storis.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

The Brits have a habit of building a tank and then trying to find an engine that fits. The Centurion went about 51 tons and change battle loaded. 10 ft high, 11 ft wide and 29 ft long with the external tank (37 ft with the gun over the front). Was powered by a Rolls Royce, Meteor Mark IV. The same engine as the Spitfire, without the supercharger. It had an oil capacity of 6 gallons It produced 650 bhp at the face of the engine, transferred through the weirdest transmission known to man. It had 5 fwd gears and two reverse. Pulling the left tiller bar going forward turned you left, in neutral it produced a stationary (true neutral) turn left, in reverse, it turned the tank to the right. Top speed was 21.5 mph at 2350 rpm. The shifter came up between your legs and you had to double clutch up and down. The clutch required a pressure of 78 pounds to dump the pedal. Although the Centurion was capable of faster speeds, neither the steering brakes, stopping brakes or weight of the track would allow it. The driving brake could only be used at 3 mph or under. You could panic stop at from 5 mph, but then you‘d have to adjust the brakes. We carried 60 & 63 gals of gas in the internal saddle tanks and 100 gal on the external knock off tank. Well tuned, in fifth gear on paved roads, you burned about 3-5 gals per mile. Cross country this could go uo to fifteen gal per mile. There was also a four cylinder Austin engine that was used just to run the generator. We had an L7A2, 105 mm main gun with a .50 cal ranging gun (no laser), 7.62 GPMG mounted coaxially and a .50 cal AA in the Commander‘s mount. I seem to recall 74 rds main gun as the load. Mixed as the situation dictated HESH, APDS, Smoke and Canister. It was a pain to work on but mostly loved by the crews. We just wore it out. The Israelis used it to destroy a superior force of more modern tanks during the Yom Kippur war. If you‘ve seen Kelly‘ Heros, change the Shermans for Centurions, and you have the Cdn tanks in Germany. We had a blast!

 

[Spanky]

Awww Geee Another Recce Guy!!! Why did ya have to encourage him???

 

[Recce41]

OOOOO Helmet Time. I remember my Father in one of them. I remember the time he told me about the one that went down RCD hill, or Range Road Hill when some poor driver missed a shift.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

Wait one.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

Ho hum,
As you can see from the avatar to the left, I am much kinder and gentler now .I refuse to rise to the bait. However, if you feel the need to unburden your pent up feelings of envy, I‘m all ears and willing to help you work through them to a mutual end!

 

[John Nayduk]

Look out, next RECCE GUY will have the Chaplin avitar next to his name.

 

[Gordon Angus Mackinlay]

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Actually the Canadian Centurions still exist:

Many of the gun turrets complete with gun and MG were supplied to the Austrian Army, these statically emplaced in various alpine passes facing east. A number still remain.

While at least 41 of the vehicle hulls ended up in South Africa, and it is quite possible that ARMSCOR remanufactured them into Oliphant MBTs or support vehicles.

Like Canada, Australia replaced the Centurion with the Leopard 1 A4 in 1st Armoured Regiment. Whilst a superb vehicle, it is nowhere near as effective a jungle basher as the Cent, nor does it "waddle" through the deep mud in the unique way of the Cent.

I have a very soft spot for Cent‘s, in SVN they could and did go anywhere. The 20 pounder canister round would take anyone‘s mind off sex, whilst it‘s very effective tracks and immense weight
truly superb for crushing bunker systems. AND most importantly of all - you could always get instant hot water off the tankies for a cup of tea!!!

A new book will be published in early 2003 on the squadron tours of 1st Armoured Regiment RAAC in South Viet Nam. Having seen snippets of it, looks very good. They saved many lives in country.

Yours,
Jock in Sydney

 

[Harry]

Hi Jock,

Actually the turrets ended up in Switzerland and the hulls wound up in Israel. I wouldn‘t be shocked if there was a South African connection, seeing as how the light of day has fallen on such things as munitions transfers, nuke technology and many other things. The Israeli‘s and South Africans had a very sweat relationship going while the SA‘s where under severe embargo.

Back in 89-90 I did some research on the CFE Cent‘s that never made it back to Canada, except one or two that became pedestal mounts.

I had the opportunity to visit a couple of Swiss emplacements and noted the various former Canuck serial numbers and in a couple of cases, the original issue plates in the turrets, located behind the crew commander‘s slot.

The Austrians from what I recall had numerous systems, but the US M-48 turret seemed to be the most common, however, they were predominantly located on the Hungarian side of the country. Most positions had bunker mounted 75 and 90mm guns. The one that still makes me laugh was at the border crossing south of Garmische-Partenkirchen, they had a single 88 mm mounted in an open recessed bunker on the West side of the road, about 100 mm back, for nostalgia I guess, LOL.

For anyone who might have traveled this route to Innsbruck from Munchen, it was the site with all the concrete and angle iron obstacles in a narrow; the railway is on the left. And there are lots of nice green pillboxes everywhere.

While I worked for the UN, my military counterpart was an Austrian Capt from the 6th. Jägerbrigade. His AO in Austria is that region.

 

[Gordon Angus Mackinlay]

The 48 gun turrets of the Cents from 4CMBG were transferred by the Federal German Government (the Cents were part traded in for the Leopard C1 deal to Krauss Maffei) as part of a complex barter deal.

The 1988 edition of WIENER Friedrich. Die Armeen der Neutralen und Blockfreien Staaten Europas. Truppendienst Taschenbuch, J.F.Lehmanns Verlag, Munich, 1988. Has under the section on the Republik Osterreich a item on the static gun turrets of various armoured fighting vehicles (amongst other items of hardware!). The Cent turrets being shown as under the command of Gruppenkommando I‘s First Brigade in Burgenland, which fronted onto the Czech border.

A publication more easy to obtain, DUNSTAN Simon. Centurion : Modern Combat Vehicles 2. Ian Allen, England, 1980. Shows on p.120 a Austrian Cent gun turret, fitted with a Austrian manufactured gun simulator and laser firer, that were specifically designed for use with the various gun turrets. Since most of the turrets were situated in working areas or residential complexes, live ammunition could not be fired in peace. Due to the small size of their country the Austrian Army makes great use of such types of battle simulation equipment for training.

If my memory serves me right, most of the Cents that remained in Canada were expended as hard targets at BATUS, in the late 1970‘s, early eighties.

Yours,
Jock in Sydney

 

[Gordon Angus Mackinlay]

My apologies, brain not working to well in the 37 degree C plus heat.

The Canadian Army purchased 374 Mk III Cents in 1952-53, subsequently converted to Mk 5‘s. In the late 1960‘s, 3 regiments in Canada were equipped with Cents, as was the one in 4CMBG in BAOR. The British Army ordnance depots in Belgium held the equipment for the "fly-over" brigade group that was to re-inforce BAOR in time of war. The depots held (amongst the other material) a full regiments worth (57?) of Cent‘s plus forward delivery war replacement vehicles (probably another 20-30 MBTs). My notes show that all of these vehicles were converted to Mk 6‘s (by the use of British conversion kits with the L7 105mm guns) in 1962 in the BAOR base workshops. Also that the MBTs held by 4CMBG were subsequently converted to Mk 11‘s (.5 ranging MG, and the infra-red searchlight) not sure about the war stocks MBTs.

With the change in Canadian defence policy, 4 CMBG was reduced in size and moved across the FGR to US 7th Army Command. This also entailed the sale/transfer of much Canadian equipment held by the Royal Army Ordnance Depots in Belgium. For instance, the Artillery Battery of the Belgium Army‘s Para-Commando Regiment acquired eight 105mm howizers C1 (and still had them until only a couple of years ago). But, there is nothing on the sale of the Centurions held. Making an educated guess, I would say that the gun turrets in Switzerland would be from those war stocks.

Jane‘s Armour and Artillery 1978 under the section for Leopards state that the deal for the C1‘s included all Cent‘s held in Europe - by this I would persume would include war stocks?

The Swiss army still held in operational units in 1978 some 240 Cents, and the purchase of those Canadian vehicles would have been a ideal way of purchasing spare parts, and what better to do with the turrets than integrate them into the static defence systems.

An example of such deals is in the Australian Army purchase of the original C1 Leopard turrets when they were replaced, as spare parts for our Leopard AS.1‘s.

Yours,
Jock in Sydney

 

[Harry]

Hi Jock,

Here is a cut and paste from a previous post on this issue. It is located in

The War Diary » The Combat and Supporting Arms » Armour » Russian, what do think?

Centurions, and not the breast plate wearing kind that were some of our instructors.

As the Leo program came on line, disposal of the Centurions was a pretty clear issue. It was expected that due to their age a simple trip to a local foundry would aleviate us of our venerable but wholly antiquated tanks.

Low and behold a little country in the Middle East needed some armor. The Americans saw a golden opportunity to supply armor to the Israeli's. Armor that could not be traced to the US. The US had been trying since 1964 to sort this issue out and after a couple of close calls decided to make it happen.

Deals were struck in smoke filled rooms and the tanks from Germany were quietly placed on ships to be returned to Canada. However, this ship was then reported to be proceeding to Israel. The Arab League went to he Security Council and said ship-reversed course and returned to Bremerhaven.

What too do. Well, here is the rest of the story.

The Swiss were in the middle of beefing up their homeland defences. A deal was struck wherein they purchased the turrets and placed them into static fortified positions through out Switzerland. The now demobilized hulls were declared farming equipment and exported to Israel.

For the AFV gods amongst us, who can recall the pictures of the Israeli armor sporting a hull that looked like a Centurion and a turret of the T-55 or 62 family? The Israeli's would remove Arab armor from the battlefield that had serviceable turrets and place them on their new farm pieces.

Many of those home made systems have since been retired with newer armor, but watch the news, those Centurion hulls are still rumbling around as command vehicles, heavy support APC's and a couple have been shown lately with a new Israeli designed 105mm turret.

The difference from the Brit supplied and the Canadian farm pieces is simple. The Brit Centurians stayed in the original config with only slight mods over time and retained in War Stock. The Canuck chasis have been the ones used for R&D projects etc.

Who whudda thunk there was a Canadian connection?

P.S. here is the link that mentions the Canuck Centurions , ironically it is the only place that mentions it...

 

[Sharpey]

Around 1995 - 1996 I took a photo of a Centurion sitting in a compound in Meaford. Any ideas on what that was all about? Was it in transition to a museum or to the range? Were did it end up? I have a lousy photo if that helps.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

It ended up at the front gate. Without the turret bins, that give it that distinct shape. They said they were going to fix the originals, then fabricate new metal ones, then wooden ones( who‘d know after a coat of paint, eh?). Nothin‘. The RCR stripped the Snr NCO mess of all things armoured and relegated them to the back rooms. Do you think they‘re going to worry about a tank across from their beloved sign at the gate?

 

[Recce41]

I think,they forget. Meaford is the second Birthplace of the Armour Corp. Why do you think there is so many Sherman tracks still at vailss point. From some grunt with a track pad on his foot?

 

[Sharpey]

Thanks recceguy for answereing a meer Reservists curiousity.

 

[onecat]

I have a added question that maybe the recce guys can answer. How did the Centurion compare to other MBT of the day. From what I read it had great cross-country proformance but was on the slow. So was were US, French, and other nations on the same level.

 

[Gordon Angus Mackinlay]

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I must apologise for the late response to this!

The gentleman using the nom du plume of Harry wrote " Back in 89-90 I did some research on the CFE Cent‘s that never made it back to Canada, except one or two that became pedestal mounts."

and

"I had the opportunity to visit a couple of Swiss emplacements and noted the various former Canuck serial numbers and in a couple of cases, the original issue plates in the turrets, located behind the crew commander‘s slot."

I had communication with Colonel Ryser, Commandant Swiss Fortification Guards (the Swiss Regular Army) in regard to this matter. Whilst Centurian spare parts were purchased from Canadian depots on the sale of the AFVs no actual hard components were acquired.

Informed that there are no foreign gun turrets in service with the Swiss fortifications, whilst large numbers of L7 105mm guns were acquired, there were mounted in gun turrets of Swiss design and manufacture (based on the Pz 61 MBT turret).

If you go to the search engine webferret, and type in Swiss fortifications, it will bring up some six sites (mostly in German) which give the history of the fortifications and show examples of all such examples of the military art.

Even today it is an offence to show any person around active fortifications, the only persons allowed there being those post to such, and those whose military duty takes them their.

The gentleman using Harry also stated "The Austrians from what I recall had numerous systems, but the US M-48 turret seemed to be the most common" No M-48 turrets were ever emplaced by the Austrian Army, those currently emplaced are Centurian, M60A1‘s and Charioteer‘s. The M47 Patton turrets were removed many years ago due to maintenance problems.

Yours,

Jock in Sydney