More British light Armor in early WWII

riggerrob

Ah!
OTL Bishop MK 1 mounted a 25-pounder on a Valentine hull. They were all converted in North Africa and rather crude.

ATL WI they developed Bishop Mk 2 and 3 on the Valentine Archer?
Probably have to add recoil spades.

The Valentine caisson would be popular for moving ammo and gunners forward. ..... so popular that infantry regiments request hundreds ..... leading to the first fully-tracked APCs. Because gunners understand air bursts, they request a shrapnel-resistant roof.

Mind you, most infantry regiments would be happy with an armoured mortar-carrier that could be fired without dismounting. Install an 80mm - or bigger - mortar. A dedicated armoured mortar-carrier could be built on a Universal Carrier or armoured car chassis, though UC would need to relocate the engine to clear a “pit” for the mortars.
 

Peg Leg Pom

As you wish. An Australian L.P. Universal Carrier with 3" Mortar.

Aust_3_inch_mortar_carrier%28AWM_134428%29.jpg
 

TonyA

steamboy said:
The Birch Gun (and that is a LOVELY picture of one, never seen one so clearly) is one of those great "What if's.." or at least a missed opportunity of the British pre WW2 army. The future was right there before them but financial parsimony and old fuddy duddies made them ignore (what to us is now) the obvious.
Click to expand...
Neatest thing about it, get rid of the rivet heads and the crank starter handle, and it's right modern looking...like an M56 Scorpion before the diet, or such.
 

Peg Leg Pom

Thinking about turning obsolete Vickers Mediums into Birch guns again, after Dunkirk Britain bought several hundred obsolete US M1917 75mm guns and ammunition. This was based on the British 18 pdr. Now if they had mounted some of these to rebuilt Vickers Mediums they could have taken 100 obsolete tanks that were otherwise useless for combat and 100 obsolete non standard guns and created a very useful force of S.P.G's that would have been greater than its parts even if only used for training. If sent to the desert though they'd have given Rommel a very nasty shock.
 

yulzari

There were only a handful of Vickers Mediums ever made of which few survived to 1940 and were well worn. The M1917 guns were needed as conventional artillery towed by modern wheeled transport which could move further and faster and far more reliably than a knackered Vickers Medium could. Not to mention that transforming the few existing Vickers Mediums means that much fewer tanks and they already come with a (albeit smaller) tank gun. The track life was appalling low by even two years later standards and were not even being made, nor were most of the spares in general. If there were Birch Guns about in 1940 I would have advocated taking the guns off them and putting them on trailed carriages for strategic mobility.
 
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