"Wet stowage" in Sherman?

[Andy H]

One of the major drawbacks to the Sherman was it's vunerability to fire, hence the nickname Ronsons.

However this was overcome by various means, one of which was Wet stowage (Glycerine-protected) ammunition racks. Can anyone shed any more detail on this please

Kind Regards


Andy H

[daveh]

Wet stowage consisted of surrounding the ammunition stowage bins with a water/gylcerine mixture held in an outer hollow casing. The idea was that the water mixture would pour out over any penetration of the bins by enemy AP shot/ shell fragments thereby preventing or at least slowing ammunition fires.

This modification appeared in Feb 44 on late production M4A3s

A US Army study showed that 10 - 15% 0f wet stowage Shermans burned compared with up to 80% of dry stowage vehicles.

[Andy H]

Thanks for the response David, seemed that Wet stowage proved a winner and life saver

Andy H

[Darrin]

Wet stowage consisted of surrounding the ammunition stowage bins with a water/gylcerine mixture held in an outer hollow casing. The idea was that the water mixture would pour out over any penetration of the bins by enemy AP shot/ shell fragments thereby preventing or at least slowing ammunition fires.

This modification appeared in Feb 44 on late production M4A3s

A US Army study showed that 10 - 15% 0f wet stowage Shermans burned compared with up to 80% of dry stowage vehicles.

I certainly don't recall seeing anything like this. One CW study of crew cas in tanks showed that the sherman was not any worse than any other CW tank. The Study also broke down the fighting into different years nd even this way the sherman does not have the HGUE difference you mention. You really start hearing complinat about it in normandy mainly with the CW but by then the newer W ones were already avilable. The development of this seems to be driven than something more than just the ronson image. They even had a very popular field modification to con dry shermans to wet.

[RichTO90]

I certainly don't recall seeing anything like this. One CW study of crew cas in tanks showed that the sherman was not any worse than any other CW tank. The Study also broke down the fighting into different years nd even this way the sherman does not have the HGUE difference you mention. You really start hearing complinat about it in normandy mainly with the CW but by then the newer W ones were already avilable. The development of this seems to be driven than something more than just the ronson image. They even had a very popular field modification to con dry shermans to wet.

Probably derived from Steve Zaloga's Osprey book on Shermans (page 21). The actual range of "improvement" given in the study was:

without wet stowage 60-80% of Shermans penetrated burned
with wet stowage 10-15% of Shermans penetrated burned

The improvement was as a result of complaints made in North Africa, as early as their first issue and use at El Alamein. However, it was quickly realized that the tendency to burn had nothing to do with the fuel and everything to do with the propellent stowage. Various remedies were designed and tested before the wet stowage design was finalized in late 1943, with production phasing in beginning in January 1944 (M4A1 76mm), February (M4A3 75mm), March (M4A3 76mm), May (M4A2 76mm) and June (M4A3E2).

The initial wet stowage Shermans available in the ETO were M4A1 76mm (w) issued mid July to the 2nd and 3rd AD. Through early fall most of the wet stowage Shermans received and issued were M4A1 76mm (most of the M4A2 76mm (w) went to the Russians and British), but by late July and early August the first M4A3 75mm (w) were arriving, followed shortly thereafter by M4A3 76mm (w) and the M4A3E2, which also featured wet stowage.

Overall of 883 First Army tanks (M4, M5, M24 and M26) examined 1944-1945, 38.17% had burned.

[Andy H]

Thank you for the extra info & clarification

Andy H

[Darrin]

I certainly don't recall seeing anything like this. One CW study of crew cas in tanks showed that the sherman was not any worse than any other CW tank. The Study also broke down the fighting into different years nd even this way the sherman does not have the HGUE difference you mention. You really start hearing complinat about it in normandy mainly with the CW but by then the newer W ones were already avilable. The development of this seems to be driven than something more than just the ronson image. They even had a very popular field modification to con dry shermans to wet.

Probably derived from Steve Zaloga's Osprey book on Shermans (page 21). The actual range of "improvement" given in the study was:

without wet stowage 60-80% of Shermans penetrated burned
with wet stowage 10-15% of Shermans penetrated burned

The improvement was as a result of complaints made in North Africa, as early as their first issue and use at El Alamein. However, it was quickly realized that the tendency to burn had nothing to do with the fuel and everything to do with the propellent stowage. Various remedies were designed and tested before the wet stowage design was finalized in late 1943, with production phasing in beginning in January 1944 (M4A1 76mm), February (M4A3 75mm), March (M4A3 76mm), May (M4A2 76mm) and June (M4A3E2).

The initial wet stowage Shermans available in the ETO were M4A1 76mm (w) issued mid July to the 2nd and 3rd AD. Through early fall most of the wet stowage Shermans received and issued were M4A1 76mm (most of the M4A2 76mm (w) went to the Russians and British), but by late July and early August the first M4A3 75mm (w) were arriving, followed shortly thereafter by M4A3 76mm (w) and the M4A3E2, which also featured wet stowage.

Overall of 883 First Army tanks (M4, M5, M24 and M26) examined 1944-1945, 38.17% had burned.

But this doesn't explain why the CW never saw a problem with thier cas numbers with shermans compared to thier other vehicles. The study certainly contradits what they saw in reality. Even your last US field survy found about 40% of alll the tanks had burmed.

Perhaps the dry tanks burned more easily but the crew was able get out before this became an issue. Although recovery and repair of the higher number of burned tanks could be a problem.

It was also said the CW crews tended to store ammo in less dangerous places. This may have been something thier yankee mates had not learned yet.

The CW used a high number of diseal shermans which the yankees did not in europe. Diseal generally burned more diff than gas. This might allow the crew to escape sig damage maybe even the tank could be spared. The problem with this third theory is all the earlier CW tanks alll used gas and none of them showed a remarqable degrre to increse crew cas than even early shermans.

While it might be wet stowage was better I doubt it was anywhere near 4 times better!!!

[RichTO90]

But this doesn't explain why the CW never saw a problem with thier cas numbers with shermans compared to thier other vehicles. The study certainly contradits what they saw in reality. Even your last US field survy found about 40% of alll the tanks had burmed.

darrin, I wasn't commenting on the validity of the study that Zaloga quotes, since I have not actually looked at the study itself. And the study of First Army tanks is not a good comparison neccessarily, since it includes all tank types as well as Shermans with both wet and dry stowage (and doesn't always identify them as such). However, we can sample the study as a "reality check" by looking at just Shermans in June, July and August 1944, when all were either 75mm "dry" types (although by August some M4A3 75mm wet were evidently being issued) or 76mm "wet" types. In that group the figures are:

June - 8 of 25 dry types burned or 32 percent (187 total were lost to 1 July)
July - 28 of 54 dry types burned or 51.9 percent (208 lost 2-29 July)
2 of 4 wet types burned or 50 percent (12 lost 2-29 July)
August - 47 of 86 dry types burned or 54.7 percent (237 lost 30 July-2 September)
8 of 21 wet types burned or 38.1 percent (38 lost 30 July-2 September)

Overall, from this incomplete and possibly imperfect sample, it appears that the wet types were not significantly different. I will see if I can find more on that.

Perhaps the dry tanks burned more easily but the crew was able get out before this became an issue. Although recovery and repair of the higher number of burned tanks could be a problem.

The problem with a propellent fire is that it is an explosive event rather than a slowly building fire, making it difficult for the crew to evacuate in time. This is reflected in the difference in crew casaulties in tanks that burned versus those that did not (1.28 crew casualties per loss versus 0.78 crew casualties per loss). The threat of propellent stowage as a cause of loss was also evident in many other designs, including the Panther.

It was also said the CW crews tended to store ammo in less dangerous places. This may have been something thier yankee mates had not learned yet.

Possibly.

The CW used a high number of diseal shermans which the yankees did not in europe. Diseal generally burned more diff than gas. This might allow the crew to escape sig damage maybe even the tank could be spared. The problem with this third theory is all the earlier CW tanks alll used gas and none of them showed a remarqable degrre to increse crew cas than even early shermans.

Neither diesel of gasoline burns easily in its liquid state (it is possible to put out a lit match by dropping it into a bowl of gasoline, it is also nearly impossible to light liquid gasoline from a lit cigarett, as is so commonly done in Hollywood ). In its vapor state gasoline is much more volatile though. But to be a threat the gasoline has to be at least partly vaporized, while still contained when subjected to ignition. In the case of the First Army tank study it was quite evident that penetration and/or rupture of fuel tanks was not a factor in most fires - in one instance it was noted that a penetration holed both fuel tanks, spilling copious amounts of fuel, without ignition. In another a penetration holed a fuel tank spilling fuel that did ignite, but did nothing more than burn out the engine compartment. The second gasoline tank, although subjected to the heat of the fire in the engine compartment, did not rupture, burn or explode. OTOH Tigerfiebel is quite definite on the threat presented if the engine is started before the engine compartment is ventilated to disperse any gasoline vapor!

BTW, I think you are confusing crew loss and vehicle loss, they are not the same.

While it might be wet stowage was better I doubt it was anywhere near 4 times better!!!

Well if it did reduce the chance of burning then it did reduce the incidence of crew casualties. OTOH without the actual report as cited by Zaloga we do not know what data it was based upon, nor how the data was analyzed, so it is difficult to assess a degree of "doubt" as to its validity.

[Darrin]

Perhaps the dry tanks burned more easily but the crew was able get out before this became an issue. Although recovery and repair of the higher number of burned tanks could be a problem.

The problem with a propellent fire is that it is an explosive event rather than a slowly building fire, making it difficult for the crew to evacuate in time. This is reflected in the difference in crew casaulties in tanks that burned versus those that did not (1.28 crew casualties per loss versus 0.78 crew casualties per loss). The threat of propellent stowage as a cause of loss was also evident in many other designs, including the Panther.

BTW, I think you are confusing crew loss and vehicle loss, they are not the same.

While it might be wet stowage was better I doubt it was anywhere near 4 times better!!!

Well if it did reduce the chance of burning then it did reduce the incidence of crew casualties. OTOH without the actual report as cited by Zaloga we do not know what data it was based upon, nor how the data was analyzed, so it is difficult to assess a degree of "doubt" as to its validity.

Of corse the avg CW cas was someing like 2 per tank I assume thats wia and kia but don't know. Even if it creaped up to as high as 1.3 in Us tanks from proellent fire from 0.8 non propellent fire it was an increase of less than DOUBLE. It was still just 1.3 at the worst out of a 5 man crew or 25% of the total crews. Even in the CW it was close to 40% it seems the prllent fires although important were not that important to overall crew cas. I've actually heard it reported somewhere that half of the crew cas happped after the crew bailed out of thier tank. The ger were supposed to keep shooting at tanks until they burned to prevent repair. An allied tank hit for the first time often had time to bale out before the actual burn up round happened.

I'm really talking about crew loss mainly but even your US numbers seems to paint a different picture about vehicle loss then zolgas 4 times. The US had more then enough shermans to suffer higher loses due to burning. Esp as you seem to indicate this problem was not just confined to the US shermans but even the ger panthers.

[RichTO90]

Of corse the avg CW cas was someing like 2 per tank I assume thats wia and kia but don't know. Even if it creaped up to as high as 1.3 in Us tanks from proellent fire from 0.8 non propellent fire it was an increase of less than DOUBLE. It was still just 1.3 at the worst out of a 5 man crew or 25% of the total crews. Even in the CW it was close to 40% it seems the prllent fires although important were not that important to overall crew cas. I've actually heard it reported somewhere that half of the crew cas happped after the crew bailed out of thier tank. The ger were supposed to keep shooting at tanks until they burned to prevent repair. An allied tank hit for the first time often had time to bale out before the actual burn up round happened.

I think you are again confusing things. The cause of loss is given as "burning" but not all neccessarily burned due to a propellent fire, although that was probably the main cause. As far as Commonwealth Shermans go the only report I have at hand is ORG Report No. 12, which analyizes the cause of loss for 45 Shermans between 6 June and 10 July in Normandy (thus all were "dry"). In that case a wopping 37 brewed up (33 of 40 penetrated by AP, 3 of 4 mined and 1 unknown).

And the loss per tank in the US records is for all tanks, including 4-man M5 tanks.

Yes the casualties to crew when dismounted are probably a significant factor as well. British crew casualties also varied, for four regiments in GOODWOOD the crew loss versus tank loss was 50:37, 1:2, 13:15, and 6:1, so a lot of variation occurred, but was probably not that dissimilar from US experience.

I'm really talking about crew loss mainly but even your US numbers seems to paint a different picture about vehicle loss then zolgas 4 times. The US had more then enough shermans to suffer higher loses due to burning. Esp as you seem to indicate this problem was not just confined to the US shermans but even the ger panthers.

Then you need to be careful since you are comparing apples and oranges. One addresses the liklihood of being a casualty and the other the liklihood of a tank burning, they are related, but not the same.

I'm unsure of the point to your statement that the "US had more then enough shermans to suffer higher loses due to burning"? Losses of any type were preferably avoided, especially since operational conditions often meant that replacements for losses could take some time to get to units.

No the problem was not "confined" to Shermans or Panthers, propellent fires were (and probably still are) the main cause of total losses and are responsible for the design philosphy of modern tanks such as the Abrams, where isolating the crew from the propellent is a hallmark of the design.

[Michael Kenny]

Quote:
"The ger were supposed to keep shooting at tanks until they burned to prevent repair. "

But did they? From the same survey Rich mentioned (RGd Report no. 12: Canadian 2nd Army:Analysis of 75mm Sherman Tank Casualties Between 6th June and 10th July.) Tanks hit once = 25. Tanks hit twice= 11. Tanks hit 3 times=2. Tanks hit 4 times=1. One tank was hit 8 times. It seems one hit was the norm.
Frontal hits=19, side hits=36 and rear hits=10
It also says that of a further 124 tanks inspected 83 had hits that failed to penetrate! That seems a bit high for me, am I reading it wrong?

[Darrin]

I'm really talking about crew loss mainly but even your US numbers seems to paint a different picture about vehicle loss then zolgas 4 times. The US had more then enough shermans to suffer higher loses due to burning. Esp as you seem to indicate this problem was not just confined to the US shermans but even the ger panthers.

Then you need to be careful since you are comparing apples and oranges. One addresses the liklihood of being a casualty and the other the liklihood of a tank burning, they are related, but not the same.

Well I certainly know I am comparing aplles and orages a bit. But crew cas were much much lower then 80% burned up tanks you tried to point to. Esp since you tried to make the point earlier that the proellent fires were so bad none of the crew could get out. Yet even in dry US shermans the cas ratio was 1.3 crew per 5 man tank. Not very horrific your statment is without any basis in fact.

[Michael Kenny]

Well Darrin butcher this in your future posts!

I have reference to WO 291/1186, "The comparative performance of German
anti-tank weapons during WWII.", an OR report dated 24 May 1950.

The percentage of tank losses, by cause, for different theatres is given as
follows:

Theatre (tanks) Mines AT guns Tanks SP guns Bazooka Other Total
NW Europe (1305)22.1% 22.7% 14.5% 24.4% 14.2% 2.1% 100%
Italy (671) 30% 16% 12% 26% 9% 7% 100%
N Africa (1734) 19.5% 40.3% 38.2% nil nil 2% 100%
Mean values 22.3% 29.4% 25.3% 13.5% 6.1% 3% 100%
of which destrd 20.3% 29% 24.4% 12.7% 5.4% - 91.8%
of which dmaged 2% 0.8% 0.9% 0.8% 0.7% - 5.2%

Caution is advised over the "damaged" figures because of variability in
reporting.

It is stated that tanks and SP guns should be considered together, as war
diaries often show doubt over what exactly caused a tank loss.

Percentage personnel casualties, by type of tank:

Tank type Mines AT guns Tanks SP guns Bazooka
Sherman 24.6% 41.4% 60.5% 54.3% 44.7%
Churchill 14.7% 45% 46.7% 30% 14.7%
Stuart 34.6% 29.8% 51.7% * *
Crusader * 38.5% 41.7%
Cromwell, Valentine,
Matilda, Grant 17.4% 34.4% 28.6% * *
Mean values 21.8% 40% 46.4% 48.4% 38.6%
Of which killed 4.8% 18% 21.8% 20.4% 18%
Of which wnded 17% 22% 24.6% 28% 20.6%

An asterisk indicates a sample smaller than 30. These are included in the mean
values.

I have no idea why Shermans should apparently find tanks more
productive of crew casualties than AT guns or SPs, nor why it
should be apparently so (relatively) safe to be knocked-out by
an AT gun if riding in a Stuart. Overall, though, being in a
brewed-up Sherman appears to be not much more dangerous than
being in an average brewed-up tank.

All the best,

John D Salt.

Sorry but I don't have details of the author but it is at
http://rhino.shef.ac.uk:3001/mr-home/hobbies/loss.txt
It does not look very clear as posted so use the link to see in in table form

This link is also revealing

http://www.geocities.com/jeffduquette/E ... alties.jpg

[RichTO90]

Well I certainly know I am comparing aplles and orages a bit. But crew cas were much much lower then 80% burned up tanks you tried to point to. Esp since you tried to make the point earlier that the proellent fires were so bad none of the crew could get out. Yet even in dry US shermans the cas ratio was 1.3 crew per 5 man tank. Not very horrific your statment is without any basis in fact.

darrin, I'm really tired of your silly childishness.

"I" never made the statement that "80% burned up tanks." I simply referenced where the remark came from, corrected it to the actual "60-80%" figure given by Zaloga and then stated that I couldn't comment on its accuracy given that I haven't seen the report. I also posted some data to show that it is possible that the ratios are exaggerated. You then somehow have turned that into 80% crew casaulties, another statement I have never made.

I also never made the statement that "proellent fires were so bad none of the crew could get out." I simply remarked that the greatest threat of "burning" was a propellent fire, rather than a fuel fire. Quite simply that is yet another of your demented twistings of fact.

Nor do you seem to be able to get it clear that the crew loss average in burned tanks as derived from the First Army study is not 1.3 per 5 men, it is 1.3 per tank. It also is not "even in dry US shermans the cas ratio was 1.3 crew per 5 man tank" since the study includes both four and five-man crewed tanks, as well as both wet and dry stowage tanks. Your statements are without any basis in fact.

So what exactly is your major malfunction? Do you simply find yourself drawn to being a troll?

[Darrin]

Well I certainly know I am comparing aplles and orages a bit. But crew cas were much much lower then 80% burned up tanks you tried to point to. Esp since you tried to make the point earlier that the proellent fires were so bad none of the crew could get out. Yet even in dry US shermans the cas ratio was 1.3 crew per 5 man tank. Not very horrific your statment is without any basis in fact.

darrin, I'm really tired of your silly childishness.

"I" never made the statement that "80% burned up tanks." I simply referenced where the remark came from, corrected it to the actual "60-80%" figure given by Zaloga and then stated that I couldn't comment on its accuracy given that I haven't seen the report. I also posted some data to show that it is possible that the ratios are exaggerated. You then somehow have turned that into 80% crew casaulties, another statement I have never made.

I also never made the statement that "proellent fires were so bad none of the crew could get out." I simply remarked that the greatest threat of "burning" was a propellent fire, rather than a fuel fire. Quite simply that is yet another of your demented twistings of fact.

Nor do you seem to be able to get it clear that the crew loss average in burned tanks as derived from the First Army study is not 1.3 per 5 men, it is 1.3 per tank. It also is not "even in dry US shermans the cas ratio was 1.3 crew per 5 man tank" since the study includes both four and five-man crewed tanks, as well as both wet and dry stowage tanks. Your statements are without any basis in fact.

So what exactly is your major malfunction? Do you simply find yourself drawn to being a troll?

You said this in the thred above.


'The problem with a propellent fire is that it is an explosive event rather than a slowly building fire, making it difficult for the crew to evacuate in time.'


This theroy is clealry contritidcted by your own US numbers and even the CW number of crew cas.

I don't know why I bother resonding to your spasdic comments and attitude. They clearly affect the precption of whatever facts you happen to have.