Renault FT and TSF – The Longeron (Suspension Beam) - Inside Track | Renault TSF Tank Kent

Rebuilding authentic suspension beams for our Renault FT and TSF was facilitated through access to the iconic Renault FT in the Tank Museum collection. This FT was one of the first 150 Renault FTs training tanks from the first contract in 1917. This particular example, which was delivered to the UK, has cast body components in particular the nose, rear and forward are under the turret. This vehicle represents a good mix of prototype and pre production with part numbers found in the 1917 part manual of 1917 – quite different to the 1918 parts manual, which has a quite different set of part numbers. The time given at first appeared to be ample yet the task was great given the number of parts we had to record. Some decisions made initially we later came to regret where we faithfully followed the Tank Museum example in producing patterns and copies. We later discovered the old adage ‘act in haste and repent at leisure’ was very much apparent in many of the patterns, castings and fabrication copies we had made. One of these errors was with the suspension beams - longeron. Where had we gone wrong? Surely the Tank Museum FT left hand side suspension was no different to the many production FT examples we had studied? The Tank Museum FT and 1918 operational equivalents had been studied for some time. We had settled on the left hand side as it appeared to match the suspension of the production series. The differences however are very subtle and easily missed. We will show just where these changes are. The three holes visible in image 2 (Tank Museum) when compared to image 4 and 5 have disappeared. The single plate visible on the underside of the beam in image 3 (Tank Museum) has changed to an angle iron bracket in image 6 and image 7. The differences between these operational or production Renault FT suspension beams and their future post war cousins are just as striking. These differences will be covered at a later date. .

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