SHERMAN T1E3 'AUNT JEMIMA'
MINE ROLLER TANK CONVERSION

By Ray Mehlberger

History

One of the many hazards faced by both man and machine in WW2 was that of the landmine. Various means were designed to counter it, and while none were more effective than clearing an area by sheer manpower, there were some mechanical devices designed to be fitted to tanks. The U.S. Developed mine exploder device fitted to Shermans was known as the Aunt Jemima. The Aunt Jemima (T1E3 exploder) was named after a popular pan cake mix logo, because somebody thought the big exploder wheels resembled gigantic pancakes.

The 'Jemima' consisted of nothing more than two massive steels rollers pushed in front of a tank, with one roller ahead of each tank track. Each roller was divided into five discs. Each disc was about 4" thick and 11' in diameter. The Sherman, itself, was about 9' high and the whole setup weighed in at around 59,000 lbs. The roller chains from the Sherman sprockets drove the loosely mounted discs; the spacers were arranged and grooved to allow the discs to move. The T1E3 worked well in tests, but in service use the device proved difficult to maneuver. One account says that it took the length of 2-3 football fields for it to make a U-turn!! The 'Aunt Jemima' detonated mines by its heavy weight, but this caused severe mobility problems, when it sank into soft terrain, and other Sherman tanks were often called in to push it .The few U.S. Units that used this device highly disliked the mobility problems and quickly lost interest in the vehicle. The British 'Crab' which flailed chains in front of a Sherman was a much better device.

The Model

The basic kit used for this conversion was DML's excellent M4A1 Sherman kit. The T1E3 resin conversion kit is from VLS.

I built the Sherman pretty much straight from the box. I chose this version of the Sherman because it appeared to be the correct version in the few pictures I have of the actual vehicle in books in my home library. By the way, pictures of this vehicle are kind of lean on the ground too. I added a travel lock for the main gun barrel which showed in some of the photos that I have. I also added extra armor plates to the hull and turret sides to match the pictures of it.

The VLS kit is resin and PE. The resin makes up the roller assembly and the glacis plate mount ­ the PE is the arms that the rear push plate is consisting of. One of the discs in the kit was warped, and I found it impossible to straighten using heat or any other ideas. So I turned the worst part of the warp towards the bottom, so it would be least obvious. I also had to shorten the width of the large resin piece that mounts to the front of the Sherman, as the drive chains would not go the distance from the exploder wheels to the drive sprockets otherwise. All gluing on the resin was done with C.A. VLS never did say which brand of Sherman kit that this conversion was designed to fit - I suspect that it was not the one I used.

The instructions called for making rivets from stretched sprue to assemble the arms on the rear push plate. I felt that making this many rivets, keeping them uniform, and mushrooming the heads on both ends would be a real pain. I opted to go to the local shop and buy some railroad train small screws and nuts. The smallest ones were a tad too long. I screwed these into the PE arms of the push plate suspension arms and then clipped off the excess with a pair of side cutters. Then a drop of super glue was used to make sure that they would never unscrew.

The individual tracks were a real pain to do. Not only do you put the links side by side, but there are little triangular end connectors to add to each side between the links!! I found that the cups in these connectors were in most cases too small for the pins on the links to go into - and actually reamed out ever one of them! This took, what seemed like, FOREVER!! The final result and fit were worth the effort though. Care had to be taken not to turn the pin-vice drill too many times and go clean through the connectors. With practice I found out that five turns of the pin-vice with light pressure was enough.

I put together a jig to assemble the tracks. This was made using a article that appeared in Fine Scale Modeler Magazine several issues back. It worked great! I made two long runs for the area that is under the road wheels and a long run to go over the return rollers. These runs can be kept pretty straight, as there was little or no sag in Sherman tracks above the return rollers. Shorter lengths were made to got the distance between the links under the road wheels to the drive sprockets and idler wheels. The rest of the links were carefully fitted around the drive sprockets and idler wheels in the amounts needed and then the whole were linked up. The Sherman was painted with Tamiya acrylic olive drab - the links were the chevron type and painted in shades of rust and brown..with steel on the areas where they came in contact with the ground. A dry brushing of mud color and a little steel scuffing was added to the tank. The stars are from a dry transfer sheet by DML. I see no vehicle numbers etc. on any of the pictures of actual Jemimas, so none were added to my model. Finally a DML figure was added to the upper hatch of the turret.

The Diorama

The diorama is made up of mostly Woodland Scenes products, found in the railroading section of the local hobby shop. The gravel road bed was made from pulverized kitty litter, to make the gravel smaller and glued onto the base with Elmer's white glue. The cliffs were poured with plaster of Paris and rubber rock molds, also from the railroading section. The stream is a Woodland Scenes product that is sold in little yellow crystals. You heat these crystals in an old soup can , on the stove, and then pour the molten stuff onto your diorama. Here came the first problem!! The store owner told me that the crystals would turn CLEAR after heated! This was not true!! I wound up with a stream that looked like a Klondike gold mine sluice!! I tried to tone it down by putting a coating of Future floor wax, mixed with some brown food coloring. It worked to some degree, but not totally completely to my satisfaction. The stream later cracked in several places from transporting this diorama to and from contests this year.

I added a second U.S. tank crew figure, from DML , walking in front of the Jemima. He has a burp gun in one hand and a pair of wire cutters in the other. He is going to cut the barbed wire, strung across the road by the Germans. There is also a sign, warning of mines, written in German. I bought this soft lead barbed wire product, years ago, from some outfit in Texas. I cannot remember the brand name. The sign was scratch built with lettering done with individual rub on lettering and a skull and crossbones from the decal scrap box. Larger rocks in the river are from my back yard.

The scene is supposed to show a Jemima doing its job in a mountainous area of Italy. The trees atop the cliff are twigs from my back yard with Woodland Scenes foliage glued to them. I committed a cardinal sin with this diorama. I put it on too small a base. The Sherman should not be overhanging the edge of the oval board like that. I tried to use the old eye-balling-it method before going to the store and getting the wood base. After all was set on this base it was then realized that it was a tad too small.

This diorama has won first, second, and third place awards at several contests here in the midwest, that I went to. It was a long build process taking several months, but worth the effort. I love special purpose vehicles like this.

I am sorry to say that I don't know if the VLS T1E3 conversion is still available from them anymore though.