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Impressive Vintage Armoured Cars


"QUANTUM SHOT" #819
Link - article by Simon Rose and Avi Abrams




"The armored cars of dreams, contrived to let us do so many a dangerous thing". -- Elizabeth Bishop

We’ve done features on lots of different types of road vehicles here at Dark Roasted Blend, from vintage and antique examples to the very unusual, odd, weird and at times utterly bizarre. This time we take a look at the many different types of armoured cars that have appeared over the last one hundred years.


(Armored Vehicle art from Russia; images via 1, 2)


We'll start with perhaps the most interesting - a streamlined armored car: "Built by Skoda in 1923 and armed with 4 Maxim MGs,
this Zelva served with the Czechoslovak police, and weighed more than 7 tons":



(images via 1, 2)


Here is an imposing BA-3 armored vehicle made in Soviet Russia in the 1920s:


(image via)


Vintage Russian armored vehicles, called "broneviki", are still very popular for all sorts of parades:



...sometimes sporting intimidating paint-jobs, like "A God of War"? -


(images via 1, 2)


Some of the old armored vehicles are used for movies, some are left out in the cold in Russian backyards:



(images via 1, 2, 3; bottom right: miniature armored car art installation)


The British Army’s Humber Pig armoured personnel carrier was used extensively in Northern Ireland between 1969 and 2007 (left image). Right image: this Alvis Saracen FV603 is from the mid sixties:


(images credit: Graham Robertson, 54 Ford Customline)


Another couple of Humber armoured cars, this is the MKIV and the MKIII:


(images via)


Here’s the Daimler Ferret MKI Scout Car, also used by the British Army:


(image credit: Albert S. Bite)


Daimler Ferret Mk2/3 Scout Car, from 1958:


(image credit: Welsh Harlequin)


The U.S. Army Ford M20 Armored Utility Car dates from 1944:


(images via)


The M8 Greyhound armoured car was also built by Ford for use during World War II, remaining in service for quite a while after the conflict:


(image credit: Angus Murray)


Another American vehicle from World War II, the T7 armoured car (on the right is the American Army's armored half-track):


(image via)


This Soviet BA-6 vehicle from the mid thirties saw action in both the Spanish Civil War and World War II:


(image via)


Here’s the armoured Rolls Royce that was part of the convoy carrying Michael Collins that was ambushed on August 22, 1922 at Beal na Blath in West Cork during the war for Irish independence:


(images via 1, 2)


Another vintage Rolls Royce armoured car from the 1920s:


(image credit: Joe Gordon)


The first Leyland armoured car was built in 1934. This one dates from the late thirties:


(image credit: Clive Barker)


Here is a Daimler Armoured Car from 1943:


(image credit: David G. Paul)


This was the main armoured car used by the Polish Army at the outbreak of World War I in 1939 (left image below). On the right you can see an armored vehicle from the First World War at the Royal Automotive Museum in Amman, Jordan:


(images via 1, 2)


Also from Poland, the Kubus armoured vehicle used during the Warsaw Uprising in August 1944. It was designed by the Polish fighters, based on a Chevrolet truck and used to carry between eight and twelve people:


(image credit: Paul & Kelly)


The Austin-Putilov was a Russian vehicle from 1918, built on a British vehicle chassis (left image below). On the right you can see the Lancia Astura Lince or Lynx armoured car from 1942:


(images via 1, Paul McCurley)


The Daimler Ferret Scout Car was built from 1952 to 1971 and used by the British Army and by the military in many countries in the Commonwealth:


(image credit: Nicola Robynson)


Another Alvis-Ferret was seen in good condition in Russia:


(image credit: Alexei Shustrik)


The Channel Islands off the coast of Northern France were the only British territory occupied by Germany in World War II. This vehicle was captured by the Germans after the invasion and put to use by the occupying forces (left image below):


(images credit: John Lilburne, Ronnie Bell)

Right image above: This vehicle was used by the military in Czechoslovakia in the thirties and a few were captured and used in Eastern Europe by the Germans in World War II.


British armored vehicle supplied to Tito’s partisans in Yugoslavia in late 1944 (left image below). On the right: Crossley supplied Vickers with a number of chassis for use in the manufacture of armoured cars in the 1920s. These vehicles were sold to a variety of different countries, this one seeing service in India:


(images via 1, 2)


This Italian armoured car was primarily used in the North African theatre in World War II:


(image via)


More great 1910s and 1920s armored vehicles


(a typical armored car from 1915 - image via)


This Crossley Mk I armoured vehicle was developed in the twenties. It was considered inferior to the more popular Rolls Royce cars, although the Crossley models were used for training early in World War II:


(image credit: Iain)


The Peerless armoured car dates from 1919:


(image credit: Iain)


This 1920s Rolls Royce vehicle was used by the Derbyshire Yeomanry in 1939 and undertook patrols along England’s northeast coast, watching for a potential German invasion:


(image credit: Iain)


The Lanchester Mk II armoured car was first built in 1928. Most were based in the UK, but a few were used elsewhere in the Empire, with the ones in Malaya being captured and later used by Japanese forces:


(images credit: 1, 2)


Stalin's Impressive Armored Limousine

This armored limousine ZIS-115 dates back to the Soviet Union in the late 1940s and was one of the models used to drive Joseph Stalin himself around. "The heavily armored car weighed over 8 tons, and its windows (each of which weighed over 200 kg) were powered by a hydraulic system":



(also shown ZIS-110 model; images via 1, 2, 3)


Some of the versions were colored navy blue and some blinding white:





(images credit: Zurel, Russia)


Your Private Retro Gun-Mobile

This is our favorite vehicle conversion. Fantastic setup, lightweight and extremely maneuverable, complete with the M1895 Colt-Browning machine gun:


(image via)


And finally, here are some truly strange, and some very ugly, armored vehicle conversions



(top left image: conversion from 1940, via - right image: is this a pickup truck??)

Article by Simon Rose and Avi Abrams, Dark Roasted Blend.


CONTINUE TO "ANTI-RIOT POLICE VEHICLES"! ->

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YOUR COMMENTS::

8 Comments:

Anonymous Jose Manuel "Gizmo" said...

During Spanish Civil War some weird ill-conceived under powered armored vehichles were improvised. You can find some of them here

___  
Anonymous Jose Manuel "Gizmo" said...

Oh! I forgot to advice you to scroll down the webpage until "Tiznao" armored car appear :) There is a lot of artillery and trucks before it

___  
Blogger ArtOfOz said...

Great stuff.

Here is some interesting improvised armored vehicles from Croatian war for independence, it's not vintage, but some of them looks like they are.
There are also some armored trains at the bottom.

http://www.massimocorner.com/afv/Surviving_Croatian_Improvised_AFV.pdf

___  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

On the last picture lower right, is that a (stripped down) sd.kfz 2 Kettenkrad? Where was this picture taken?

___  
Anonymous Tasheka said...

I like the second photo

___  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

if that was croatian war for independence what was croatian army doing during that was in herzegovina whicih is part of bosnia and herzegovina

___  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I'm sorely disappointed that the "Death-mobile" from the movie "Animal House" didn't get a mention.

___  
Anonymous Weaver said...

Fun, but you've not even scratched the surface yet ;-) Off the top of my head:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Beaverette

http://www.war44.com/home-front/2307-vehicles-used-home-front.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marmon-Herrington_Armoured_Car (look for better pictures)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_War_Car

http://mailer.fsu.edu/~akirk/tanks/GreatBritain/British-OtherVehicles.html (this is the motherlode!)

As the Duke of Wellington might have said, "I don't know whether they scare the enemy, but by God they scare me!"

___  

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