The Renault FT was a French light tank that was among the most revolutionary and influential tank designs in history. The FT was the first production tank to have its armament within a fully rotating turret. The Renault FT's configuration – crew compartment at the front, engine compartment at the back, and main armament in a revolving turret – became and remains the standard tank layout.
The Renault FT Char Canon is a FT with a 37 mm Puteaux SA18 short-barreled gun – about 3/5 of tanks ordered, about 1/3 of tanks actually produced.
Finnish use: Finland bought 32 of these tanks from France in year 1919. Two additional tanks delivered in year 1920. Renault FT 17 was the first tank of Finnish tank corps and the main tank in their use in 1920's and 1930's. During Winter War they didn't see any combat use as tanks, but some were dug into turret down positions and used by as bunkers of sort by Finnish infantry. The last few FT 17 tanks remained in training use until year 1943. 14 of them were equipped with 37-mm tank guns and 18 had been equipped with 8-mm Hotchkiss M/1914 machineguns. Finnish Army decided to simply call the version with tank gun as koiras (male) and version with machinegun as naaras (female).
The female-version was equipped with 8-mm Hothckiss M/1914 machinegun, which was slightly more problematic from Finnish point of view. These machineguns had been first noted unsatisfactory already in year 1924 and the ammunition (French 8 mm x 50R Lebel) used in them was very much non-standard for Finnish military, since it wasn’t used in real numbers in any other weapons. Yet, these might have not been such serious issue, if the machineguns had not proved unreliable and worn out in such extent that ultimately they needed to be replaced. This happened in summer of 1937 and the last eight Hotchkiss machineguns were sent to Weapons Depot 1 (Asevarikko 1) in October of 1937. The replacement of French Hotchkiss was Finnish designed variation air-cooled Maxim machinegun M/09-31, which was similar to ones used in 7.62 ItKk/31 VKT anti-aircraft machineguns. To be more exact M/09-31 Maxim tank machinegun was similar to right side machinegun of 7.62 ItKk/31 VKT, since its ammunition belt was fed from the right. This machinegun has theoretical rate of fire about 900 rounds per minute and it was fed with 250-round disintegrating ammunition belts made from steel. Besides this change of machineguns, only another visibly notable Finnish made modification for Renault FT 17 tanks was adding a large toolbox on side of the vehicle, which happened in year 1934.
The file contains all the sounds and pcx files. Model is not my own creation. Wyrmshadow provided the animation files and Ares de Borg did the sounds. I merely put the pieces together and cleaned up the model for CivIII and added some what if pieces. A big thanks to everyone that helped out!
The Renault FT Char Canon is a FT with a 37 mm Puteaux SA18 short-barreled gun – about 3/5 of tanks ordered, about 1/3 of tanks actually produced.
Finnish use: Finland bought 32 of these tanks from France in year 1919. Two additional tanks delivered in year 1920. Renault FT 17 was the first tank of Finnish tank corps and the main tank in their use in 1920's and 1930's. During Winter War they didn't see any combat use as tanks, but some were dug into turret down positions and used by as bunkers of sort by Finnish infantry. The last few FT 17 tanks remained in training use until year 1943. 14 of them were equipped with 37-mm tank guns and 18 had been equipped with 8-mm Hotchkiss M/1914 machineguns. Finnish Army decided to simply call the version with tank gun as koiras (male) and version with machinegun as naaras (female).
The female-version was equipped with 8-mm Hothckiss M/1914 machinegun, which was slightly more problematic from Finnish point of view. These machineguns had been first noted unsatisfactory already in year 1924 and the ammunition (French 8 mm x 50R Lebel) used in them was very much non-standard for Finnish military, since it wasn’t used in real numbers in any other weapons. Yet, these might have not been such serious issue, if the machineguns had not proved unreliable and worn out in such extent that ultimately they needed to be replaced. This happened in summer of 1937 and the last eight Hotchkiss machineguns were sent to Weapons Depot 1 (Asevarikko 1) in October of 1937. The replacement of French Hotchkiss was Finnish designed variation air-cooled Maxim machinegun M/09-31, which was similar to ones used in 7.62 ItKk/31 VKT anti-aircraft machineguns. To be more exact M/09-31 Maxim tank machinegun was similar to right side machinegun of 7.62 ItKk/31 VKT, since its ammunition belt was fed from the right. This machinegun has theoretical rate of fire about 900 rounds per minute and it was fed with 250-round disintegrating ammunition belts made from steel. Besides this change of machineguns, only another visibly notable Finnish made modification for Renault FT 17 tanks was adding a large toolbox on side of the vehicle, which happened in year 1934.
The file contains all the sounds and pcx files. Model is not my own creation. Wyrmshadow provided the animation files and Ares de Borg did the sounds. I merely put the pieces together and cleaned up the model for CivIII and added some what if pieces. A big thanks to everyone that helped out!
