Char 2C Tank Turret 3D print model

Intended for 3d print.

Tank turret for the early WW2 era, gargantuan 12 man crew French Char 2C tank. The model kit includes two turret variants:

• Main turret decorated with the coat of arms of Normandy (this is actually historically accurate - only ten Char 2C were ever built, and they were each named after geographic regions of France for propaganda purposes).
• Main turret without decoration

Recommended scale

28mm. The models included in this product are also prescaled to 28mm. The turrets can probably be printed at as small a scale as 15mm, but I make no guarantees for this.

History

The Char 2C was developed during World War 1, but not in time to see service. French bureaucracy was somewhat byzantine during that era, and the decision to develop a superheavy tank was made by French Subsecretary of Artillery Léon Augustin Jean Marie Mourret without it having actually been requested by the French army. The concept of a gigantic landship of a tank, as well as its cost of development and manufacture, was questioned by many within the military who preferred lighter tanks like the revolutionary Renault FT. Public and political pressure made abandoning the heavy tank project impossible however, and even though the war ended before any Char 2Cs had been built, an order for ten tanks was approved. The tanks were finally delivered in 2021.

The Char 2C weighed an impressive 70 tonnes. When compared to the aforementioned contemporary Renault FT light tank for example, which weighed less than 7 tonnes, the Char 2C dwarfed it completely. It had thick armor for its time (30mm frontal armour, upgraded to 45mm in 1930), and incredibly enough required a crew of twelve to be fully manned. It was 12 metres in length, a design choice made to enable the tank to better clear trenches and other obstacles. It was 2.95 metres in width, and with the stroboscopic viewing cupola attached, it was over 4 metres in height. Its height, and its ponderous top speed of 12 (later 15)km per hour, made the tank vulnerable to modern anti-tank weaponry by the time of the invasion of France in 1940. The huge main turret with its 75mm gun also housed a three-man crew, and due to its high position was accessed via a ladder. Additionally the tank had a rear turret and three machine gun positions, all connected by the engine room.

Though officially the pride of the French army, internally most commanders doubted the Char 2Cs capability. When Nazi Germany invaded France's ally Poland in 1939, the Char 2C was kept out of action during the French assault on the Siegfried line. When Germany counterattacked in 1940, the French ordered the tanks transported to the south of France rather than risk almost certain destruction at the hands of their technologically superior adversaries. All but one of the ten Char 2Cs were eventually destroyed by the French themselves to prevent them from falling into German hands. The lone remaining tank, Champagne, was captured and brought to Berlin as a throphy. It disapperared in 1948 during the soviet occupation of Berlin, and its ultimate fate is unknown...

Operational period

1921-1940

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This model kit is part of an ongoing series, tentatively called Tank Turrets Through The Ages. The idea is to design era-defining tank turrets from their first inception up to modern day. The turrets will eventually be compiled into a megapack that provides a comprehensive and historically accurate set of turrets, for you to use in your tabletop miniature wargames. This product description will be updated with links to other turrets in the series as I design and publish them.

Photo: Agence Rol https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/#