The Bob Semple Tractor TankDuring World War II New Zealand was on the far edge of the British Empire

The Bob Semple Tractor TankDuring World War II New Zealand was on the far edge of the British Empire, and a low priority to the British.  As a result few arms were sent to defend the islands.  However the people of New Zealand felt very threatened by the possibility of a Japanese invasion.  With little armaments and no support from Britain, some in New Zealand felt that they needed to take the matter of national defense into their own hands. At the beginning of World War II, New Zealand’s Minister of Works Bob Semple commissioned a project to manufacture a tank for New Zealand’s defense forces.  There was one problem, New Zealand had little heavy industry and no indigenous arms production.  As a result the new “Bob Semple Tank” was produced from unorthodox materials like something from an episode of “The A-Team”.The core of the “Bob Semple” tank was the Caterpillar D8 tractor, a common vehicle among New Zealand’s farmers.  To create the tank a simple superstructure was fabricated and mounted over the tractor.  Armor consisted of 8 to 13mm corrugated iron. Armaments consisted of six Bren Light Machine guns; one on a turret, one on the left and right sides, one at the rear, and two at the front.  Put together with ingenuity and improvisation, the Bob Semple tank was hastily constructed by hand in small workshops using no formal plans or blueprints.  The tank was designed to be operated with a crew of eight.A number of fully functioning Bob Semple tanks were constructed, however most production was geared in manufacturing the hulls alone.  The idea was to disperse the hulls all over New Zealand.  If the Japanese did invade, the locals could mount the hulls onto their local farm tractors within two hours, creating a working tank on demand.  Unfortunately the Bob Semple tank was nothing more than a rolling piece of junk.  Poorly designed using substandard materials, the tank was very slow, under-armored, and featured several flaws.  The tank had to come to a complete stop in order to shift gears.  Vibrations from the tank made shooting from it difficult and inaccurate.  Finally due to the shape and design of the tank, one of the forward gunners had to lie prone on a mattress over the engine in order to fire his machine gun.The New Zealand Army rejected the Bob Semple tank for military use.  Most were converted back into farm tractors, with the tanks hulls being used for scrap metal. -- source link

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