We have a total beauty sitting in our reception area here at Armourgeddon, receiving much love from Joe, one of our engineers and instructors for Tank Paintball Battles. Ours is a an MK13, manufactured in late 1945 and therefore too late to actually take an active role in any WWII offensives, although it was expected that this design could withstand a direct hit from a German 88mm gun. This tank design was highly successful benefiting from many upgrades over the decades and as such, there are still some variants in use today. Our Centurion was used by the Royal Engineers.

The Centurion was introduced in 1945 and was the primary British battle tank of the post-World War II period. As well as many other upgrades over the years, the chassis has also been adapted for several other roles.

The development of the Centurion had begun in 1943 with 6 prototypes arriving in Belgium in May 1945 less than a month after the war in Europe had ended. Initially equipped with the 17-pdr (76.2mm) cannon, which was one of the best tank guns, used by the Western Allies during the war. By the time the Centurions saw combat in 1950 during the Korean War, they had been up gunned to the more powerful 20-pdr (83.4mm) cannon. The 83.4mm remained the standard gun on the centurions until the early 1960s when a further increased specification brought the 105mm L7 on board.

Israel used Centurions in the 1967 Six Day War, 1973 Yom Kippur War and during the 1978 and 1982 invasions of Lebanon. Centurions modified as armoured personnel carriers were used in Gaza, the West Bank and on the Lebanese border. The Royal Jordanian Land Force use Centurions first in 1970 to fend off a Syrian incursion within its borders during Black September events nad later in the Golan Heights in 1973. South Africa also commissioned Centurions in Angola.

The 4-man crew of the Centurion was well protected with armour up to 152mm thick. Stowage bins on the turret sides helped provide standoff protection from HEAT rounds. High-explosive anti-tank warheads (HEAT for short) were enveloped during the Second World War as ammunition made of an explosive shaped charge that uses the Monroe effect to create a very high-velocity partial stream of metal in a state of superplasticity (deformed well beyond its usual breaking point), and used to penetrate solid vehicle armour. The Monroe Effect is the focusing of blast energy by a hollow or void cut on a surface of explosives.

The skirts along the suspension helped protect against anti-tank rockets. Various upgrades allowed the Centurion to stay in active duty until well into the 1980s with exports to Canada, Denmark, Israel and South Africa. They saw action in numerous wars including the Indo-Pakistan Wars, Arab-Israeli Wars, the 1956 Suez War and various conflicts in South Africa and Cuban forces.

Here on site, our MK13 Centurion is being worked on as we type. The air cleaners, oil pipes and radiators are off, the auxiliary generator and engine disconnected and work has begun to split down the engine to be able to get to the bolts that hold the engine in place.

Joe has disconnected the clutch from the crankshaft and has been working on re-wiring for the magnetos, which send the sparks to the spark plugs. He has re-worked all the sensors to get them all working and has disconnected the throttle and the choke linkage. Various water pipes have been undone and the oil and petrol tanks have been removed from the right hand side of the engine.

The next job for Joe was to undo the main bracket at the back of the hull that supports the turret, to remove the oil filter and dynamo off the engine and remove the exhaust manifolds off the engine.

Joe is hoping that the engine will come out in its entirety later today. The engine will then be stripped down with parts replaced and serviced followed by a compression test. It’s then decision time! The preferred next step is to replace the existing petrol engine with a diesel engine which will make the Centurion more economical to run and therefore more available to use and also make it more reliable. But that depends on a diesel engine fitting into the space from the extricated diesel version. So, the next step remains to be seen! Watch this space for the next update!

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