Sherman Tank Versions

Sherman tanks came in many variations.  These variations meant the tanks looked and performed differently.   Nearly 50,000 Sherman tanks were made in WWII and many were upgraded during their service life.  Sometimes upgrades were an improvement given to most of the fleet and other times they were individual upgrades when a tank had been damaged.  They used 75mm guns, 76mm guns, and 105mm howitzers.

They had Lee / Grant style suspensions, the so called heavy suspension most common, and the HVSS the late war and post war most common version.

Some had a pistol port on the turret, it was removed, and later put back on.

They had at least three different gun mantlets.

Early tanks had one hatch on the roof of the turret and later had two hatches on the turrets.

Sherman tanks had diesel and gasoline engines.  The diesel were often used by the USMC and the Soviet Union.  The most common gasoline engines were Ford and Continental, but there was also one by Chrysler which did not see combat.  Different engines made different engine decks due to the size or shape of the engine and the ventilation and fuel requirements.