smoke generator on Japanese Tanks WW2

[mackeebryanee13]

Hello everyone! I hope you all doing fine and safe!
Does anyone have anymore info about this interesting Japanese defense system?

Would be appreciated

Thanks

 

[tom!]

Hi.

All Afaik:

There was no official army program for smoke launchers on armored vehicles. Some troop improvisations were made from available engineer equipment:

Same as above, standard small smoke candles fired by pulling wires through the pistol port seen above the "discharger"

Same system as above next to the cupola of a Type 97 Medium Tank

similar system as above but using the large engineer smoke candles

On an Armoured Working Vehicle SS

Yours

tom!

 

[mackeebryanee13]

Thanks tom. This is good pictures.
What book does this came from?

 

[tom!]

Hi.

These pictures were collected from various websites, my favourite is the forum https://forum.axishistory.com/index.php In my opinion there are only few reliable non-japanese sources on japanese army ground forces topics. But there are many people quite good in everything regarding IJA and IJN on the website mentioned. Maybe you can get further infos in the "Japan at War"-Thread there.

Yours

tom!

 

[tom!]

Hi.

Some additional infos from Axis history forum:

a) To be exact, it is not smoke discharger, but a mount of Type 99 self-projecting smoke candle(九九式発射発煙筒).
Type 99 is an official weapon for general purpose. It was used standing on the ground or attached to improvised base. At tank unit, it was attached to tank with a mount locally improvised. So, there are several manners to attach according to unit.

b) In the late WWII, two types of smoke dischargers were developed at Chiba Tank School. One is long-range smoke discharger. It could launch a smoke candle in 1,000m distance. Another is instant smoke discharger. It launches many smoke candles and hides a tank instantaneously. They were judged as effective, but I have never heard that they were actually used on tanks.

Taki

Taki is a special expert on IJA ground forces technologies. I posted my pic 1 on the forum and this is his reply.

Type 99 self-projecting smoke candle. The candle was fired by a pull igniter visible on the top

Type 99 self-projecting smoke candle.

length 8.2 inch​

diameter 2.1 inch​

body color grey​

White Japanese characters on side.​

weight 2.9 pounds​

smoke mixture HC Type​

Projectile has sheet metal casing. Igniter tube extends whole length of projectile. Under bottom cover match head exposed through slot.

Type 94 large smoke candle (here with a floating device ). Pic 3 shows these smoke candles used in a similar way.

Type 94 large smoke candle

length 18 inch​

diameter 6 inch​

Body color Grey​

white label on side​

weight 44 pounds​

Smoke mixture Berger type​

Hinged wooden handle at top, attached to metal band around casing. Small screw cap lid.

Data from the US Army "Handbook on Japanese Military Forces"

Yours

tom