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Show Utah Guard Launches New Training Course A special maintenance and operation course to acquaint 20 key personnel of the Utah National Na-tional Guard with the proper care" and operation of the new M-55 eight inch howitzers recently re-cently assigned to Army Guard units, began this week in Salt Lake City, according to Major Gen. Maxwell E. Rich, Utah Ad-iutant Ad-iutant General. The four week course for Guardsmen from Logan, Ogden, Salt Lake City, Provo, Beaver arid Cedar City is given by technical tech-nical representatives of the new Vehicle School, Ordnance Tank Automotive Command, Detroit. On January 12 a second group of instructors will demonstrate the firing and recoil mechanisms and similar equipment. Instruments Instru-ments and fire control mechanisms mechan-isms will be covered in the final two weeks of the course. Instruction on the many hydraulic hy-draulic and electric power assists of the vehicles will be an important im-portant part of the course, which will consist of both lectures and practical demonstrations. Last May the Utah Guard received re-ceived over $8,000,000 worth of the new weapons, capable of firing fir-ing atomic artillery projectiles, enough to equip three battalions in northern and southern Utah. In spite of their enormous size and wieght the huge M-55's can be operated almost as easily as an automobile. They have power steering, automatic transmission and an 800 horsepower, 12 cylinder cyl-inder air cooled engine. The new engine was designed especially for the M-55. It has considerably more power and far fewer main-tenace main-tenace and cooling problems. Parts are interchangeable with several other military enginees which further reduces the maintenance main-tenance problems in military operations. The new howitzeT is highly maneuverable, capable of speeds on good roads of about 35 miles an hour and 20 miles an hour across country. It can convert from travelling position to firing position in only a few minutes and can move out again just as quickly. |
