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There does appear to be several versions of the Panthers history. Roy Hamilton, of the Littlefield restoration team recounts thus;
"When the Panther first arrived (in USA), it was in a very sad shape as would be expected from spending the better part of 40 years under water and suffering from the effects from the demolition charge set off in its interior when abandoned. The turret was pieced together from parts of the original turret".
(The turret was in fact so badly damaged that much has been rebuilt by the guys in USA).
"Other damage caused by this explosion included blowing the bulkhead between the fighting compartment and the engine about 5 inches into the rear! This also broke most of the torsion bars, tearing loose and moving the upper deck support forward, breaking and blowing down part of the bottom of the left sponson. Many of the seam welds also failed; blowing up the deck itself, plus lots of other damage.
The first job was to completely disassemble the tank and all of its componets to ascertain what was salvageable and what had to be found or made from new. New metric steel was ordered and a new top deck and all its components was made along with new bulkheads, sponson bottom, deck support, engine compartment etc. After all this had been re-fitted the entire hull was sandblasted and all of the rust pits were filled in. At about the same time a "new, old stock" turret ring was located and brought from France".
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