What was the Type 64?

The most readily available information on the Taiwanese Type 64 in brief, is this; around fifty units were constructed out of marrying an M18 Hellcat tank destroyer turret with a M42 Duster self propelled anti-aircraft gun chassis.

The Republic of China Army was supplied with surplus M18 Hellcats (around 214 units) and were used for front-line service, starting from 1952 to about 1971.

The M42 Duster was a self propelled anti-aircraft gun produced from 1952, entering service in 1953, changed designation to M42A1 in 1956 and ending production in 1959. It has been very hard to find out when The Republic of China Army first took delivery of these, in operational order or as parts. As of 2012, M42/A1 Dusters were still in service with the ROCA, in their original configurations.

However, somebody came up with the idea of salvaging the turrets off the worn out Hellcats and install those into the Duster chassis and the first Type 64 came into being. Out of the fifty units created, only two remain, one on display at Armor Academy military base, Camp HuKou, HuKou, Hsinchu (top of post picture) and at the Chung Cheng Institute of Technology (pictured below, source: http://ff1073.pixnet.net/blog/post/29454065-2003%E5%B9%B4%E4%B8%AD%E6%AD%A3%E7%90%86%E5%B7%A5%E6%A0%A1%E6%85%B6 ).

If anybody out there can read what the plaque from the Armor Academy Type 64 has to say, I would be very curious to know.