How would the Squad disembark?
The leap from on top of a tank hull to the ground can be jarring, particularly when loaded up with field gear and weapon.
The other thing to think about is in Armored Infantry Regiments, the "driver and one or two squad members would remain with the halftrack to operate the machine gun"
So could this vehicle fit a 12 man squad, if the driver and vehicle commander were counted?
Also, Smoke Grenade Launchers would be good.
All very salient points on where I want to take this. Luckily with the benefit of hindsight I am planning to address most of this. I hope.
The first point is the most pressing. The top of the Lee is very high, so this has been discounted off the bat. I have built a 1/35 Defrocked Priest (Kangaroo BTW the Italeri "Kangaroo" isn't that good a start for a Normandy version. Use a Dragon M7 Mid/Early as a basis) and getting in and out is highly impractical. The RAM Kangaroo was a little better. But these were really never supposed to deploy infantry in battle conditions.
So far I plan to have the side doors fold down, with a pop down step. So fully laden infantry can clamber down over the guards/running gear only. The top hatch to hinge up a bit to give some headroom, helmet or not a whack on the scone onto armour is not pleasant (Some experience there during IMT training). My minds eye sees a cable/winch mechanism to close them up.
My time line is post Africa into Sicily/Italy with these being withdrawn before D-Day, so pre the formation of the APC Regiments. So I see this as more of a Battle Taxi, with crew being drawn from Tank resources initially and as such would stay with the vehicle. I am really hoping I can get a squeezy full 10 Man British Infantry section in, if not, 8 is probably a good compromise.
Considering the Universal Carrier could doctrinely hold 4 men this would appear to be a great advance with the benefit of overhead armour.
Smoke launchers.. certainly. This will be a British type innovation/conversion.
I want to see if I can minimize the amount of "workshop" time and resources to make this practical. Much like the very practical NA75 Churchill tank, another Sicily/Italy innovation then never saw service anywhere else, no matter how practical it was.
Again I find myself doing the hand wringing of practical whiffery compromises.
Later update, a bit of proof of concept building. Pretty much that is what my mind eye sees, lets see if it can be delivered