AMC 34

Before the first vehicle was even delivered, it was decided on 26 June 1934, as part of the Plan 1934 to improve both quantity and quality of French tank production, to change the specifications for an AMC: its armour had to be immune to anti-tank guns. As the AMC 34 was not strong enough to carry the extra weight it was redesigned into the AMC 35. No more orders of the original type were made.

France, however, had such a dearth of modern tanks that it could not afford to forget the twelve pre-series vehicles. In January 1936 they were taken into use with the 4th Cuirasssiers, at first fitted with gun turrets removed from Renault FTs and then with the APX1 turret also used for the Char D2s, armed with an SA34 47 mm gun. By 1937 the growing production of more modern tanks allowed the AMC 34 hulls to be shipped from France to Morocco to be used by the 1e Régiment Chasseurs d'Afrique, which received them on 15 December 1937. They were at the time the most modern armoured vehicles in the colonies, but were refitted with the two-man APX2 turret. It took many months before 25 mm guns could be fitted as well; until that time the tanks drove around with just the 7.5 mm machine guns. The tanks used the ER 28 short wave radio (all AMCs were supposed to have radio sets); also a better protected fuel tank at the back was installed together with a safer horizontal ventilation grille on the back engine deck. In November 1939 the AMC 34 was replaced by the "H 39"; three vehicles were taken by 5 RCA and used for driver training. These and the other nine vehicles do not appear on the armistice control lists, so they were either already scrapped in the summer of 1940 or hidden.

In 1935 the Belgian cavalry started a mechanisation programme. It was planned to equip all six cavalry regiments with an organic squadron of twelve tanks: eight T-15 and four guntanks. To fill the latter position on 13 September 1935, 25 AMC 34 hulls were ordered with Renault, at a unit price of 360,000 French francs, and 25 turrets with APX. The AMC 34 had been chosen over the competing Vickers Medium Tank Mark F after testing the prototype from 7 until 10 November 1934. It was stipulated that the production vehicles would be of an improved configuration and be delivered in a rate of three per month from October 1935 onwards.[1] However, due to technical and financial problems, Renault was unable to deliver. Only after a delay of over three years, ten hulls were exported of the more modern AGCI1 or AMC 35. The ordered APX2 turrets were refitted with Belgian 47 mm guns and 7.65 mm Hotchkiss machine guns; thirteen were used on coastal defence pillboxes.