>>6163973Ammunition shortages weren't a huge issue for the Germans, surprisingly, but things like fuel and parts were always in critical demand due to design creep constantly adding more armour and weight with every iteration, causing monstrous fuel consumption and excess strain on already unreliable parts like the engine and tracks. Ergo you ended up seeing a lot of
>>6163974 where tanks were modified to carry as much spare fuel, tracks and road wheels as possible. As far as I know the circular boxes for road wheels were a field modification and were never official. I'm thinking that maybe the standard boxes may have put flat spots on the wheels after rough travel and the third spare container was a "bugger it, we always need more spares" decision.
My favorite "bits" modification is applique armour using tracks and road wheels. Pretty much anything was fair game, and I found my 40k conversion can strap a length of tracks to the turret roof using scale chain that stretches just so over the hoist lugs. It looks great.
