Up-armouring a Sherman tank using telephone directories???

[Gil Boyd]

I would have to side with Skiprat on this one. Sandbags were the choice of all soldiers whether in a tank on not.
The key thing on defeating the opposition from dropping a HESH round into the cab was to get as much angled deflection on the tank as possible, and by placing the track spares on the front would indeed help......a little.
Mines are, by their very nature designed to stop and disable a tank for a given period whilst the crew change the track, or hit a more substantial mine that it kills those inside. Thats why sandbags in my book would have been used.
The turret front armour was just 76.2 mm (3 inches) thick, angled at 30 degrees from the vertical, giving an effective thickness of 87.9 mm (3.46 inches). The opening in the front of the Shermans turret for the main gun was covered by a rounded 50.8 mm (2.00 inches) thick rotor shield.
Sandbags would be needed in my view to reduce the shock wave and blast from mines, envariably setoff by the tracks, and therefore from an oblique angle. Sand and bags in plentiful supply too>