Centurion shock absorber question

[Malcolm Towrie]

Hi, no responses on HMVF so I'm trying here.
I'm still plugging away at getting our Mk 5/2 Centurion drivable at the Ontario Regiment Museum. I'm lubing the long-neglected suspension now, and have a question about the two shock absorbers at the top of each large suspension unit. They are supposed to be submerged in a reservoir of a light ISO 12 viscosity hydraulic oil and they draw from that reservoir in operation. When I removed the fill plugs I found all of them very low in oil, possibly dry, and one with a fill of grease, or at least grease had been slathered down in the fill hole. I was surprised at the lack of oil because none of them showed any signs of leakage. Other oil-filled assemblies like the final drives and gearbox still had clean oil in them up to the correct level.

Then a member here who had served in Chieftains expressed his surprise that's the Cent has shocks, because he said the Chieftain didn't.

Now I'm wondering if it was decided the Centurion shocks didn't do anything useful and were just given up on, in the sense that no further maintenance was done on them. And the Chieftain consequently didn't even bother with shocks. Seems strange to me, but I thought this forum might shed some light.

Malcolm