Tank dilemma

[Yellow Fang]

I see in the news this week some interesting info on the tank front.

The militaries of the world regarded the German Leopard as the tank to have. Agile, fast, big gunned, well armoured. All the western armies dribbled at the sight of them.

The Turks have some Leopards and have sent them in to Northern Syria in their pogrom against the Kurds. Alas, the Leopards are getting hit very badly and being knocked out. The question now arises as to whether there is some major flaw in the Leopards design, or whether the Turks, who aren't famed for their effective military doctrine, are simply deploying them like muppets.

A Leopard.

 

[Yellow Fang]

I don't know which ones they are using but I have read in a couple of books regarding the Challenger 1 and it's replacement, that the Leopard tank was one of the tanks tested in the competition. I think that there were certain aspects of the Leopard that our test team didn't like.
What came up in the book was how much punishment the Challenger's predecessor the Cheiftain could take as proven in the Iran Iraq war.
It is interesting that I think this is the first time that the Leopard has been tested in combat .

However, I think there was a major problem with the Chieftain. The engine was designed to run on a range of fuels: diesel, petrol, chip fat, etc. Unfortunately it was very unreliable, and as it happened, it never needed that flexibility.

 

[Yellow Fang]

Look at production numbers. From wiki

Total axis tank numbers manufactured - some 49000. Of those 6500 were panthers and less than 2000 tigers of both types. Ok there were assault guns as well but its a figure

Something like 49000 shermans were produced - as many as all types of german tanks put together. And the sherman was as good or better than any but the tiger or panther, and likely more relaible than either.

The russians built rather more t34s of various models as well

If you say the shermans balance the non tigers, that still leaves 50000 t34s to deal with the 2000 tigers.

And that's not even reckoning the churchills crommwells matildas, is and kv heavy tanks, lees, grants, french tanks in 1940 etc etc

T34

The blurbs did say on balance the T34 was probably the most effective tank in the war. The Tigers were great but they took a lot of resource to build, and there were never that many of them. I think the Panthers were better in that regard. Shermans far out-numbered German heavy tanks, but allied tank crews were terrified of Tigers. It was bad for morale. It's a poor way to treat your servicemen to make up in numbers for a lack in quality. The Americans did fight bravely TBF. I read it took five Shermans to knock out a Tiger. The Tiger would knock out four while the 5th got around the back.

 

[subaqua]

 

[Profpointy]

View attachment 394345
T34

The blurbs did say on balance the T34 was probably the most effective tank in the war. The Tigers were great but they took a lot of resource to build, and there were never that many of them. I think the Panthers were better in that regard. Shermans far out-numbered German heavy tanks, but allied tank crews were terrified of Tigers. It was bad for morale. It's a poor way to treat your servicemen to make up in numbers for a lack in quality. The Americans did fight bravely TBF. I read it took five Shermans to knock out a Tiger. The Tiger would knock out four while the 5th got around the back.

Yebbut, formidable though the tiger may have been there were so few of them and many of those conked out or had no petrol. I have also read that there was a natural tendency to identify any enemy as a tiger, not unreasonable if you were terrified and peering through a slit looking at a long barrelled pzIV which perhaps didn't look that different. The 17lbdr of the firelfly could destroy a tiger I gather, and the 75 or 76 was ok for HE and for the larger numbers of pz iv they were mostly facing.

 

[byegad]

One fault with the Cromwell that made them unpopular with the crews was the hatches were quite small, making bailing out after a hut difficult. The Sherman had much larger hatches.

Also I'm not so sure about the Cromwell being more reliable. Certainly a fair few squadrons swapped over to the Cromwell from Shermans said they weren't as reliable as their old Shermans.

Post war use of the two also shows precious few Cromwells saw service with other nations whereas the Sherman was still in use with Chile, from Israel, although much modified by both nations into the 1990s. Yes a heck of a lot more Shermans were produced but looking for Cromwell users post 1945 shows the last use was in 1955.

The best selling point of the Cromwell was its 40mph top speed, much faster then contemporary tanks, and the steering system adopted meant that unlike other tanks is didn't suffer a large speed loss when turning. This was a bit much for the suspension and later they were geared down to a still fairly rapid 32mph.

 

[Yellow Fang]

One fault with the Cromwell that made them unpopular with the crews was the hatches were quite small, making bailing out after a hut difficult. The Sherman had much larger hatches.

Also I'm not so sure about the Cromwell being more reliable. Certainly a fair few squadrons swapped over to the Cromwell from Shermans said they weren't as reliable as their old Shermans.

Post war use of the two also shows precious few Cromwells saw service with other nations whereas the Sherman was still in use with Chile, from Israel, although much modified by both nations into the 1990s. Yes a heck of a lot more Shermans were produced but looking for Cromwell users post 1945 shows the last use was in 1955.

The best selling point of the Cromwell was its 40mph top speed, much faster then contemporary tanks, and the steering system adopted meant that unlike other tanks is didn't suffer a large speed loss when turning. This was a bit much for the suspension and later they were geared down to a still fairly rapid 32mph.

Yes, I have read since that the Sherman was reliable. I think the Cromwell was pretty much replaced by the Comet after the war. The Comet was based on the Cromwell but redesigned to take a bigger gun.

 

[nickyboy]

 

[subaqua]

Personally it’s braithwaite or balmoral ...

 

[MiK1138]

[QUOTE 4905630, member: 43827"]Bloody motorists, contaminating the countryside.

I'd choose a bike.

View attachment 365922 [/QUOTE]
Full susser is no good mate, the recoil from the mounted 50 cal would bounce you all over the place. need a good hard tail

 

[Drago]

 

[Yellow Fang]

Yebbut, formidable though the tiger may have been there were so few of them and many of those conked out or had no petrol. I have also read that there was a natural tendency to identify any enemy as a tiger, not unreasonable if you were terrified and peering through a slit looking at a long barrelled pzIV which perhaps didn't look that different. The 17lbdr of the firelfly could destroy a tiger I gather, and the 75 or 76 was ok for HE and for the larger numbers of pz iv they were mostly facing.

It was difficult to mistake a Panzer IV for a Tiger after being in the Tiger Hall at the Bovington tank museum, it was about a quarter of the mass. The Tiger 1 was frightening enough, but the Tiger 2, Jagd Tiger and King Tiger, Jesus Christ!

Those big tanks did look like the way to go. Most the post-war battle tanks were big brutes. However, I wonder if aircraft like the A10 Warthog made them all obsolete.

 

[Tim Hall]

View attachment 394363

Point of order m'lud. That's a cylinder. The tank is the thing in the loft.

 

[subaqua]

Point of order m'lud. That's a cylinder. The tank is the thing in the loft.

Hmm not so sure . The OED would define it as a tank , and also as a cylinder . Common parlance calls it a hot water cylinder .

But no doubts I am wrong ...


I was about the Wales Scotland rugby match ...

 

[Profpointy]

Point of order m'lud. That's a cylinder. The tank is the thing in the loft.

Tanks can be cylindrical can't they