German Armour What If?

[Nic.H]

Hi...

Not stoking the flames but making an observation...the panther copied the t34 for sloping armor, but the Germans used hi grade steel alloy.....tigers and panthers could easily penetrate the sloping armor with high velocity shells(seen pics where the shells had gone through as if it was butter)....now this is the key.."high velocity!"..Western and Russian shells were not high velocity..not till the end anyway

Where western and Russian lacked in steel tensile...the Germans were way ahead... yes yes...sides were vulnerable...but ALL tanks are weak side on....remember the triangle...gun...speed and armor...got to be balanced..or you get the tiger, a box ...or a lighter tank..the panther...less weight with frontal slope, but still a compromise with the sides...regardless how high... so look at the Comet....regarded as a Tiger killer...yet it was a box...all flat sides....but velocity had been introduced with the gun ....old argument I know...


And optics...the Krauts(I am half of one..so I can call them this!!!)...had good optics right from the beginning...

Nic...

Only in '45 were there tanks that could match the Germans....don't get me wrong...I am a Comet man...the father of all british tanks....but you see the time lag....RAF and USAAF were the only reasons that the Germans slowed down...

I have now lit the fuse of this little fire cracker..I shall now stand back!!

[Nic.H]

Oh yes...and the Germans for some reason like torsion bar suspension...which was all internal...so raised the tank height..


Nic

[JayBrd]

I have now lit the fuse of this little fire cracker..I shall now stand back!!

Gee Thanks Nic!!


You should put the matches down and get crack'n on your Panther again!!

[mustclime]

I think you guys are getting it now. Track hight is pretty much set buy how high of a wall/rock you want the tank to crawl over...so thats a given. Yes you have armor behind the road wheels, so that is more or less a given as well. My point was that the fwd layout forced the hull to be higher and with the extra armor needed, this razed the tanks overall weight. I love this pic so I will post it again....



The panther just has so much more hull to hit above the tracks, If you just talk about exposed sq footage above say 5ft. There is not compairison. There are several things that could have added years to the war imo. Things like mp44 going strait into preduction in 42, the me262 being rushed into preduction in late 42 rather mid 44, the XXII uboats being ruched into preduction in 43 rather the money and material goinng into the rocket program and lastly the vk3002 DB being chosen over the krup design of the panther.



With its simple leaf spring suspension, rwd less thursty deseil motor and its easy to produce design...the germans could have had and extra 6000 of these by mid 45.....and with this as the base design for the king tiger...that would have been a real "what if". I have said it before but the germans made the wrong panther.

[FreakyDude]

OK peeps
I started a new thread called LIVELY DEBATE lets move this discussion there so I can get this thread back to my "What If build".

maybe I should have closed this a while ago but the opinions was what I was after as when I first started

[fv432]

Sooo Freakydude what plans have you got ?

(trying to get it back on track lol)

nic stop playing with matches you know what happens if you do lmao

[FreakyDude]

well FV432
here is a pic of my idler tensioner, The springs are from a muffler on a 1/10 buggy, the bolts everything sits on are stainless with brass nuts. There is sections of brass tube that sit over the threaded bolts and then bearings at the pressure points in the hull and on the outside of the posts. It moves quite freely with rising tension. With the rear wheel drive I am hoping I only need to keep the pressure on the idler from a downward motion as the track will be pulling on the idlers. when the tank is reversing there will be no tension on the idlers at all. If i run out of tension all I have to do is move the screw on the floor plan farther back stretching the spring more. I think this should work quite well, I love the rising tension of the spring when stretched a bit it becomes quite strong.
The bolts you see sticking out at the front will be cut off, now that both sides work I need to make it look better.

[Saxondog]

Might I suggest another bar across the hull,using this to retain the springs,it will also act as another stabilizing member for the hull sides?

Also this will remove any interference with your suspension system?

idler tensioner 002.jpg (40 KiB) Viewed 1791 times

I found another series of German Armor 1945+ designs if you would like me to post them,one seems rather similar to the direction you are moving?

[FreakyDude]

Saxondog that spot is where the SLU will go when I get it. I am going to try and get everything I can in the front now as it does seem to be rear heavy at the moment.
Please post the designs, I would like to see them.

[Saxondog]

Ok give me a moment to find them,be right back

These I POSTED BEFORE

i DON'T THINK i posted these but the middle one possibly