King Tiger AKA Porsche turret
Posted: Mon Sep 15, 2025 1:28 am
The Bovington tank museum has made a statement that this tank is going to be restored to running condition. Very exciting.
It does make me wonder what tracks they will use on V2. It was originally fitted with double link Gg 24/800/300 tracks but the British examiners replaced them with the single link Kgs 73/800/152 tracks from Tiger II 9 or 12 that was also captured at Haustenbeck. It would be nice to see it fitted with its correct ones after all these years although they would likely need to be reproductions given the only other set of these tracks is correctly fitted to their Porsche suspension Jagdtiger.
Some of the other missing parts like the cupola and rear turret hatch are apparently in an undisclosed private collection, would be good to see them reunited.
This restoration might even bring enough attention to the topic to finally put the Porsche turret myth to bed too.
Another unlikely dream of mine would be to see the US Army Armor & Cavalry Collections Panther II and V2 together at a Tankfest some day given how deeply intertwined their development was. Panther II would be a much easier restoration as it was running in 1988 before a faulty fuel pump set the exhaust on fire.