10-21-2020, 06:05 AM | #41 | |
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Brighton
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Re: Knocking out a WW2 tank
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Going more experimental: Dogs with explosive harnesses were tried but didn't work (dogs preferred the more familiar Russian tanks they had been trained on)
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Grand High* Poobah of the Cult of Stat Normalisation. *not too high of course |
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10-21-2020, 06:21 AM | #42 | |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Wellington, NZ
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Re: Knocking out a WW2 tank
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A penetrating hit with such a rifle wouldn't usually do critical damage to a tank, but multiple shots mean that sooner or later something important gets a hole in it - crew, fuel lines, control lines, etc.
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Rupert Boleyn "A pessimist is an optimist with a sense of history." |
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10-21-2020, 07:39 AM | #43 | |
Join Date: Jul 2006
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Re: Knocking out a WW2 tank
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ampulomet ...there we are. |
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10-21-2020, 07:50 AM | #44 | |
Join Date: Jul 2006
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Re: Knocking out a WW2 tank
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Reinforcing bridges for tank operations is still at thing in the modern era, and it was even more normal back in WW2 when roads an bridges were often built for horse-carts. IIRC there are reports from the invasion of Poland of panzerpioneer units having to reinforce bridges for PzIIs to cross... |
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10-21-2020, 08:28 AM | #45 | |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Wellington, NZ
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Re: Knocking out a WW2 tank
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Rupert Boleyn "A pessimist is an optimist with a sense of history." |
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10-21-2020, 09:46 AM | #46 | |
Join Date: Jul 2006
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Re: Knocking out a WW2 tank
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10-21-2020, 10:31 AM | #47 |
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: Chatham, Kent, England
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Re: Knocking out a WW2 tank
A bazooka, A PIAT: get as close as you dare, shoot at: 1 rear, 2 side, 3 tracks.
Escape. Expensive. A teller mine, A panzerfaust: lay the mine / set up a booby-trap wherever the tank will probably go, then retreat to a safe distance and repeat. Single booby-traps cause delays out of all proportion, successful or not, as the victims look for the other ones. Cheap. A panzerfaust can be wired to a fencepost /door-frame / table at about three feet off the ground and activated by a tripwire or object acting as a lever, look up the panzerfaust manual's diagrams. Hope this helps. |
10-21-2020, 04:06 PM | #48 | |
Join Date: Jul 2006
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Re: Knocking out a WW2 tank
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Also, several movies that I recall show German troops (and, in one I think Finns) placing AT mines on top of the tracks of a Soviet tank in close assault. Not clear whether this was a historical tactic and whether they were expected to follow the track round and be triggered when they were drawn under it (or around the idler or drive or something) or whether they were to be fired some other way... |
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10-21-2020, 04:46 PM | #49 | ||
Join Date: Oct 2010
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Re: Knocking out a WW2 tank
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Quote:
The Lee/Grant: A poor layout, but the only way to get a 75mm gun into the field quickly. Allegedly known as "a coffin for 7 brothers" to the Soviets, but that may be apocryphal. To be fair, it was always intended as a stop-gap. Still much appreciated by British tankers who finally had something beefy which they could properly attack anti-tank positions with, rather than trying to charge down with machine guns. Difficult to compare directly due to it's odd layout, but probably not as good vehicle all round, but starting to be a contender. The various British cruisers, which were as close to a "medium tank" as Britain produced: Various shades of bad to mediocre. Fast, sure, usually, but often suffered reliability problems, and often either had to choose between being undergunned (2pdr armed designs) or 2 man turrets (many of the 6pdr armed tanks), and a tendency to be lightly armoured, and lacking much (if any) HE capability until outside the mid-war period. You do have the odd duck which is the Valentine, which was allegedly an infantry tank, but was used in both roles. Had the same firepower problems, but was reliable, and decently armoured for the period. In balance, all probably inferior tanks to a mid-war panzer 4. The T34 - 2 man turret, with worse visibility. There were various other issues, but the rest could arguably be put down to problems caused by rushed production, poor production quality, and the inexperience of the crews. However, otherwise it was a more advanced design. Superior in terms of protection and mobility, and comparable in terms of firepower (significantly superior initially, putting aside accuracy issues, probably slightly outclassed once the long 75 was adopted, but still fully capable to take on it's main opponents when it could find and hit them, which were probably the major difficulty). These obviously improved as the war went on, which it had more space to do than the Panzer 4, but in the "mid war" period, probably overall a comparable vehicle to the Panzer 4 with the long 75. Sherman: Yup, definitely a more advanced design. Firepower probably comparable again, and not hampered by a 2 man turret. Armour again superior. Mobility was apparently comparable in the mid war period. The slight edge the Panzer 4 probably has in firepower (a gun with superior penetration, at least in most cases by the time the Sherman was in action), is probably countered by the inferior levels of protection it has. Both could knock each other out at typical engagement ranges. So, looking at it's "mid war" contemporaries, the Panzer 4 was a good tank. It was a little outdated in it's design, but not by any margin that didn't mean it couldn't stand up to its opponents. The best of the mid war designs (the T34 and the Sherman) were more advanced, but really had not had the time to get to their full potential yet. Those tanks had matured a bit more by the late war period, where I can agree the panzer 4 was long in the tooth, and arguably obsolete but I still think it is a stretch to say grossly so, given it could still take other medium tanks on in a straight fight (whereas a Panzer 3 probably could not). The main advantage they had was they were both still capable of receiving further improvements where it could not. |
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10-21-2020, 05:31 PM | #50 | |
Join Date: Jul 2006
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Re: Knocking out a WW2 tank
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tank, wwii |
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