A tank a day keeps Politicians at bay.

Discussion in 'The Lounge Bar' started by von Poop, Nov 1, 2019.

  1. Robert-w

    Robert-w Banned

    Apparently it had a ferocious recoil that could fling the entire vehicle backwards sometimes shedding crew members in the process
     
  2. Dave55

    Dave55 Atlanta, USA

    "Luxury!"

    German Bison

     
  3. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

    I always think the German conversion of captured Mk.VIs to 10.5 GsW looks like it'd roll a full 360 back onto it's tracks after firing, spindly spade or not..

    Quite sweet, though. :unsure:

    vickers-105mm-german-spg.jpg
     
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  4. Ramiles

    Ramiles Researching 9th Lancers, 24th L and SRY

    Comet at Cobbaton Combat Collection

    Blake Hornsby on Twitter

    "The Comet, sadly rusting in the carpark of the Cobbaton Combat Collection. Hopefully a future restoration project."
     
  5. Robert-w

    Robert-w Banned

    There appears to be a star of David on the front right of that SPG which I'm pretty sure wasn't an orthodox (or even reform) marking on German AFVs of the period
     
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  6. Dave55

    Dave55 Atlanta, USA

    Used in German heraldry too but I have a feeling not a lot during the 30s and 40s

    Coat of Arms of Hamburg.
    upload_2019-11-12_19-16-43.png
     
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  7. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

    Possibly an early insignia of the 227th Infantry Division.
    Not certain.
    They seem to have taken the strange little vehicle Ostwards.
    gp1-vickers-spg.jpg
     
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  8. Dave55

    Dave55 Atlanta, USA

    Hope it made it to Kubinka.
     
  9. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

    13.
    M50 Ontos (Thing)

    Since it's cropped up once, and we've veered onto 'Small', why not.
    Another air-portable 'maximum punch' idea. Rejected by the US Army, & in the way of such things: carried on by the USMC.
    Its original tank destroyer role was largely put aside by them in their finest traditions of destroying absolutely everything in the way.
    Not exactly common in Vietnam, but seems to have been reasonably well-liked for street-obliterating street-fighting.

    Quite a clever (if slightly batshit) design using off-the-shelf parts & maximum simplicity, but once again I'm reminded I really don't have that much good technical reference on it.


    (Whoops. Just ordered the Osprey as Blackwells have it for roughly half anywhere else... Edit: It was a fiver & a bit an hour ago - now not. Seems their pricing system as weird as Amazons.)

    LW09n3B.jpg ssssss.jpg ontos_v1.jpg imagesontosser.jpg 1 qVP1fZjsWESIRBGLWXjfBA.gif 800px-m50_on_chu_lai_beach_1965.jpg
     
    Last edited: Nov 13, 2019
  10. Owen

    Owen -- --- -.. MOD

  11. Robert-w

    Robert-w Banned

    Post war a great deal of effort and resource was wasted on the development of very light armoured vehicles. Three American AFVs typify this; these were the Ontos, the Scorpion and the Sheridan all of which were attempts to produce air portable vehicles with a big punch. All three were actually used in Vietnam.

    Ontos development began in 1950 and the vehicle was in service with the US marine Corps by 1956. The name is taken from the ancient Greek for ‘thing’ which quite effectively describes the vehicle. It wasn’t quite a tank and it wasn’t exactly a self propelled gun but somewhere in between. It was originally intended as an air portable ‘hit and run’ anti tank weapon but never used in this role. Armed with six 105 mm recoilless rifles it combined all the advantages and disadvantages of these weapons.


    In its favour the Ontos packed a big punch for its diminutive size. Firing HESH or hollow charge rounds it should have been able to knock out the largest of enemy tanks. Its small size and nimbleness would have given it a chance in a shoot and scoot operation. It would have needed every advantage it could get; it would have been outranged when facing tanks with conventional high velocity guns so that it its best chance of success would have been greatest when operating from an anti tank ambush. The record of anti tank operations in the Western Desert and subsequently in Normandy and Germany indicate that a well dug in anti tank gun can usually expect to be able to fire off a number of rounds before its position can be pin pointed and retaliatory fire commenced. Even then a good dug in position could provide significant protection both directly and by presenting as small a target as possible. It is the nature of the recoilless weapon that its first shot reveals its position. The back blast will also make the design of any dug in position more difficult (it is usually a good idea to have as much empty space behind the gun as possible). Self propelled armoured anti tank guns (including tanks) usually try to operate in a hull down position with only the turret or gun protruding over a natural fold in the ground or a man made mound. The design of the Ontos would force it to have a significant portion sticking up ‘over the parapet’. Once it had fired its first salvo it would need to employ some PDQ scooting.

    The nature of recoilless weapons is such that no one in their right mind would share an enclosed turret with one; the back blast would produce a nicely cooked gun crew. Consequently the Ontos’s guns were mounted on the outside of the vehicle. This produced an interesting paradox; the designers of the Ontos had considered the dangers to its crew such that they needed to be protected by armour but the weapons system was so designed that to operate it someone had to get out of the vehicle (in this case to reload the guns). The paradox could be more than interesting when the Ontos was being operated in an environment where there was considerable small arms fire (as in Vietnam).

    About 170 examples of the Ontos were used by the US marine Corp in Vietnam. One of the Marine Corps many talents seems to be the ability to make the most of obsolete or unsuitable weapons and their crews did their best with the Ontos. The vehicle appears to have been mainly used by battalion commanders in a reactive manner to deal with situations as they arose rather than as an offensive weapon. One issue may have been the Ontos’ vulnerability to mines, a problem shared by other lightweight AFVs in Vietnam. The Viet Cong and North Vietnamese forces were very ingenious in their use of the mine. The Ontos did have an anti personnel round that was very effective in clearing areas of jungle and many of its former crews have expressed the view that it could have been used much more aggressively. On one occasion Ontoses were loaded onto riverboats to provide water borne firepower in a surprise attack. This proved very successful.

    The Ontos was developed by the Allis-Chalmers' farm machinery Division. The history of AFVs is full of attempts to covert agricultural and construction tractors into tanks, usually with scant success. The Ontos reverses this process as after their decommissioning in 1970 many of them were stripped of their armour and successfully converted into tractors. Some may still be around on building sites and farms today.

    The M56 Scorpion (not to be confused with the British light tank with the same name) was an air portable self propelled gun developed to meet the same requirement as the Ontos. It shared a similar suspension and track system but was armed with a powerful 90 mm anti tank gun. To keep the vehicle small and light the only armour protection for the gun crew was a simple shield. There was no protection from wind and rain whatsoever. Its crew would have felt very exposed in any environment but especially so on the battlefield. It did have an advantage over the Ontos in that it was much less likely to be out ranged by the tanks of the late 1950s and early 60s and could therefore engage at a greater distance (and hopefully away from small arms fire). The US Army adopted the Scorpion for airborne units. It was never used in anger as an anti tank weapon but a number were despatched to Vietnam where it acted in a fire support role. Apart from its extreme vulnerability to ambush (a serious problem in an environment like Vietnam) the Scorpion had a major flaw in that it was too light for the weapon it carried so that when this was fired the recoil could send the whole vehicle leaping backwards (presumably scattering any crew men who had failed to hang on very tight). The gun would then have to be layed on to its target all over again. The Scorpion saw fairly limited use before being permanently retired.

    The Sheridan brings up the rear of this potentially airborne trio. First announced in 1966 it was intended to be “the fastest, deadliest and most advanced armoured combat vehicle ever devised”. A conventional turreted tank it was armed with the ill fated the 152mm M81 gun/missile system. It was an interesting hybrid weapon that could act as both a rocket launcher for the MGM-51 Shillelagh command IR-guided missile and a gun firing ‘conventional’ shells.

    American tanks of the 1960s and early 1970s tended to suffer from electronically assisted gun laying systems that were difficult for the gunner to use and not robust enough for combat situations. The dual functionality of the M81 added to this complexity and vulnerability especially since the gunner also had to act as a missile controller when the Shillelagh was in flight. In ideal, combat sterile, conditions both the conventional shells and the Shillelagh had a high probability of hitting the target and destroying it. However when the gun was fired in a conventional mode the fierce recoil often created enough shock to decalibrate the gun sight and some time was needed to realign and reset it. Worse still the shock could also put the Shillelagh missile guidance system out of order and in need of repair. The same effect could be had from a near miss by an enemy gun or even just the inevitable jolting of a tank crossing rough ground..

    The ‘conventional’ ammunition for the M81 differed from classic tank shells in that it did not have a brass shell case to house the propellant and act as a breach seal. A different self sealing breach was used and the propellant acted as a self consuming cartridge. This had a significant advantage as one of the many hazards facing tank crews had been the clutter of expended shell cases on the floor of the vehicle. Firing the missile of course involved no shell case. A simlar attempt to produce a hybrid gun and rocket launcher with a self consuming cartridge for use as an aircraft weapon but had been abandoned because a basic fault which was shared by the M81. This was that firing the rocket or the self consuming cartridge could leave a burning residue and hot gas in the breech which when opened would vent into the confined space of the turret. This could propel still burning pieces of cartridge around the turret, if one of these hit another cartridge waiting to be loaded this would take fire. Some early Sheridan tanks blew off their own turrets, This problem could only be partly cured by adding further complex equipment to the gun assembly in the form of a compressed air system that would blow all material out of the barrel after firing but before the breach could be opened. Complexity plus a combat environment equals a higher probability of equipment failure.

    It quickly became apparent that with such an unreliable gun system this vehicle was totally unsuitable as a tank killer. Accordingly in 1968 the US army shipped it off to a theatre where there was no danger of it meeting an enemy tank – Vietnam.


    In Vietnam the Sheridan proved to have other problems apart from its unreliable gun system. In order to save weight new aluminium based armour had been used, this was found to be ineffective against heavy machine gun fire which could penetrate the turret. The tank was especially vulnerable against mines. A mine that could cripple a Patton tank but leave its crew unhurt would kill the Sheridan’s crew. Above all else the tank was very unreliable. Statistics on the first 54 Sheridans sent to Vietnam show that in a year there were 15 major equipment failures, 25 engine replacements and 125 electronic circuit failures. The gun recoil mechanism fitted to the Sheridan repeatedly jammed. The M81 gun’s case less cartridges continued to be a constant problem producing over 40 instances of gun misfires and 140 ammunition ruptures (all of which put the crew at extreme risk). In 1970 use of the Sheridan ceased. The Sheridan development programme had cost over $1 billion.
     
    Last edited: Nov 13, 2019
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  12. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

    14.
    The FCM 2c

    There's big, and then there's really big. Makes Independent, TOG & T35 look like mediums.
    Photographers seem to have a penchant for lining as many people up alongside/on top, & who can blame them, especially when there's a dozen crew members around to facilitate.
    Estienne had visited a British tank factory in 1916 & seems to have got a bit carried away regarding building something bigger & more 'Landship-y'.

    Not unlike the German Neubaufahrzeugs, they mostly found a passing military role in propaganda shots. Despite being c.20 years old by 1940, they still looked good, well... big... in pictures.

    fcm-2c-heavy-tank-crew.jpg


    'France Expects...'
    Annotation 2019-11-14 014902.png
    904ac792246e779e217db0a8015ce7f8.jpg Char2C-91-11.jpg Char2-and-R35s_zpsjjo1kaf8.jpgoriginal-ConvertImage.thumb.jpg.312b84c7fdde773055c2d70be693f3f8.jpg

    Someone thought it wasn't heavy enough, so they did a single 'Bis' version with a howitzer & another few tons.
    18yt1gknnvtz.jpg
     
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  13. Tolbooth

    Tolbooth Patron Patron

    Always look as though it should have this Gentleman in front of it and large, ornate smokestack on top.
    [​IMG]
     
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  14. Robert-w

    Robert-w Banned

    The German A7V Committee had a number of heavy tank designs which were never developed. One of these was a heavy tank with two turrets, one facing forward the other rearward. This was a similar configuration to a tank actually built by the French. In theory the Allies had agreed to standardise on a common heavy break through tank, the British designed Mark VIII, to be built in factories in Britain, France and the USA. Known as the International this was an entirely new design but following the principles established by the Mark I to Mark V* series. America was to lead the way in producing this vehicle and in fact was the only country to produce any significant number before the end of the war. The International formed basis of the US Army’s heavy tank force in the 1920s. Whilst France agreed to standardise on the International some French elements seem to have had problems with the concept of using a British design and a French break through tank was designed and built. This was the Char 2C called the ‘Char de Rupture’, an apt title. The Char 2C fell into the bottom half of the super heavy category weighing 75 tons (almost twice as heavy as the International). It had tracks that went all round the hull which was surmounted by two revolving turrets one at the front and one at the rear. It was in many ways advanced for its time but proved to be not very manoeuvrable and this was to contribute to its downfall.


    The Char 2C was too late to see service in the First World War but a squadron was maintained in service right up to 1940 when it was dispatched to face the oncoming German Army. At this time the Char 2C still had a heavier armament than the majority of German panzers. Its designers had incorporated an interesting feature into the vehicle to assist in transporting it to the front. Each Char 2C had a connection at each end for a railway bogie. Jacked up and connected thus it became its own railway wagon. A train made up of the Char 2Cs and crew carriages was hurried off to meet the advancing enemy. Whilst it was passing through a long railway cutting it was spotted by Luftwaffe dive bombers. Bombs were dropped on each end of the cutting effectively trapping the train, in the narrow space it proved impossible to offload and manoeuvre the unwieldy Char 2Cs past the locomotive and carriages. In the face of the advancing German forces the French crews had to disable their own tanks and retreat on foot. Some of the tanks were restored by the Germans and paraded as war trophies.
     
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  15. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

    15
    The Skeleton/Spider

    Weighing in at a surprising 9 tons, there's some logic to the US Skeleton rhomboid. Light can equal good off-road, central box as armoured as any contemporary & raised up for wading. And, of course, shells just pass through... :unsure:.
    I'm not laughing, though - as it comes from that fascinating period when nobody had quite worked out what a tank as a truly efficient vehicle might be. I like 'intermediate' design where anything possible is worth a go. If the First War hadn't ended, who knows.
    Didn't know it was made from plumbing components - 'easily' dismantled for transport.
    Still extant at Fort Lee.

    Was hoping this might show it's parade through Winona in some form, but not available to me for GDPR reasons. Might open for some international visitors:
    (Once) Made in Winona: The stealth tank
    (Used a proxy... It doesn't.)

    index.jpg vsfr8h3itygy.jpg Skeleton_Tank_02_-_APG.jpg
     
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  16. Robert-w

    Robert-w Banned

    You've missed the point of the skeleton which was very simple.The Germans had realised that one simple defence against the tank was to dig wider trenches. Light tanks like the Renault FT17/ American 6 ton could not cross them. The skeleton was an attempt to produce a light tank with the trench crossing (and obstacle climbing) capability of a British rhomboid heavy tank. Apparently its downfall was twofold. Col.Patton, who was the technical advisor to the US Army Tank Board didn't take to the idea (he tended to do so to designs he had not been consulted on in advance) and the screw threaded commercial pipe joints used to work loose so that bits kept dropping off.
    An alternative was devised this was to enable the MK VIII International/Liberty tanks to carry 6 ton tanks piggy back through the trench lines and then let them off to harry the enemy rear. This was part of the 1919 planning.
     
  17. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

    16
    Kinderpanzer

    Not exactly keeping politicians at bay...
    Sadly that nice little page on them seems to have died.



    bund_f_3-036.jpg post-33-1100113798.jpg 244726-5008991-thumbnail.jpg childrenarmor.jpg
     
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  18. Dave55

    Dave55 Atlanta, USA

    Threefold. The war ended. ;)
     
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  19. von Poop

    von Poop Adaministrator Admin

    17
    The Wolseley Tracked Motor Sledge

    Pre-tank. :unsure:
    c.1910.
    Three made for Scott's Antarctic expedition.
    Apparently not a great success. Wooden tracks & other fittings, early engines. Not happy in extreme cold.

    See that cable at the front? Described in one place as steering, that is. With a man at the other end.
    i001170516.jpg


    Some more great images on a fine site:
    Freeze Frame » Search Results » motor sledge
    And a more general description:
    Freeze Frame » Transport

    This looks like an improved/different version, but might just as well be an earlier attempt. I do not know.
    Im1910v109-p336.jpg
    File:Im1910v109-p336.jpg - Graces Guide

    And it's a little more confusing as there were replicas made for films.
     
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  20. Richelieu

    Richelieu Well-Known Member

    This put me in mind of the wonderfully named Lancelot Eldin de Mole’s contemporary ‘tank’ of 1912.
    upload_2019-11-17_20-7-38.jpeg
    View digital copy
    View digital copy
     
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