"Engineering Analysis of the T34/85 Tank"

[dirtdart]

Download the audio tapes for "in their own words." One of the vets interviewed was a loggy who cleaned and repaired tanks to send back into action. Sobering.

[PR3D4TOR]

T-34 was an awesome tank in 1941 when they were first put into action near Moscow. The Germans had almost nothing that could defeat its armor at the time, and the 76.2 mm gun was more powerful than those on all German tanks in service. The M4 would have been equally impressive in 1941. We must not forget when analyzing their performance later in the war that the T-34 and M4 are the contemporaries of Spit V and P-40E. They were updated and up gunned later in the war, but they were no match for the newer tanks coming off the production lines in Germany in 1943-45. For that we must look to the Pershing, the Centurion and a whole lot of what-could-have-beens that never made it into production.

[Chalenge]

Download the audio tapes for "in their own words." One of the vets interviewed was a loggy who cleaned and repaired tanks to send back into action. Sobering.

Early after D-Day most of the first generation M4's were having real troubles with survivor rates. Soon though, all of the M4s with wet-storage ammo bins and the larger 76mm gun began to be used in more realistic tactics. In tank school these men had been told they had the best tank, which was true but it is not designed for tank-vs-tank combat. There were many 76-mm M4s that crews survived as many as five tanks being knocked out. And of course, with proper tactics they did manage to knock out even Panther tanks. Even then it was not within their design to fight tank-vs-tank.

Aces High is nothing like WWII when it comes to the tactics, of course. While we have the tanks, we do not have towed artillery, Division level combat, or infantry. Finally, the restrictions of terrain that kept the Panther on low and level ground does not exist in Aces High. Even the M4 can traverse much steeper ground in AH than it could in actual fact. That's a game concession that we must live with since the terrain itself is not intended to be realistic.

[Rich46yo]

Would not the temperature of the metal also have a effect on how strong or weak it was?

Cold Temps and long storage times for steel actually was a factor for steel quality in Soviet production. So much steel was left laying about due to sloppy accountability and the stress on the Industry base and the moving of it that there was a lot of brittleness in armor plate to varying degrees. Most of all early on when their production capability was so stressed. They got better at everything as the war progressed but their tank steel quality was never on the German level anytime in the war.

Credit the soundness of the T34 design and the courage of its crews for its successes.

[DaveBB]

The ambient air temperatures of a Russian winter are enough to be able to shatter a carbon steel plate if simply dropped on the ground.

[Wolfala]

Download the audio tapes for "in their own words." One of the vets interviewed was a loggy who cleaned and repaired tanks to send back into action. Sobering.

I would like to listen to it but can you direct me specifically to where I can find this?

[dirtdart]

Dunno. I had them on cd years back. Let me look around.