50 Cal verse Tank

[Karnak]

DejaVu,

The specific reason cited was penetration.

[rogwar]

Originally posted by Karnak
DejaVu,

The specific reason cited was penetration.

How would that perform against Kurt Tank?

[Voss]

Originally posted by Karnak
DejaVu,

The specific reason cited was penetration.

That doesn't invalidate Deja's argument, necessarily. A poorly aimed round is very unlikely to hit at a ninety degree angle on demand.

Still, I remember that scene in 'Saving Private Ryan' where the German 20mm(?) cannon was brought in to shoot the Infantry guys swarming on the Tiger. The only thing penetrated there was flesh. Ah, but that's Hollywood.

[Hortlund]

I posted this in another thread a long time ago.

Many use the battles in Normandy as examples of how devastating airpower is against ground units. In fact, most Whermacht-wieners (LW whiner sounds wrong when talking about ground units, but you find these guys everywhere there is a discussion about wwii) will claim that the only reason the allies won in Normandy was because of their airpower. While this may be true or not, airpower had an almost neglectable effect on combat damage in Normandy. Let me give an example:
Often the German attack at Mortain is used as an example to show the effectiveness of the fighter-bombers as tank killers. But in fact this engagement is rather an example of vastly exaggerated claims. The British 2nd TAF claimed to have destroyed or damaged 140 German tanks in the Mortain area 7 - 10 August, while 9th US Air Force claimed 112. This actually exceeded the number of German tanks employed in the operation. In fact no more than 46 tanks were lost in the operation and of these only nine had been hit by air weapons. That is 9 out of 178 tanks actually used in the area. It is also interesting to see the claims. British and American pilots claimed 252 German tanks destroyed or damaged, the real number was 9...

It seems that very few German tank were lost due to hits from weapons carried by aircraft. Probably no more than about 100 tanks were lost due to hits from air weapons during the entire Normandy campaign. Rather it seems that air attacks on tank formation protected by AA units were more dangerous to the aircraft than to the tanks. Allied losses of aircraft were considerable, the 2nd TAF (including elements of Air Defence of Britain that took part in the Normandy campaign) lost 829 aircraft, while US 9th Air Force lost 897

The main reason for the poor results of air attack on tanks was lack of suitable armament. Machine guns and cannons had sufficient accuracy, but lacked the power necessary to produce more than superficial damage. Heavy bombs could destroy a tank, but it took a direct hit, which was very difficult to achieve. The vaunted rockets had sufficient penetration capabilities. Trials against captured German Panther tanks showed that the rockets could penetrate the armour except on the front of the tank. The accuracy of the rockets was however alarmingly low, even when fired in salvos of eight. At trials on training ground in England the probability of achieving a hit on a tank was at most 4 %. On operations, when the aircraft was subjected to AA fire and the targets not stationary on an open field, hit rates must have been even lower.

Mortain is not an example of unusually low efficiency for the allied air forces either. It is interesting to see the causes for losses of Panther tanks. Three British studies of captured Panther tanks (or wrecks of Panther tanks), two of them during Normandy and one during the Ardennes battle gave the following results:

6 June - 7 August 1944
AP shot: 36
Hollow charge projectile: 7
HE shell: 7
Aircraft rockets: 7
Aircraft cannon: 2
Destroyed by crew: 6
Abandoned: 3
Unknown: 13

8 Aug - 31 Aug 1944
AP Shot: 11
Hollow charge projectile: 1
HE Shell: 1
Aircraft rocket: 2
Aircraft cannon: 1
Destroyed by crew: 44
Abandoned: 30
Unknown: 6

17 Dec - 16 Jan 1945
AP Shot: 16
Hollow charge projectile: 0
HE Shell: 3
Aircraft rocket: 3
Aircraft cannon: 0
Destroyed by crew: 10
Abandoned: 10
Unknown: 5

Evidently two of the main causes for losing Panthers were abandonment and destruction by the crews. These two categories accounted for nearly half the Panthers lost and during the period in August they constituted 80 % of all the Panthers lost. Air power only accounted for about 6 % of all the lost Panthers investigated. Those investigations showed above also included other types of tanks. Of 40 Tigers only one was hit by air weapons, of 121 Pz IV's (yup..our panzers) nine were hit by air weapons. Evidently allied air power was not really capable of destroying large numbers of German tanks.

Oh..and the number of German tanks knocked out by MG:s or .50 cals is 0.

Source: I. Gooderson, Allied Fighter-Bombers Versus German Armour in North&endash;West Europe 1944&1945: Myths and Realities (Journal of Strategic Studies, vol 14, No 2 June 1991) p. 221. The basic sources for the data on destruction of German tanks and other equipment used by Gooderson are the reports of the operations research teams that investigated the battlefields after the end of the battles and examined the wrecks found. These are probably the most reliable sources for such information avialable today.

[illo]

Originally posted by DarkHawk
I can see 20 or 30 mm cannon but 50 cal.

Well I can't.

[illo]

Originally posted by Creto
Have to agree with Durr,  I see alot about the .50s impact on MBTs.  The panzer F, G, H and J was produced in hugh number right up to the end of the war.  But compared to such monsters as the Maus, King Tiger, Panthers and Tiger I it was pretty wimpy in the armor department.  

Armor in these tanks were designed and placed to protect it from other tanks.  I'm sure air attacks were considered but topside armor was still pretty thin.  Though in real life you may not have gotten the big explosion you see in AH the .50 still ought to have good chance of penetrating topside armor and disable a vehical such as the IV H.

Not much change at all. You can ignore facts if you want to.

Here illustration of 50cal penetration against PzKpfw IVh top.

[Wotan]

seems steve comes throught again

[wipass]

Interesting, this is with a 75 mm round, you can also see the thickness of the hatch (i think)

http://agw.warbirdsiii.com/bbs/attachment.php?s=&postid=92292

wipass

[gatt]

Answer: "its a game concession"  

[Turbot]

Warbirds III vehicles are much better, that HotSeat guy is a nut for tanks and even went to the actual tanks and measured armor for his models.  AH vehicles are OK, but my impression is they were not nearly so well done as their Warbirds counterparts.

The quest for the perfect game IMO would be Warbirds vehicles and AH planes.

[SKurj]

warbirds vehicles??? otto and all? +)


SKurj

[Shiva]

Not much change at all. You can ignore facts if you want to.

Here illustration of 50cal penetration against PzKpfw IVh top.
http://216.91.192.19/forums/attachment.php?s=&postid=419862

Take a closer look at that diagram, Illo. Notice how much the penetration falls of at a 60° impact angle? Looking at that diagram, a .50 round would penetrate out to about 375m, but once you get out to a 60° impact angle, the penetration drops to almost nothing.

Now think about this for a moment. 100% penetration out to a distance of 375m when the firing plane is diving vertically on the tank, with penetration falling off to near-zero at a dive angle only 30° shallower. At a dive angle of approximately 70°, the 100% penetration range is only 250m.

Assuming that the pilot is diving at a dive angle of 70° at a speed of 300 mph (480 kph), fires precisely as he reaches a range of 250m, and immediately begins a pullup to leave him level at an altitude of 50m, which requires a 6.5G pullout -- assuming that the pilot pulls out immediately upon reaching a range of 250m. If the pilot lets his range close to 200m to put more rounds into the target -- less than half a second after reaching 250m -- the G force in the required pullout increases to 8.8G.

If the pilot's aircraft is moving faster, the required G forces become uglier. At t speed of 350mph (560kph), the pullout from 250m range is at 8.8G, and the pullout from 200m range is at 12G.

From the attacks I've watched from the target's view, I have never seen an attacker attempting to strafe my tank from a dive angle more than 45°, which from the diagram you reference would give no chance at all to penetrate the top armor, and no data about penetrating the side armor -- but if the side armor is at least as thick as the top armor (pretty well guaranteed), the .50 fire would have no chance to penetrate the armor there.

[Jack55]

Originally posted by wulfie




Cool chart of how .50 MG ammunition became more lethal:

http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/cal50evol.gif

Those SLAP rounds are sabot rounds I believe.  They are not something you would want to use in foreward firing aircraft guns.

[john9001]

panzer mk IV had 10mm top armor , early MK IV had 14mm side and rear, latter MK IV 30mm side and rear.

for the metric challenged, 10mm =3/8" , 14mm= 1/2", 30mm=1 1/8"

[-ammo-]

Posted this before, and is relevant to this discussion.

In my reading time in recent days, I have been enjoying a good one that Sancho loaned me. Its called "ANGELS ZERO by Robert Brulle. It’s the one fighter-bomber pilot’s story of his role in WW2 in Europe between mid-June 44- wars end. Bob flew P-47's the duration of the war with IX TAC (9th Air Force). This is a highly recommended read for of us, not just the P-47 nuts, or the allied nuts.

On to the subject. I found this very interesting. I am going to just quote it straight from the book for you all to read.


After D-day, and a foothold was established in France, the pilot had a chance to inspect some rubble and damaged locomotives once they were moved to a temp field in France.

"We first noted that the cab (of the locomotive) had two inch thick steel plates welded around it to protect the engineer. It was obviously not armor as several 50 cal bullets had pierced it. I also followed the path of a 50 cal API round that went through the steel drive wheel several inches thick, ricocheted off the lower flange of the engine I-beam structure, and imbedded itself sideways in the upper flange. I had a hard time prying the round out for a souvenir, and it didn’t have a scratch on it. It was an amazing revelation of the power of a single armor-piercing round"

"A tiger tank was disabled by repeated strafing, and twelve trucks and a staff car were destroyed.

The reader may wonder how strafing a tank could disable it. Recall that our .50 cal API rounds pack a wallop that could penetrate several inches of soft (not hardened) steel. (Recall the story on our visit to the Laon railroad yard, where I followed the path of a .50 cal API round that went through a locomotives drive wheel.) During the war, we thought the penetration power of our API round was sufficient to disable a tank by shooting off the tracks. To research the issue and keep the record factual, I contacted several armored vehicle historians and specialists. Their collective views are summarized below*.

The .50 API round fired from fast moving AC does indeed have a high momentum but the German tank armor was very hard and massive and the round only dinged the armor. The most vulnerable area (least armor thickness) is the rear deck compartment and the top of the turret. The tracks are extremely hard steel and .50 API were shrugged off with little damage. A lucky hit was possible that might cause the tank to throw a track, but if they were on a hard surface they could keep moving on the road wheels. The Germans in 1944-45 had three main battle tanks in use. They were the Mark IV, which was a medium tank comparable to the American M4 Sherman tank, and two 50-plus-ton heavy tanks, the mark V Panther and the Mark VI Tiger. The Panther and the Tiger completely dominated the Sherman.

The Mark IV had a lightly armored rear deck that could be penetrated with our 50 API rounds and set the engine on fire, but the panther and the Tiger were mostly impervious to our strafing. In those tanks the crews would just button up and hope that we wouldn’t call in AC that had bombs since that would finish them. There is a case on record where a Panther tank was strafed by P-47's for an extended time. The massive strafing shot off all the equipment parts carried outside the tank, and entombed the crew by dinging the hatch lips, effectively welding the hatches closed. If we could catch the tanks while on a road march far from the front lines they sometimes-carried extra fuel and ammunition strapped on the outside. In those cases strafing could ignite the fuel or ammunition, possibly destroying them. Although we couldn’t be sure of damaging or destroying a heavy tank, our strafing was sure to affect the crew psychologically, having to stay cooped up hearing the constant rattle of our rounds hitting the tank and not knowing when a bomb or other heavy gun would finish them off. In summary, strafing a tank could do nothing or it could destroy them, depending on the circumstances.”

*= Conversations with Dr. William Atwater, Director, US Army Ordinance Museum, Army Proving Ground, Md., and Mr. Uwe Feist, historian and author of German Armored Vehicles. Two of his books are recommended. Ewu Feist and Bruce Culver ”Panzerkampfwagon Panther” and “Panzerkampfwagon Tiger”

Brulle is a good author, telling it like it was for a “Jabo” pilot in the days after D-day and through the war. I suggest it to all that enjoy WW2 aviation books.