Serious question on tanking in AH

[Kegger26]

Originally posted by Glint
Bullets are a funny thing. A short but true story. A New Jersey State Trooper was following a pick up truck believed to have been used in a felony. The truck pulled into a dirt driveway that lead up to an abandon house with a circular driveway by the house. The driver of the truck stopped abruptly and shifted into reverse and then rammed the Trooper car. This trapped the Trooper inside of the car as the driver exited his truck. The driver was armed with a shot gun and approached the Trooper. The trooper was able to get his sidearm out and fire several rounds before the driver of the truck fatality shot the Trooper. Upon investigating there were bullet holes in the hood of the Troopers car. It was concluded that the holes were made from the troopers gun when he shot through the windshield. The bullets hit the windshield and were deflected into the hood instead of hitting it's intended target.
     So never under estimate what a bullet will do when it hits an object at any given angle.


 All the reasion we use the new IQ rnds in our guns. We still use 9mm so we need the extra advantage of a "smart" alloy bullet.  

Now on topic.... I killed a Tiger about a month back from a shot from my P51B with four .50s. Now if it was a glitch or not I do not know but it happend, and I was accused of cheating. Soo who knows how it works.



“Never argue with an idiot!
They'll bring you down to their level
and beat you with experience.”

 All the reasion we use the new IQ rnds in our guns. We still use 9mm so we need the extra advantage of a "smart" alloy bullet.  

Now on topic.... I killed a Tiger about a month back from a shot from my P51B with four .50s. Now if it was a glitch or not I do not know but it happend, and I was accused of cheating. Soo who knows how it works.

[Furious]

Tumor,

With a low enough angle of incidence, a bullet will ricochet off of nearly any material.  Since the under side of a tank and the road are parallel, the normal angle of incidence will be the same for both the road and the armour.  If it's gonna ricochet off the road, it's gonna ricochet off the harder armour.

[ALF]

Originally posted by Kweassa
Tank bottoms, are everybit as armoured as sides or tops.

 If a bullet can't penetrate it with a direct hit, it certainly will not penetrate it by ricocheting against a hard substance first.

 If the angle of the bullet striking the ground is shallow enough to bounce a bullet on asphalt, then the angle of that same bullet hitting the tank bottom after a ricochet, is exactly same as the first bounce angle which caused the ricochet. If a bullet will ricochet against asphalt, then it will ricochet off an armoured tank belly.

At the risk of sounding rude, I must point out the folly in that first statement, tank underbellies are notoriously weaker than the sides, and the tops.  There is armor, but its nothing close to the thickness of the heavily armored frons or sides.

Secondly, this is not a matter of opinion, it is a matter of factual reports by combat pilots.

One important thing that seems to be a HUGE misconception here is that a bullet striking the ground at 15º will ricochet off the ground at 15º.....this is 100% incorrect (albiet a very common assumption).  One of the nasty things about ricochets is that they a VERY unpredictable.  Bearing in mind that the projectile isnt hitting a surface that it cannot pennetrate at all....it is indeed going to pennetrate some, and the fluid dynamix (at that speed what we think of as solid is much less so) are very complex and some of the bullets will undoubtedly shoot up at a much greater than 15º angle.  The energy conserved in such a journey will also be variable.

We arnt talking about blowing up the tank in a blaze of glory here either.  All that was needed to disable a tank was for one gear, chain or other viltal component to fail.

[-Concho-]

Originally posted by moot
http://www.hitechcreations.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=97126

what i was thinking...

[ccvi]

Originally posted by ALF
Secondly, this is not a matter of opinion, it is a matter of factual reports by combat pilots.

After strafing tanks they flew between the tracks below the tank to analyse the damage. Their reports can't be wrong.

[Shiva]

Originally posted by ALF
Secondly, this is not a matter of opinion, it is a matter of factual reports by combat pilots.

Who strafe a tank and see the crew bail out as they pass overhead at 300 mph, then go home and claim a kill, while the tank crew inspects their vehicle, patches the hole in the exhaust pipe, gets back in, and drives on.  A fighter pilot is not going to hang around doing cloverleafs overhead to make sure that the tank he 'killed' stays dead; he's going to get back up out of the ground fire and look for another target. So unless a pilot claimed a tank kill by bouncing rounds off the road into the tank's underbelly, and then a tank was found in that location that was destroyed by underbelly penetration, I would discount  any claims of 'ricochet' kills.

I would expect that, had there actually been any such kills, that they would have been identified when the wrecks were examined after the area had been overrun -- and would have been listed in battle damage records. But no one seems to have produced more than anecdotal pilot claims.

[vorticon]

if the bullets wont penetrate armour at that thickness from that range why the hell would it be able to after blowing its speed bouncing of the road...then you have to deal with the angles...i simply dont know enough about how tanks were built to make any guesses about it...

[Skorpyon]

though the topic has shifted slightly from the original, I will keep it going..  Found this, which seems to pretty strongly support the "nope" side in the .50 cal vs Pzr underbelly argument.

http://www.p47advocates.com/messages/1235.html

Also, one thing to consider... one of the key components in penetrating armor is high velocity, which relatively speaking, the .50 cal has.  The problem with the ricochet theory is that any object making an immediate, significant change in direction, especially due to coming in contact with the proverbial "immovable object", would lose a great deal of its original velocity.  The sharper the angle of ricochet, the more serious the loss of velocity.  I have been a shooter all my life, both recreationally and competitively.  I HAVE seen a bullet, yes, the entire bullet, ricochet straight back 180 degrees and land at my feet.  Problem was, after hitting whatever it hit that changed its direction so severely, it had lost so much velocity that I could see it coming... and this was a .357 magnum round, with an initially high velocity.  The thing just plunked in to the sand at my feet and I picked it up.  The hypothesis would be that tank armor, even belly armor, would be thick enough to repel a richocheted, (direction changed/velocity diminished) .50 cal round with little difficulty.  Just my inflation adjusted 2 pennies worth.  

[Blue Mako]

Originally posted by MetaTron
It is possible that airmen saw tank crews abandon the vehicle when they attacked and counted it as destroyed...

Dumb argument.  If tank crews were immune to strafing aircraft then why would they abandon the tank?  Would you leave the safety of tonnes of steel and expose yourself to being strafed if there was nothing to fear?  No way, crews would only abandon a tank if they were in fear of their life, especially if there was enemy aircraft attacking at the time.  To suggest otherwise is just silly.

[Weavling]

http://www.fanta.dk/showmovie.asp?mid=96DF4FD3-90D9-47FA-A011-F33D2A0C48E4

[ccvi]

"tank crew" in this case is not just the few people sitting inside...

[BenDover]

Originally posted by Blue Mako
Dumb argument.  If tank crews were immune to strafing aircraft then why would they abandon the tank?  Would you leave the safety of tonnes of steel and expose yourself to being strafed if there was nothing to fear?  No way, crews would only abandon a tank if they were in fear of their life, especially if there was enemy aircraft attacking at the time.  To suggest otherwise is just silly.

The thought of the aircraft's next pass being that of droping bombs ever come to your mind?

Secondly, this is not a matter of opinion, it is a matter of factual reports by combat pilots.

Yeah, i guess they had a better view flying at 300mph and getting the hell out of there than RAF inspectors examining the tanks with a magnifing glass


Its well known that pilots exagerated their 'kills', and the amount of 'kills', particulary those of the Unitied States AirForce, you know the guys surposedly bouncing these magic .50cal bullets into a tanks belly?


Speaking of the RAF inspections, they discovered that very little, something like less than 5%, amount of tanks were destroyed by mg fire, most were taken out by rockets and bombs, and alot more were scuttled by the tank crews. If my memory is serving me correctly that is.

[MetaTron]

Originally posted by Blue Mako
Dumb argument.  If tank crews were immune to strafing aircraft then why would they abandon the tank?  Would you leave the safety of tonnes of steel and expose yourself to being strafed if there was nothing to fear?  No way, crews would only abandon a tank if they were in fear of their life, especially if there was enemy aircraft attacking at the time.  To suggest otherwise is just silly.

I suppose you could be right. When my tank is hit I just start screaming for supplies and wait for the magic crate to arrive. Why should it be any different for men with their lives at risk? What was I thinking?  

[Blue Mako]

Engage brain and read again.  The argument I was commenting on was that pilots probably saw tank crews abandoning their tanks after a strafing attack, even though the tanks were undamaged, thus claiming a kill of a tank by strafing.  Why would tank crews abandon an undamaged tank?  Did tank crews run away from their vehicles every time an mg was fired at them?  Think about it.

[DrDea]

I saw something on this on the Hystory channel.it was a P 47 show.They said that in a few instances it had actually been done.A .50 COULD penetrate bottom hull armor.Notoriously known for being thinner.IE Mines...attack the bottom.Sticky bombs were aimed for the bottom or treads.Cant prove any of it and its hard to say but I wouldnt disscount it right out.