Fixing the Italian Military, 1933~1945 (7 Viewers)

[Airborne2001]

Under the assumption that Italy does better in the early stages of the war with what was discussed here, they would likely need better stuff come 1943, so let's get the ball rolling on that discussion.
They need a tier 2 engine (1,250~1,500 hp range) followed by a tier 1 engine (1,750~2,000 hp range) for aircraft. The tier 2 is relatively easy, I-F could probably get that done sharpish with an Asso derivative. The tier 1 is much trickier however - maybe the Re 103 or AS.8 as a basis?

The best thing would've been Italy Balbo not canceling liquid cooled inline development for a few years until 1938. Italy was a world leading producer of quality engines... until that happened. Maybe they wouldn't have gotten the same quantity as Germany, but the quality was still up there.

Even so, there were two domestic engine designs that could've born fruit if things went differently:
1. Fiat A.38. This engine would've worked well if Fiat wasn't forced to copy the inverted style of the DB 600 series and shortening it. This was initially intended for the early versions of the G.55.
2. Isotta-Fraschini (I-F) Asso L.180. This was an inverted W (M) engine design that was started just before WWII. It was planned for a Caproni bomber project. If I-F didn't choose to instead focus on the troublesome Zeta and Sigma engines this design could've worked, especially given I-Fs history with this kind of engine.

The best thing to do still would've been to not cancel liquid cooled inline development in 1933. By the time it was reinstated in 1938, it was too late.

 

[TM06]

The best thing would've been Italy Balbo not canceling liquid cooled inline development for a few years until 1938. Italy was a world leading producer of quality engines... until that happened. Maybe they wouldn't have gotten the same quantity as Germany, but the quality was still up there.

...

The best thing to do still would've been to not cancel liquid cooled inline development in 1933. By the time it was reinstated in 1938, it was too late.

Well yes, I'm aware of that. It's one of the things I listed at the start of this discussion.

 

[Airborne2001]

Well yes, I'm aware of that. It's one of the things I listed at the start of this discussion.

Oh! My apologies for not seeing it then.

Here is a schematic of the Caproni Ca.325, which was the bomber intended to be powered by the I-F Asso L.180 that I mentioned:

It apparently was supposed to use a fuselage similar to that of the Ca.331.

 

[Shortround6]

1938 might not have been too late. Any later time is too late.
Problem/s in the 1930s, for Italy, is the fuel and money.
1941-42 Italy needed a clean sheet of paper engine. Not warmed over 1920s engines.
France fell into the same trap.
In the early/mid 1930s there was not enough money for new engines and the improvements in fuel did not demand much improvement in engine design/construction.
In 1934 does Italy come up with a clean sheet of paper V-12 design or do they just tweak the older engine/s (which have paid for tooling) to a slightly higher power output?
IN the 1930s liquid cooling went through about 3 changes in coolant.
100% water.
100% Glycol
Mixed water and Glycol with pressurized cooling system.
Turned out that the mixed liquied and pressurization could use roughly the same size water passages and radiator sizes as 100% glycol.
Glycol had offered smaller radiators and cooling passages compared to 100% water.
Higher knock rated fuel allowed for more boost which meant both more heat and higher pressure (stress) in the cylinders.
Higher rpm was being used in cars/trucks/motorcycles but that meant more heat, more stress which needed better materials and better lubrication.
It all has to come together at the same time or close to it.
And if all you have is 87 octane fuel you have to make different choices vs a country that has 96 octane or 100 octane or 100/130PN fuel.

If you want 1200-1350hp at 4000 meters you have to figure out how to get over 10,000lbs of air through the engine per hour at that altitude.

 

[Shortround6]

They also need better guns for their tanks. We can keep the 47/52 for light tanks like the AB 43 or Sahariano but the medium tanks need something better. The 75/46 is a great place to start for the medium cannons (KwK40, 76 mm M1, ZiS-S-53, 77 mm HV, Type 5, Pvkan m/43) but the 90/53 is obviously a shoe-in for a heavy cannon (KwK36, KwK42, 17-pounder, 90 mm M3). For my money, shoot for the P.43bis (sloped front armour 60~80 mm in thickness, 3-man turret, decently powerful engine, using a suspension designed for something heavier than a tractor) with a 75/46 by 1943.

Italy needed to get the 47/40 into wide spread production much sooner.
The Italians needed to get the 75/32-34 into a tank as soon as possible, the Sahriano was not it.
Italy has two real problems with tanks.
Low powered engines/drive lines.
Lack of steel to make big tanks.
Italy was never going to be able to build enough 35-45 ton tanks with 90mm guns to make any difference.
Two 26 ton P 26/40s or one Italian Panther/Tiger?
Two 330-350hp engines or one 650hp engine?
It doesn't matter what they could design.
They had to be able to build them...................in numbers.

 

[TM06]

Italy needed to get the 47/40 into wide spread production much sooner.
The Italians needed to get the 75/32-34 into a tank as soon as possible, the Sahriano was not it.

The Sahariano should take priority over the Medio series regardless, it's an objectively better platform even if only using the 47/40 - much better suspension and a more powerful engine + gearbox along with a better overall layout and armour profile. IIRC the production version of the Sahariano was planned to have a 75/34. Given how tiny the prototype Sahariano's turret was in comparison to the rest of the tank, a 3-man turret with the 75 is entirely feasible.

 

[Shortround6]

much better suspension and a more powerful engine + gearbox along with a better overall layout and armour profile.

Having a mock-up/prototype showing up in the summer/fall of 1941 is way, way too late. Getting several hundred into the field in the summer/fall of 1942 is just in time to get crushed at El Alamein in Oct/Nov 1942 and Operation Torch.
The Sahariano was a 13-16 ton tank. It was meant to combat the Cruiser MK IV which entered production in 1939 (Cruiser MK III entered production in 1938) so the Sahariano was 2-3 years out of date.
A 13-16 ton tank is a poor start for a 24-30 ton tank. Especially if you want to use even a 'medium' 75mm gun (US Grant/Sherman type) in it. You need enough 'tank' to absorb the recoil. You can use tank weight, gun weight, Recoil distance (turret size) and muzzle brakes to help absorb the recoil.
You can specify a 275hp engine at any time. Being able to build 275hp engines at even dozens per month is a problem.

Even the P26/40 used a two man turret.
And it had some real problems as an 'actual' tank.

Radio operator was in the hull next to the driver? Lack of vision devises in 1943?
Good gun but if you can't see the enemy, you can't shoot him.
Italians fell into the tank vs tank hole at this point. Yes, tanks need to fight other tanks. But they also need shoot other things, like trucks, artillery pieces and infantry. For these targets the co-ax machine gun is very, very useful. Bow machine gun less useful. Needing to have a man (75mm loader) stick his head and shoulders out the top to play with a machine gun feed with 24 round magazines is a lot less useful. Rate of fire for the 75mm gun falls to near zero for one thing. Getting the main gun loader shot by a feisty infantry man with a rifle is not a good tactical decision.
WIki, (poor source?) says 600 rounds of mg ammo for the P26/40 for co-ax gun and the out-of-turret gun. The smaller M series had around 2700-3000 rounds (?).
Germans managed to cram about 3000 rounds in the long-barreled MK IVs.
Perhaps the Italians could have found more storage. But they also needed a new machine-gun. 24 round box magazines for a co-ax gun was not a good idea in 1917, in 1941-42 is very, very poor.
Treading the path between cheap/producible and ideal/very effective/expensive was a very hard thing to do. The British certainly made a lot of mistakes (world champions in some years?).
Another question is how does the tank/AFV fit into the army as whole. British were very bad at this at the beginning of the war. How much artillery support did the Italian army have? What was the artillery support for the armored forces? How much air support and how much AA support?
What did the Italian armor need to do for itself and how much was just nice to have?

Italians vs British is interesting because just a few hundred different tanks in late 1940 and early 1941 could have affected the whole war.
By the end of 1942 you needed a thousand different tanks and very soon several thousand different tanks to make a big difference.
Italians (and the AK) were getting buried by not only Allied tanks but Allied Artillery and Allied Air power.

 

[TM06]

A 13-16 ton tank is a poor start for a 24-30 ton tank. Especially if you want to use even a 'medium' 75mm gun (US Grant/Sherman type) in it. You need enough 'tank' to absorb the recoil. You can use tank weight, gun weight, Recoil distance (turret size) and muzzle brakes to help absorb the recoil.
You can specify a 275hp engine at any time. Being able to build 275hp engines at even dozens per month is a problem.

You're taking it in the wrong direction here. Rather than beefing it up to 25~30 tonnes and having it as a medium tank, consider the possibility of a fast, low profile, roughly 20 tonne light tank with decent armament that can perform recon duties - somewhat comparable to the M24, Crusader and Puma. When viewed through that lens the Sahariano w/75mm becomes vastly more competitive.
I also think there's a bit of a misunderstanding, I'm not saying that the Sahariano could function as a Sherman-class medium tank. I'm saying that the design philosophy of the Sahariano's torsion bar suspension and general drive train layout should completely eclipse the Vickers-derived leaf spring suspension and drive train layout that the Italians have used in their tanks up to this point. If the Italians want heavier, more mobile tanks, they need to ditch the leaf spring suspension and rid themselves of the influence of the 6-tonne. The Sahariano just offers the most reasonable jumping-off point for that replacement effort.

 

[Shortround6]

You're taking it in the wrong direction here. Rather than beefing it up to 25~30 tonnes and having it as a medium tank, consider the possibility of a fast, low profile, roughly 20 tonne light tank with decent armament that can perform recon duties - somewhat comparable to the M24, Crusader and Puma. When viewed through that lens the Sahariano w/75mm becomes vastly more competitive.

The Italians could not afford the luxury of specialty tanks. They could not afford a 20 ton recon tank and 25+ton medium at the same time.

I also think there's a bit of a misunderstanding, I'm not saying that the Sahariano could function as a Sherman-class medium tank. I'm saying that the design philosophy of the Sahariano's torsion bar suspension and general drive train layout should completely eclipse the Vickers-derived leaf spring suspension and drive train layout that the Italians have used in their tanks up to this point. If the Italians want heavier, more mobile tanks, they need to ditch the leaf spring suspension and rid themselves of the influence of the 6-tonne. The Sahariano just offers the most reasonable jumping-off point for that replacement effort.

It doesn't matter how advanced your design is if you can't build it in more than handfuls. Can Italian industry supply the needed torsion bars every month, the needed armor plate (figure out how to weld before working on super suspensions). Can they supply 240-300hp engines in the needed numbers and the transmissions to go with them?

American M24 had some design problems (keeping the hull machine gunner at that point in war was pretty pointless).
Crusader in late 1942 with the 6pdr was a last gasp of the design. A bad tank for late 1942. Good suspension does not make up for two-man turret with bad vision.
If the tank crew cannon see they can't hit enemy targets. The 57mm was a good gun, IF IT HIT. Crusader also had a poor rate of fire/rate of engagement. How fast you can cross the desert doesn't make up for much if you can't fight effectively once you are there.

And there is a timing problem. Doesn't matter what the Italians can produce in the summer of 1943. The Allies are building hundreds of tanks each and every month. Not hundreds per year. Better tanks in 1940-41 might have done something to shift the balance. Better Italian tanks in 1943 delays things by 2-3 days?

 

[z42]

IN the 1930s liquid cooling went through about 3 changes in coolant.
100% water.
100% Glycol
Mixed water and Glycol with pressurized cooling system.
Turned out that the mixed liquied and pressurization could use roughly the same size water passages and radiator sizes as 100% glycol.
Glycol had offered smaller radiators and cooling passages compared to 100% water.

Are you sure about that? Glycol has about half the specific heat of water, so you actually need higher flow rate. Now, glycol also has a higher boiling point, so you can run the engine hotter, but that has limits as well, e.g. thermal expansion and knock. In practice I'm not aware of any engine that runs with a coolant temperature at anywhere close to the boiling point of pure glycol (197C).

Some properties of ethylene glycol - water solutions: Ethylene Glycol Heat-Transfer Fluid Properties: Density, Data & Charts

 

[Shortround6]

Are you sure about that? Glycol has about half the specific heat of water, so you actually need higher flow rate. Now, glycol also has a higher boiling point, so you can run the engine hotter, but that has limits as well, e.g. thermal expansion and knock. In practice I'm not aware of any engine that runs with a coolant temperature at anywhere close to the boiling point of pure glycol (197C).

Some properties of ethylene glycol - water solutions: Ethylene Glycol Heat-Transfer Fluid Properties: Density, Data & Charts

US went from 100% water to 100% Glycol (or 97%) and hoped to use 300 degree F or close to it temperatures. It didn't work as it turns out that heat transfer inside the engine didn't work the way they thought it would and they had to increase the oil flow/oil cooler size to make up for it and the while they got to use smaller radiators in end, it was not the big reduction hoped for. They had to reduce the max coolant temperatures considerably but still used higher temperatures than 100% water.
RR used 100% or close to it Glycol but I don't think they ever tried for the 300 Degree F goal.
What the French (Russian), Germans and Italians did I don't know, they might not have leaped on the 100% glycol bandwagon as fast and had to back track.
When the US and British went to a roughly 30/70 mix (Allison) they got some of the improvement in heat transfer without having to redesign the Allison and Merlin.
97-100% glycol was fiendish stuff to deal with as it leaked through openings that water would not go through even under the pressures used in cooling systems.
Using higher pressure in sealed systems helped with the temperature but there were limits to that.
Italians stopped building new liquid cooled engines about the time the 100% glycol craze started and didn't start again (experiments) until some of the problems showed up.
Racing engines are not the same as service engines.

 

[swampyankee]

Italy, until the defeat of the Axis in North Africa, also had to supply the the bulk of supply ships and escorts providing everything to those German and Italian troops in North Africa. The resources going to better tanks can't also go to the equipment needed to operate them (and the German's) on the southern coast of the Mediterranean.

 

[TM06]

The Italians could not afford the luxury of specialty tanks. They could not afford a 20 ton recon tank and 25+ton medium at the same time.

I'd argue that a light tank which can also perform secondary duties like recon and scouting is not a 'specialty tank'. But it's also worth remembering that the Regio Esercito would be getting more support in this theoretical as was discussed prior, with more steel and funds allocated to them (somewhat at the expense of the Regia Marina, mind) along with better optimization of their equipment lines and the cancellation of below-standard vehicles like the M11/39 and L6/40.
With what was discussed here, they almost certainly could afford to expand their AFV production.

It doesn't matter how advanced your design is if you can't build it in more than handfuls. Can Italian industry supply the needed torsion bars every month, the needed armor plate (figure out how to weld before working on super suspensions). Can they supply 240-300hp engines in the needed numbers and the transmissions to go with them?

While I agree, calling a relatively basic torsion bar setup "super suspension" is a vast misrepresentation. The Italians are not foreign to torsion bar suspension even prior to the Sahariano; the L3/38 used torsion bars with some L3/35's converted to use the same suspension.

However with the Fiat-Ansaldo duopoly disrupted, the engine side is easier to solve by turning to our friend Isotta Fraschini - the Asso 200 and 500 were obsolete in aircraft by this time but they could be repurposed as tank engines in a similar fashion to the RR Meteor, giving Italian tanks two reliable and easy to mass-produce engines in the 250 hp and 500 hp range in a very timely manner. Hell, you could even slap together two WW1-era Isotta Fraschini V.6's to make a decent V12 in the ~400 hp range.

 

[Shortround6]

I'd argue that a light tank which can also perform secondary duties like recon and scouting is not a 'specialty tank'.

If the light tank is close to the size/weight/cost of the main tank then there is a problem.
By the time the US was issuing the M24s of 18,400kg the M4-76 tanks were around 33,600kg.

better optimization of their equipment lines and the cancellation of below-standard vehicles like the M11/39 and L6/40.

The L6/40 was about 1/2 the weight of the M11/39 and was well under 1/2 the weight of the m13/42.
Both the L6/40 and M11/39 were both well behind the times (outdated/obsolete) when approved and placed in production.
Smarter choices would have given a much better effectiveness for resources expended but would have resulted in fewer vehicles.
If the Italians wanted/needed a tracked recon vehicle to complement the Autoblinda 40/41 they needed a bigger/heavier vehicle than the L6/40.
Wither it needed a bigger gun than the 20mm is debatable but it needed a two-man turret. Weight would have gone to 10 tons (?) but 20 tons is way too much.
As mentioned earlier, building the M11/39 after fighting Russian T-26s in Spain was a huge mistake. British were ordering the Crusader off the drawing board in 1939. The Italians were 2-3 years behind the design timeline. British stumbled and stumbled badly.

While I agree, calling a relatively basic torsion bar setup "super suspension" is a vast misrepresentation. The Italians ar e not foreign to torsion bar suspension even prior to the Sahariano; the L3/38 used torsion bars with some L3/35's converted to use the same suspension.

just using torsion bars doesn't turn an older suspension into a good one. Everything has to work together, Number and size of the roadwheels, travel of each roadwheel (both ways). Independent travel of roadwheels. Shock absorbers and number used.
L6/40 used torsion bars but it used 3 per side. 4 (eight twin) road wheels were mounted on a pair arms and pivoted. The two axle bogie assmemable was mounted to a large curved arm that was pivoted of the torsion bar. Rear trailing idler was sprung by a torsion bar. German MK III used on torsion bar for each roadwheel for independent movement.
Shock absorbers on the L6/40 are hard to find. Small or nonexistent?
Most people think of torsion bars as being used on independent road wheels.

250 hp and 500 hp range in a very timely manner. Hell, you could even slap together two WW1-era Isotta Fraschini V.6's to make a decent V12 in the ~400 hp range.

Engines were some-what easy, actually fitting them in tanks was a lot harder, See the British cruiser tank saga/tragedy/odyssey. From 1937 to 1943.
Getting transmissions to stand up to 300-400hp was often harder than getting engines.
Italians needed to make better stuff in 1938-1940. better stuff in 1942-43 is too late,

Actual war is expensive. Cost of guns and even tanks is not that bad. Cost of ammunition can be horrendous. A single 102-105mm howizer can go through 5,000 to 10,000 rounds of ammo before the barrel is worn out. Can be fixed with a new barrel and some maintenance at times. 10,000rounds of ammo is about 113.4 metric tons of empty shells (No HE or fuses) and that is finished weight, after machining.
Italians didn't have enough artillery or anywhere near the amount of ammo the British/allies did.

 

[ThomasP]

The cost of the ammo in comparison to the gun or entire tank is an interesting point.

In the NW ETO, most US tanks never fired their complete load-out of AP ammo type. There were exceptions, but not common.

This was a bit different in the Italian Campaign, where AP was often fired at bunkers and other improved positions in the mountainous terrain.

The British had a different experience in the North Africa Campaign - early-on at least - where long supply lines sometimes made it difficult to re-ammo in a timely manner, as well as due to the 2pdr & 6pdr tanks not having HE rounds for soft targets. AP rounds were often fired at the enemy AT guns in a sort of sniper action - very effective when on target, but not so effective when facing the longer range enemy 75mm & 88mm AT guns.

HE and Smoke round load-outs were another matter.

The US often used their 75mm gun tanks as mobile artillery - usually direct or semi-direct fire, but sometimes indirect fire . and could go through multiple normal HE load-outs in a single battle.

The British had their 3" Tank Howitzer in their CS tanks in the early-war. The hull mounted gun inthe Churchill Mk Is was only useful for close range direct fire (~1500 yds max effective) but the turret mounted guns could reach farther and had enough elevation to be used in semi-indirect and indirect fire over ranges out to about 2500 yds. Leaving aside the lack of HE supply in the early-war, the 3" was used with HE to good effect in the later Desert Campaign (East & West) - sometimes carrying 80-100% HE - as well as in the northern Italian Campaign where the 3" armed Churchills would fire multiple HE load-outs over time when engaging targets on mountain slopes & tops (the Churchill being the only medium tank able to climb some ot the slopes to get into firing positions with LOS to the target).

As in the later North Africa Campaigns, the British used their US supplied Lee/Grants & Shermans, and modified or new-build UK tanks with the 75mm for direct fire support and as mobile artillery in some situations.

In the NW ETO something like 90% of the fighting for US ground forces was in urban built-up areas, where the most tank gun fire was direct at the various German improved or hardened emplacements, or at AT guns & Stug IIIs situated at the end of the street or camouflaged/concealed in structures. The British faced the same situation in the urban built-up areas which accounted for most of their combat, but if what I have read is accurate they did a higher percentage of fighting tank-vs-tank in non-urban areas than the US did.

So, taking what has been said up-thread plus my input above, my question is what type of tank the Italians should have pushed for - based on what the Italian High Command thought the coming warfare was going to require? I have never come across any kind of authoritative source that gave the pre-war Italian view was re the subject of tank warfare.

 

[yulzari]

Á diverse suite of tank types is the last thing the Italians needed. What they needed was a single good medium tank with an effective dual purpose @75mm turret mounted gun upon which the available heavy engineering sources etc. could be applied. Essentially a Cromwell, T34, Sherman, PzIV equivalent. A Universal Tank in the standards of the day.

As to how they might have done it is another matter altogether. Easy to say but hard to make it happen. You can use a medium tank for recce but you can't use a light tank for assault. Unified equipment greatly eases both support and repair.

Of course we see the way with our perfect hindsight but in the pre war period, when one looks around at what powers were doing, it is clear that nobody actually knew what was needed and what would work and different power went off in all sorts of directions, even within each power. Everybody learned the lessons from actual battle and relied upon the medium tank, then supplemented them with heavy tanks post war until technology combined the two into a Universal Tank. But that only in the 1960s. In 1940-43 the medium tank became the tank of choice and the Italians had the engineering to pull off a peer medium tank had they made the decision in the mid/late 1930s. I recognise that Italy was trying build an army that could fight in Africa and also in the Alps. Just as the Commonwealth had to transit from an army for the open ground of North Africa to one for the close mountains of the Apennines etc.

 

[Shortround6]

Á diverse suite of tank types is the last thing the Italians needed. What they needed was a single good medium tank with an effective dual purpose @75mm turret mounted gun upon which the available heavy engineering sources etc. could be applied. Essentially a Cromwell, T34, Sherman, PzIV equivalent. A Universal Tank in the standards of the day.

The question is WHEN?
1st prototype Cromwell showed up in March 1942, first real field test of Centaur and Cromwell was in Aug-Sept 1943 which too late for the invasion of either Sicily or Italy.

Italy needed tanks for 1940-41, not 1943.

Using 2 or 3 different types was actually not bad. British were horrible way too many in service or development. Germans used 4 different tanks of their own plus the Czeck tanks.
Americans stuck to different basic types (hull/chassis) until 1944. Japanese used a number. Soviets had slew and had 3 basic types. Light Medium and Heavy. Expecting the Italians to leapfrog everybody else by 20 years is asking too much.

Italy had a manufacturing/resource problem. For every ton of steel Italy made the Germans could make 11-12 tons, and they had to depend on German coal to even do that.
Italians built about 2500 of the CV 33/35s which is way, way too many. They had trouble fighting old (WW I) British armored cars.

Germans built a lot of Pamzer I tanks but not quite as many and they had more money resources. British built about 2500 5-6 ton light tanks during the 30s. But from about 1936 on these 3 man tanks carried a .5in machine gun which could pretty much take out the small Italian tankettes at several hundred yards while the Italian tankettes need a lot of luck to take out the British light tanks. 6.5mm and 8mm machine guns need to be very close (dozens of yards) and hit weak points.
There was nothing wrong with making a recon tank. But make decent one. 3 man crew, not two. 20mm gun is fine for 1940-41. Can kill enemy armored cars or enemy recon tanks at several hundred yds (maybe 500?) Weight around 10-12 tons. Upgrade to 37mm gun? or the Italian 47mm gun?
The L6/40 was a waste of effort. If it had to fight it was in trouble. The 20mm gun was OK (not great) but the one man turret was problem. The man in the turret had to do too many things at once and the Italians gave him choice of either sticking his head out (in which case he couldn't shoot) or keeping his head inside in which case he couldn't see or at least not very well.
M11/13 was a complete waste. A French Char B made out of chewing gum wrappers and armed with blunt wooden sword and topped off with crappy vision for the crew so they were driving around blind.
Italians need to have something in line with the Panzer III even with the short 50 in late 1940 or early 1941. Enough armor to stop 20mm or most 37mm guns, enough gun power to go through 40mm at a decent range (30mm is obsolete in 1940) and turret with two or three men with some sort of vision so they can fight.
M13/40 fails on many of these counts. It's only saving grace was that the British were screwing up by the numbers in 1940/41 in tank design, anti-tank, and tactics.
German Panzer IV did not become main a battle tank (universal tank) until March 1942 when they started putting in the 7.5cm L/43 guns.

 

[TM06]

I had planned to continue on with the rest of the tanks, the discussion just got sort of stuck on the light tank. Here's the outline of what I was thinking for mediums;

• 1940~1941 medium tank: More or less the original P 26/40 but without the hull MG, the Breda Mod. 38 machine guns replaced with a variant of the Breda-SAFAT 7.7mm, torsion bar suspension with a 250 hp Asso 200, ZF-inspired transmission, and the 75/34 in a three-man turret. 25~26 tonnes. It's not going to be a world-beater but it should last them until 1942.
• 1942 medium tank: Same as above but with a sloped one-piece UFP and the Cannone da 75/34 updated to a longer barrel (36, 38 or 40 calibre), better radios, Asso 200 engine tuned up to 300 hp, wider tracks. 27~28 Tonnes. Design work started on the 1943 medium tank immediately.
• 1943 medium tank: Revolutionary design akin to the P.43bis - Welded armour supplanting the riveted armour (85mm sloped UFP, 100mm turret), torsion bar suspension, 500 hp Asso 500 engine (possibly de-tuned to 400 hp or 450 hp for engine life), ZF-inspired transmission, Cannone da 75/46 in a three-man turret, improved radios. 35~36 tonnes. This one should last them until the war's end.

 

[Shortround6]

I had planned to continue on with the rest of the tanks, the discussion just got sort of stuck on the light tank. Here's the outline of what I was thinking for mediums;

• 1940~1941 medium tank: More or less the original P 26/40 but without the hull MG, the Breda Mod. 38 machine guns replaced with a variant of the Breda-SAFAT 7.7mm, torsion bar suspension with a 250 hp Asso 200, ZF-inspired transmission, and the 75/34 in a three-man turret. 25~26 tonnes. It's not going to be a world-beater but it should last them until 1942.
• 1942 medium tank: Same as above but with a sloped one-piece UFP and the Cannone da 75/34 updated to a longer barrel (36, 38 or 40 calibre), better radios, Asso 200 engine tuned up to 300 hp, wider tracks. 27~28 Tonnes. Design work started on the 1943 medium tank immediately.
• 1943 medium tank: Revolutionary design akin to the P.43bis - Welded armour supplanting the riveted armour (85mm sloped UFP, 100mm turret), torsion bar suspension, 500 hp Asso 500 engine (possibly de-tuned to 400 hp or 450 hp for engine life), ZF-inspired transmission, Cannone da 75/46 in a three-man turret, improved radios. 35~36 tonnes. This one should last them until the war's end.

Unless you can fix Italian Artillery, Air Force, Supply and Italian Navy it doesn't matter what sort of design they can come with for a tank in 1943 and later.

 

[TM06]

Unless you can fix Italian Artillery, Air Force, Supply and Italian Navy it doesn't matter what sort of design they can come with for a tank in 1943 and later.

You tell me that Italians needed better tanks in 1940~1941, I give you exactly that with a development line from 1940 to 1943, and now is suddenly the time when the other branches get brought up in this side discussion specifically about the Regio Esercito's tanks? I don't mean to be rude but that just feels like goalpost shifting.
We've already more or less solved most of the issues with the Regia Aeronautica and Artillery in this thread, and the Regia Marina is entirely irrelevant to tank design.