Soren and McKenny's thread to discuss why the Tiger or Sherman rocked or sucked.

Medvedya said:

It's an incredibly Gucci piece of kit, but what really, really matters are the results it achives within the situation and time in which it was used.

Something that whilst being robust, but is not particually fancy like the Shermans or T-34's, those are the designs which can be churned out in huge numbers, and THAT is what history has proved you fundamentally need to have if you're fighting a total war - therefore no matter what technical marvel the Tiger may have been at the time, the two main opponents of it should always be considered the better tanks for that one simple reason.

Click to expand...

I agree with you completely there - but I think soren and mkenny enjoy the pugilistic banter. We all get to learn, so everyone wins. Sometimes people do forget that what matters is no sh*t combat effectiveness, not sexiness. Not being able to field a piece of gear in large enough numbers - well that greatly diminishes its effectiveness if there's a need for it. The german armaments ministry seemed to not completely appreciate this. A German officer said "how do you destroy 50,000 tanks" when referring to the Sherman. I'd guess a similar number of T-34s were produced as well.

I think Med actually hit the nail. When compared one on one the Tiger is the better tank over the Sherman or the T-34 but as he pointed out and mkloby accented, how do you destroy 50,000 tanks. Therefore as history is concerned they are the better tanks. They won the war.

Exactly. Take the massive tank battle of the 13th of July, 1943, in the Kursk Salient. Visibility was such that the German tanks couldn't exploit their superior long-range firing capabilities anyway, and the Germans lost half of their remaining tanks. It was a loss from which they could never recover, and the Soviets, while taking massive losses themselves, were still able to churn out their "simple" tanks by the dozens and continue the push westward. So much for German technical superiority.

But it does still make for interesting debate.

OK

Did the Tiger rock or suck? IMO it both rocked and sucked. I would sy it was effective though.

As for the M4A3E2 'Jumbo', well I know it could shrug off 88mm hits L56 that is, not sure about the PaK43 though - and NO I can't be bothered posting sources.

A big part of this is a law called shatter gap. If you want a definitive answer, delcyros is an unbiased expert.8)

IIRC some Jumbos were upgraded with 17pdrs, this would make a decent weapon.

The problem was, the jumbo was sloow - and mobility is a huge part of a tanks protection.

m kenny said:

This is the comment and as it is in the thread I don't see the problem with replying in the thread.

Click to expand...

Nor do I. IMO it tidies the place.


Hi Soren,

Besides what evidence do you have that it was exclusively an 88 which engaged these two Jumbo's ?? And at what range ??

Click to expand...

A valid point?

The Jumbo's glacis should be impervous to both guns at 200m and beyond.

Click to expand...

Kissing distance. What were the other Sherman's doing whilst it was getting that close? If they weren't KO'd 1st, then they would be putting holes in the sides or rear. Also nearby Bazookamen could do the same etc.

Also, I'm pretty sure a decent Jombo commander would've disabled a Panther before it could get that close? Weren't Jumbo commanders hand-picked IIRC?

German guns were definitely capable of sub MOA because of the quality of the gun and optics. Infact during training, without the stress of combat, the 88mm Kwk36 on the Tiger Ausf.E would hit a 2 x 2.5m target 87% of the time at 2,000m and 53% of the time at 3,000m - not bad ! And the Panther's 75mm Kwk42 proved even more accurate with a 92% accuracy at 2,000m and 55% at 3,000m.

Click to expand...

I suppose an advantage of their Henschel suspension was that it allowed less shock to be transmitted to the occupants, as well as fatiguing them less and being better for a gun platform. With 122mm rounds though...

Like someone on here said before, Zeiss optics were hyper-accurate but very time-consuming.

Not a fairytale, they actually did this until they got the more powerful Pz.IV F-2, after which they didn't have to.

Click to expand...

Wasn't it Otto Carius who famously did this?

Easy there, its not ruined, we'll just debate the matter elsewhere

Need a moderator to move the last few posts please.

Click to expand...

How polite you are.


Hi Medvedya,

Terrible fuel consumption, heavy, slow, needed to be a vast size just to carry the 8.8 - took AGES to build one... from 43 onward, the Germans really couldn't afford the time or resources to mess about with Uberpanzers like Tigers or King Tigers.

Click to expand...

Oh I think Uberpanzers were needed as hero tanks, and the Tiger was reasonably fast and compact. I do agree with a lot of what you say though.


"how do you destroy 50,000 tanks"

If they're Shermans - with 10,000 Panthers!

I think a lot of it is morale; Panther and Tiger crews knew their tank designers/procurers cared about them. The Allied tankers sometimes knew that theirs didn't give a sh*t.

The unreliability of the German heavies was evidence of the latter though, but I'd say that was Maybach's and the procurers fault, not MAN and Henschel.

No offense Scwarzpanzer but I think you actually missed the point of the posts....

...Now having said that, keep posting.

Hmm the top road speed of a Tiger was 23 m.p.h, as far as speed goes, it's not tee-riff.

The Panther is a better tank, but again still too heavy and slow, and if the final drive burns out (which could happen) you couldn't get to the gear box of a Panther without taking half the tank to pieces - not a practical proposition when PPSh rounds are whizzing past you!

T-34 - the transmission was utter junk, the designers knew it, so they made it easy to get to at the back. Okay, this arrangement did sometimes make the gears hard to shift but this was quickly solved by finding a hammer and yelling "Rabota, tuy sooka!" before precisely smashing it down on the levers.

Does exactly what it says on the tin as they say.

Medvedya said:

T-34 - the transmission was utter junk, the designers knew it, so they made it easy to get to at the back. Okay, this arrangement did sometimes make the gears hard to shift but this was quickly solved by finding a hammer and yelling "Rabota, tuy sooka!" before precisely smashing it down on the levers.

Click to expand...

Not very practical to know such thing happened when in combat with a Tiger, Panther, Mark IV (LB) or sturmgeschutz...

Well, if because of things like that you don't have to take a T-34 out of the field, that doesn't matter since if one gets knocked out, there are still going be other T-34's coming in behind it's exhaust fumes!

You're still thinking of one on one combat - only someone tired of living would take on those three you mentioned single handed.

But that's not how you fight a war. Have a go - but make damn sure you're with all yer mates as well! And although granted, your Tiger or Panther is going to turn lots of them into roman candles, sooner or later one of those Shermans or T-34's is going to get lucky...

This is a very bad thing if that was your one uberpanzer gone because the rest of them are all being patched up back behind the lines!

Those mid/late war German tanks were amazing but.... wrong weapon, wrong war, wrong time.

These discussions are similar to any weapon system dominance discussion. If you ignore maintenance, supplies, training, repair, logistics the discussions are fun...but only entertaining.

But keep it coming!

Matt308 said:

But keep it coming!

Click to expand...

It's the only way to win a war!

The complication of the entire German system lost them the war, not the tank designs they produced. Had the German industry abandoned the Tiger and King Tiger then turned the industrial capacity toward the single build; Panther Ausf G. The Germans would have had the greatest tank of the war in numbers sufficient to stem the tide of the Soviet and Allied medium armour.

And I'm not talking one on one; the Panther had the balance of firepower, speed and armour combined with a relatively small build time (for a tank of its size) and an ability to destroy the enemy in a ratio far in its favour.

Outside Konigsberg a single Panther G managed to destroy three IS-2s and stem a Soviet assault on its own. What prevented there being another two or three Panthers with that one, was simply the fact that resources were wasted on the King Tiger and Tiger.

In technical terms of combat ability the Germans ruled, however.