Those of you who have "played" with British cruisers in WW2 games have no doubt shared my wish that the British had taken their Christie and gone down the same path as the Russian ending up with the sloped armour of the T34.
In a fanciful moment I married a Centurion 1/200 scale turret (30 year old Skytrex )with Crusader and potentially Cromwell bodies and shaped the front armour. I gave the Crusader a 75mm - but the Cromwell could be an American 76mm
Its only fun, but then so is VBCW ..... The result is both visually pleasing...and an effect tank for 1942-44.
Has anyone else ever created a fantasy tank or indeed aircraft for a period game?
Hmmm British fantasy tank for WW2.....
One that didn't break down or blow up, had a three man turret with a ring wide enough to allow progressive up gunning over it's life, could mount a decent HV gun, carried armour capable of stopping projectiles bigger than a bullet and had a reasonable turn of speed....
Wasn't that the Centurion? :-\
Runner up would be the Comet.... any chance of a model, they did see service after all?
The Centurion is my fantasy tank!
Quote from: Sunray on 28 January 2014, 03:48:50 PM
Those of you who have "played" with British cruisers in WW2 games have no doubt shared my wish that the British had taken their Christie and gone down the same path as the Russian ending up with the sloped armour of the T34.
In a fanciful moment I married a Centurion 1/200 scale turret (30 year old Skytrex )with Crusader and potentially Cromwell bodies and shaped the front armour. I gave the Crusader a 75mm - but the Cromwell could be an American 76mm
Its only fun, but then so is VBCW ..... The result is both visually pleasing...and an effect tank for 1942-44.
Has anyone else ever created a fantasy tank or indeed aircraft for a period game?
Picture...or it didn't happen :)
Quote from: fsn on 01 February 2014, 04:41:34 PM
The Centurion is my fantasy tank!
I think we know that.......
IanS
Quote from: DanJ on 01 February 2014, 03:21:58 PM
Hmmm British fantasy tank for WW2.....
One that didn't break down or blow up, had a three man turret with a ring wide enough to allow progressive up gunning over it's life, could mount a decent HV gun, carried armour capable of stopping projectiles bigger than a bullet and had a reasonable turn of speed....
Wasn't that the Centurion? :-\
Runner up would be the Comet.... any chance of a model, they did see service after all?
No argument with the above. I would add that the additional heresy in the British design school was the retention of the WW1 style hull machine gun, which negated the potential for using sloped armour. Add the fatal dichotomy that demanded both infantry tank and a fast cruiser. Just imagine a Churchill will a bigger turret ring and sloped armour. (Someone did -it was called the Black Prince.)
The corollaries of these flaws was as Dan has stated. By 1941 the British were unable to match the 50mm gun of the Panzer III or indeed the 75mm of the Pz Iv.
The Comet - when it did arrived in early 1945 was essentially an up gunned Cromwell. If the Cromwell had been available for the Italian campaign - despite its box shape - it would have been a winner from the start.
So my tank is a wishful tankers dream that fills that 1941/43 gap. Images will follow when grandkids arrive with digital camera.
I do believe that a Comet is in the Pendraken pipeline.
Quote from: Sunray on 02 February 2014, 11:19:28 AM
I do believe that a Comet is in the Pendraken pipeline.
Were still talking about tanks here right?
Quote from: Sunray on 28 January 2014, 03:48:50 PM
Those of you who have "played" with British cruisers in WW2 games have no doubt shared my wish that the British had taken their Christie and gone down the same path as the Russian ending up with the sloped armour of the T34.
We were just always a year behind everyone else.
I think when we had the Meteor engine we could then produce fast tanks with armour, the 17pdr was as good, and APDS ammunition was a world beater.
Crusader was too small to do much with. If you put a Meteor in it you could slap more armour on but thats about it. When they put a 6pdr in it they had to reduce the turret crew to 2 men.
If we had been a year ahead we would have had 6pdr Cromwells for Alamein, Comets for Normandy, and Cents, Black Princes and (potentially) Tortoise for late '44 and '45. That lot would have been better. OR would it mean the Germans would have tried harder and got rid of PzIV and replaced it and Panther with Panther II? :o
I've had similar thoughts regarding kit design but for aircraft. Namely the Westland Whirlwind. A 1940 single seat twin engined cannon armed beast, m/ that was sentenced to death because Merlin engines were reserved for Spitfires and Hurricanes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westland_Whirlwind_(fighter) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westland_Whirlwind_(fighter))
But interesting to muse :) :)
Quote from: Sunray on 02 February 2014, 11:19:28 AMthe additional heresy in the British design school was the retention of the WW1 style hull machine gun, which negated the potential for using sloped armour.
Didn't the T34/76 have a hull machine gun and sloped armour?
I seem to recall that most WWII tanks had hull machine guns, I don't think that design decision was unique to the British.
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Quote from: Russell Phillips on 02 February 2014, 11:41:11 AM
Didn't the T34/76 have a hull machine gun and sloped armour?
I seem to recall that most WWII tanks had hull machine guns,
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Indeed they did, even the superb fontal armour of the Panther had a blister for the MG. However the Brits seemed to "box" the MG - an antiquated design with vertical front plate. This created a shot trap. By 1944 the feeling was that the hull MG was redundant, the Centurion benefited from this design flaw being jettisoned.
The Americans retained it in the M47 as late as the 1950s.
Quote from: Sunray on 02 February 2014, 03:09:04 PM
Indeed they did, even the superb fontal armour of the Panther had a blister for the MG. However the Brits seemed to "box" the MG - an antiquated design with vertical front plate. This created a shot trap. By 1944 the feeling was that the hull MG was redundant, the Centurion benefited from this design flaw being jettisoned.
The Americans retained it in the M47 as late as the 1950s.
Deleting the hull MG also had the benefit of reducing the tank crew to four men which, in theory, meant crew available for more tanks.
Quote from: Hertsblue on 02 February 2014, 05:44:53 PMDeleting the hull MG also had the benefit of reducing the tank crew to four men which, in theory, meant crew available for more tanks.
I thought the hull machine gunner was also the radio operator? Or have I got that wrong? I used to know WWII tanks really well, but I've forgotten a lot of it :-(
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On German tanks the hull machine gunner was the radio op. Same on US tanks up to Lee an Russian tanks. On British ones he was the loader, or gunner if a two man turret. many Crusaders ditched the hull gunner, removing the sub turret. All German tanks up to Tiger I have a flat front plate with the Mg in it.
IanS
Quote from: ianrs54 on 03 February 2014, 07:55:33 AM
On German tanks the hull machine gunner was the radio op. Same on US tanks up to Lee an Russian tanks. On British ones he was the loader, or gunner if a two man turret. many Crusaders ditched the hull gunner, removing the sub turret. All German tanks up to Tiger I have a flat front plate with the Mg in it.
IanS
Ian's right. That's why the innovation of T34 was such a shock to the Germans. Indeed the only saving grace of early German tank design was the relatively wide turret ring of the Pz III and IV which allowed up gunning.
Counterfactually if Black Prince had been pushed into production the Brits would have had their own version of a Tiger 1.
A pretty good and rather depressing analysis of what was wrong with British tanks in WW2 is 'Death by Design: British Tank Development in the Second World War' by Peter Beale.
Yes Dan its a depressing but accurate account. The Centurion was the first battle worthy model with really good sloped armour. The qualification to that is that the Matilda II - despite small turret ring - seems to have been on the right track design wise back in 1939.
But is was a dedicated infantry tank - top speed 15mph.
I think that the sloped armour issue is sometimes a bit overplayed, only the T34, Panther and Tiger II had it, I don't think the Sherman's front plate was sloped enough to be effective, just about every one else used vertical or near vertical plates on their tanks.
The problem with the British tanks was the terrible combination of a gun which couln't damage the enemy combined with armour which couldn't keep out enemy fire at the sort of range the Brits had to get to to for their guns to be effective. For instance the Churchill IV had the same armour as the Tiger I but a gun which had to get much closer than the Tiger's to be effective. The Firefly was so effective because it could engage the enemy at ranges where return fire although probably quite likely to penetrate the sherman was a lot less likely to hit in the first place.
The Sherman was even worse, a mediocre gun (in 1944) and armour and with ammo storage in places virtually guaranteed to catch fire when the hulll was breached, wet stowage which helped with this problem was introduced by the Americans but I don't think the Brits got any and suffered accordingly.
Sorry - wrong.
The British and US Sherman and after designed to a "basis" value, normally on the turret. So Sherman slope ups the 45-50mm to 76mm of the turret, and how can you say the Crusader is not sloped.
T-34 wastes internal volume with it's side slopes, which adds useless mass, a cardinal sin in tank design.
IanS
Not sure if this will work
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It's been a long time since I was into the nitty gritty of WW2 tanks but the crusader may have something of a slope on the glasis but the plate above it is vertical as is the whole of the turret, in the unlikley event of anything ricocheting (sp?) off the thin glasis it would hit the inadequate 30mm plates above it. There were also shot traps under the turret and it had an unfortunate tendancy to catch fire due to poor ammo stowage and protection just like the Sherman.
As for wether the slope of the armour was important this often relies on opinion. The T34's came as a shock to the early war Germans because it was relatively thick and well sloped, that combination was enough to beat the existing german AT and tank guns while it mounted a gun able to defeat the panzers at relatively long range.
I've never yet found any reference to the slope on the sherman's armour having a pronounced effect on survivability, sloped or not is was too thin to effectively withstand late war german AT rounds.
The Panthers armour was so good because it was sloped and relatively thick while the tank as a whole was superb because it also had a great gun. The Churchill MkVII probably carried more armour but the gun was inadequate for dealing with the panthers and tigers but was just about ok against the Mk VIs.
(http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa242/danandsan/Peelers3.jpg) (http://s198.photobucket.com/user/danandsan/media/Peelers3.jpg.html)
Weird, I can upload pictures of anything except the crusader mk III - maybe it's too embarrassed.
(http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa242/danandsan/Crusader.jpg) (http://s198.photobucket.com/user/danandsan/media/Crusader.jpg.html)
Thank you so much Fenton :x
Not sure what was happening...I just took your image and used the img shortcut from photobucket like you did...very weird
The debate as to sloped armour - has its fulcrum in the date we are talking about. If the Brits had a cruiser with sloped armour, Christie suspension and at least 75mm gun in action for 1941/42 they would have had a winner like the T34. Which is the inspiration for the fantasy.
The Aussi design - the Sentinel - is a wonderful example of what could have been achieved on a budget on the other side of the world. A decent 17 pdr gun and American running gear.