Tanks and other Armoured Vehicles Image thread.

The US used a fucking armored car (M8) and the M3/M5 and later M24 for scouting.
For most of the war, the Germans used their 4-Rad, 6-Rad, and 8-Rad armored cars for recon, but the WAllies started to add some pretty hefty tanks (the M5 and M24, which would be considered medium tanks early war) towards the end of the war, which necessitated adding tanks to German recon units.
 


So I guess the Mexican Army is still using Stuarts, and sticking their turrets on Duck scout-cars...kinda amazing to see this.


Yeah Mexico doesn't really have a tank division per se... They barely have anything resembling proper tanks.

But they do have armored vehicles and some seriously really cool militarized pickup trucks.

Still love seeing the museum AFVs out in the wild. I remember looking up the Mexican armo d vehicles for my Mexegypt thread.

Mighty Mexico's Tank Divisions. 💪

 
I think the biggest flaw of German tanks in WW2 was that they put the drive sproket in the front of the tank rather than the rear. doing that added a bunch of unnecessary moving parts to the design because the engine was still in the rear of the tank.
 
I think the biggest flaw of German tanks in WW2 was that they put the drive sproket in the front of the tank rather than the rear. doing that added a bunch of unnecessary moving parts to the design because the engine was still in the rear of the tank.
From what I've read there are - as always - trade offs. Rear engine + front drive does call for a shaft running the lenght of the tank and makes the vehicle higher, but simplifies gearbox related issues. In turn rear engine + rear drive brings about problems with gear changes.
German tanks had many other issues besides front drive. The war's best tank - the medium M4, had front drive.
 
From what I've read there are - as always - trade offs. Rear engine + front drive does call for a shaft running the lenght of the tank and makes the vehicle higher, but simplifies gearbox related issues. In turn rear engine + rear drive brings about problems with gear changes.

In practice German tanks frequently had problems with the gear box although that could have just been a result of their habit of overengineering everything and poor quality parts due to the war.
 
The Sherman also had rear engine, front drive.

There are *very* good reasons for that arrangement. Shifting gears and steering are purely mechanical, so the less distance between the driver and the transmission/final drive/brakes the better. Tanks of that era with rear sprockets and transmissions were notorious for how difficult it was to change gears and steer. Extending the main drive shaft forward, while it has consequences for the height of the tank, is mechanically far easier than extending the control linkages rearward.
 
In practice German tanks frequently had problems with the gear box although that could have just been a result of their habit of overengineering everything
I believe the problems were caused by the "I likes'em big, I likes'em chunky" mindset, e.g. making the Pz.V grow from 30 to 45 tons WITHOUT corresponding changes to drivetrain.
 
The Sherman also had rear engine, front drive.

There are *very* good reasons for that arrangement. Shifting gears and steering are purely mechanical, so the less distance between the driver and the transmission/final drive/brakes the better. Tanks of that era with rear sprockets and transmissions were notorious for how difficult it was to change gears and steer. Extending the main drive shaft forward, while it has consequences for the height of the tank, is mechanically far easier than extending the control linkages rearward.

The best solution was to just put the engine in the front of the tank. It would also mean there is more metal between death and your crew as well.
 
I think the biggest flaw of German tanks in WW2 was that they put the drive sproket in the front of the tank rather than the rear. doing that added a bunch of unnecessary moving parts to the design because the engine was still in the rear of the tank.
The biggest flaw was that they only got round to thinking "we should have a standard set of AFVs for the various weight classes, sharing as many parts as possible" at the end of the war.

German tank development was basically a crapshow driven by Hitler's bizarre whims, serious effort was even put into a design which didn't have a main gun and was meant to ram enemy tanks because of him.
 
The biggest flaw was that they only got round to thinking "we should have a standard set of AFVs for the various weight classes, sharing as many parts as possible" at the end of the war.

German tank development was basically a crapshow driven by Hitler's bizarre whims, serious effort was even put into a design which didn't have a main gun and was meant to ram enemy tanks because of him.


The entire German arms industry was a shit show, They were still doing things like sewing seat cushions for planes by hand in 1941
 
The best solution was to just put the engine in the front of the tank. It would also mean there is more metal between death and your crew as well.

Not really; if it was that clearcut a solution, it would have been adopted by the majority of tanks to follow. In reality. . . the overwhelming majority of tanks have rear-mounted engines, with the front-engined Merkava being notable as an exception.
 

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