I think the Tiger I was great.It has an excellent performance record, and I'm tired of everyone shitting on it just to sound cool. The constant shitting on it and lumping it as le bad impractical German wunderwaffle is undeserved.
It was also a lot more reliable, readiness reports compiled throughout the war show the Tiger I was generally more reliable than the Panther or later Panzer IVs
>>65543610>a lot more reliablea lot more reliable than given creditMissed that part, whoops
The French just got their Tiger back in running order.
The Tiger is the most classic tank imo
>>65543564What are you trying to achieve here? If you think the tiger is neat, what will you accomplish by telling everyone about it? Go to bed, find a woman, have children and forget about this place
>>65543564I always liked how it looks. Definitely what comes to mind when I think "tank".
>>65543658>why are you discussing weapons on a weapon board?
>>65543658>Go to bed, find a woman, have children and forget about this placeThe first parts are easy. But how do you forget about this place?
>>65543621It's so sexy
>>65543610Yeah but also Tiger units were held at higher readiness and got better maintenance + lolgi on top of being better designed than the Panther in the first place.
>>65543717Logistics* but the readiness is just part of being a dedicated, non-late-war breakthrough unit in effect.
>>65543717not an engineer, what's the significance of this picture? planetary gears more robust, right?
>>65543658I felt like using my right to freedom of speech.
>>65543658
>>65543717Assuming we aren't assigning too much credit to supposedly preferential logistics, it's still very impressive, especially considering reliability is one of the first things armchair generals gripe about with Tiger I.
>>65543736The Panther's FD basically is a case of using insane amounts of leverage twice. You're asking the input and intermediate gear to do giga-leverage to push the sprocket. Simultaneously they're itty bitty (HABEEB IT) gears that don't have a lot of tooth engagement and are small in diameter so all that stress is focused on the sole teeth set that's engaged.The Tiger has a bigger input gear that has more tooth engagement and that then drives the yuge intermediate gear. Said intermediate gear then engages a bunch of satellites with the sun gear so all that force is spread out over 4x+ teeth pairings (look at the partial engagement of the teeth in the image for the sun/planets).The Panther was destined to frag the final drive since it was a pseudo-heavy tank that had undersized transmission components. It was insanely anemic, compare it to the Sherman which had the growth potential to become a Jumbo and not regularly grenade the final drive. Being double helical/herringbone gears helped a lot as well since engagement was initially gradual AND constant for the Sherman.
>>65543800>WeI. And no, having preferential logistics means you actually get the parts you need if they're in system. No maintainers means you're dealing with an inert object. When you're in an elite breakthrough/heavy tank unit you're expected to be a firefighter with high readiness effectively. If you're driving maintenance queens it means at least you are getting your tanks repaired and driving out. No preferential logistics means you're not deploying at all.The Tiger I is a combination of good factors, the Panther is a combination of bad factors. This means all factors like logistical, engineering and strategic planning combined together.>ImageHaving two tooth engagement in the FD reduces the stress (and potentially fatigue for subpar quality steel that doesn't have the sufficient material characteristics) the gear will experience. The Panther's FD was absolutely shit for all that weight it had to haul around.
>>65543828Why didn't they make the teeth on the Panther bigger?
>>65543717I can see why an RPM limiter was put in the Panther and the driver had to essentially baby it to keep it going...not easy with inexperienced undertrained crews later in the war.
>>65543838Everything in engineering is a compromise: The actual design, the ability to produce it (and at scale/the numbers desired/restricted resources/manhours/etc), the time you had to even get any of that done, the maintainability of it in real life and most importantly to get it past management/bigwigs/dear leader.You'd have to look into the archives and/or speculate on why the Panther had said design especially in the context of the time. There were continuous attempts to deal with the sins of the original design being so overburdened (the Panther originating from the VK30 project and being vastly heavier). Before I get to those, have FD failure stories where they did more attrition than kinetic combat:>1943>Final Drives: Special bolts for the large drive gear in final drives shear off. Also housing plugs that are not spot welded often fall out, causing oil leaks. Oil also leaks out between the cover plate of the final drive housing and the hull side. The bolt that fasten the final drive to the armour work loose.>On 16 october, the Abteilung started an attack with 31 Panthers. No long distance was covered but within seven hours, 12 Panthers fell out for the duration of the action due to mechanical breakdown. The operational strength report for the I.Abtelung/Panzer-Regiment 2 for 18 October 1943 revealed 26 operational Panthers, 39 in need of repair, and 6 total writeoffs, for a total of 71 Panthers. The average daily operational strength of the Abteilung from 9 to 19 October was 22 Panthers">1944>Final Drive: A very large percent of Panthers broke down through damage to final drives. As an example, since the first of March, 13 final drives were replaced in 30 Panthers, more on the left than on the right. Bolts on the large gear inside the final drive shear off. Final drives can not hold up to steering in reverse in heavy soil.
>>65543621Definitely the classic German tank.
>>65543838>German Panther tanks (Ausf. D, A, G) suffered chronic final-drive failures due to overloaded spur gears, weak housings, and substandard steel. The original design used simplified double spur gears (instead of a planetary epicyclic system) to speed production. In combat these gear teeth and bearings proved the tank’s Achilles heel – life expectancy was only about 150 km under stress, and final-drive bolts frequently sheared. British trials found “inadequate bearings and poor housing strength,” with many gears lacking proper hardening. Guderian himself noted in June 1944 that final drives wore out far faster than engines (Panther drives ~1,500 km, final drives much less) and needed an urgent fix.>The original design used simplified double spur gears (instead of a planetary epicyclic system) to speed production.Take note as to how much of a relative "unicorn" the Tiger I was design wise. The manhour/resource/cost expenses were spared only to reasonable levels in contrast to the Panther.
>>65543861>April–May 1943: Falkensee rebuild program. After disastrous losses at Kursk, the first ~250 Panthers (Ausf. D) were sent to Demag-Falkensee for extensive rebuilds. The overhaul addressed engine, suspension, steering and final-drive weaknesses. (Reports note “transmission and final drive breakdowns” as common pre-rebuild and that all Panthers underwent fixes at Falkensee during this period.) These rebuilds began implementing stronger housings and parts, though detailed final-drive changes at this time are not fully documented.>Summer 1943 (Ausf.A start): Armor and housing upgrades. The Ausf.A chassis began production in August 1943. Mid-production Ausf.A tanks received an altered armor casing around the final-drive housing and a new armored hub cap over each drive sprocket. These structural changes strengthened the housing cover against damage (for example, Soviet anti-tank rifle hits) and improved sealing. (Speilberger notes that final-drive housings were eventually replaced by stronger ones after testing showed the originals bent under track pull.) Other post-Kursk fixes also raised overall reliability: by late 1943 training and gearbox adjustments had brought Panther readiness up from ~16% at Kursk to ~37% by Feb 1944.
>>65543861>September–October 1944 (late Ausf.G): Durability upgrades. In late 1944 MAN and other firms applied a series of final-drive upgrades on new Panther Ausf.G tanks. These countermeasures included stronger gears (improved gear profiles and teeth hardening), reinforced bearings, better seals and lubrication, and beefed-up housings. Jentz reports that these modifications addressed “chewed-up gear teeth, broken parts, damaged bearings, and insufficient lubrication”. Littlefield (MVT Foundation) notes these late Ausf.G drives used the best available steel and essentially reached the metallurgy limits of the time. In practical terms, most Ausf.G tanks built after late 1944 rolled off the line with these strengthened final drives, improving field durability.>January 1945: Panzerkommission meeting. A Jan 23, 1945 report recorded that approximately 100 Panther final-drive breakdowns had been reported (verbatim for “Panther 370 and Tiger roughly 100” breakdowns) and demanded more effort on final-drive fixes. It notes all prior improvements had yielded “only minimal improvement”, but that Panther housings had been strengthened. (German leaders continued to debate introducing planetary gears, but in practice left the spur system in place.)
great posts anon, the more you know
>>65543838>German steel shortages meant gears had lower core strength and often lacked case hardening. Dr. Püschel (MAN) reported that fatigue of the intermediate gear – “due to the low-core strength of the material and the absence of case hardening” – caused most failures. Early drives also used split-ring dowels with few bolts on the large drive gear flange; these proved unreliable and were later replaced by several retaining bolts. Late war steel issues were a shitshow as well, so truly late war (late-44, 45) reliability went to shit again. This starts to bite late war Tiger I production as well (even with the better FD).>Aside from gears, final-drive bearings and seals were weak points. Pre-1944 drives leaked oil (labyrinth seals failed) and bearings were undersized. Late-war upgrades improved lubrication (better seals and oil flow) and used higher-grade bearing steels where possible. In practice, sources say the final-drive gears on restored Ausf.A units were “as good as we can make them today” by late war standards – implying that by 1944 no further metallurgy gains were feasible.Also contrary to modern* anti-strategic bombing arguments and the (at time) conclusions that Schweinfurt failed it was doing lethal damage on the logi and production side. You see this in the Panzer 4 variant progression where they can get away with roller element bearing deletes it gets done (return rollers) or outright reduction of them. Yeah it didn't reduce production numbers but it added nasty maintenance burden that reduced readiness and availability plus strategic mobility. Nuance like this is lost on modern political swine with their agendas.*Modern strategic bombing with PGMs targeting industry would be the most orgasmic meth and cocaine augmented wet dream to WW2 planners. The percentage of bombs on target and the bombs most certainly wrecking the production lines is something they could only dream about.
>>65543564It was more successful than its successors, but that was partially to the better german logistics in the early war period.After 1943, it had lots of the same issues related to lack of fuel and spare parts.
>>65543844>Bearing and housing misalignments also added stress: track pull sometimes bent early housings out of alignment under load, a problem cured only by later strengthened housings. (Speilberger confirms that the final-drive housing mounts were too weak and had to be replaced with stronger ones in later production.) No published figures of gear rating exist, but wartime reports imply the drives were working at or beyond their torque limits; e.g. Panther final drives failed routinely in mud or reverse steering, and 90% had broken by 1,500 km.This is why Panther crews were advised not to neutral steer and brake steer instead. The capability existed on paper and if you weren't dealing with too much terrain resistance you could get away with it (cobbled streets, dry+firm soil, etc)>The cumulative changes gradually improved Panther reliability, but never fully cured the issue. Early Panthers (Ausf.D) were notoriously fragile – at Kursk only ~40 of ~200 tanks were operational by day’s end, many abandoned by crews. Post-rebuild Panthers saw improved availability (rising to ~50–78% by spring 1944), but the final drive remained the most common breakdown. In 1944 US reports noted ~5% of Panthers broke their transmission within 100 km and over 90% within 1,500 km – far poorer than engines. Drivers learned to avoid pivot turns (which snapped drives) and often traveled by rail to staging areas to save wear.Speaking of low reliability, I'll put another runner up with a similar silhouette up. A lot of early production T-34 attrition was simply from transmission+clutch failures. Time to just attrit tanks left and right (with limited resources to recover them) while trying to march to the frontlines.
>>65543886>By late 1944, the strengthened drives on Ausf.G did reduce some failures. Jentz records “since 1 March [1944], 13 final drives were replaced in 30 Panthers” – an alarming 43% – but after the 1944 upgrades the unit saw noticeably fewer final-drive casualties. Crews still reported that the Panther could not “hold up to steering in reverse in heavy soil”, but the onset of winter and collapsing fronts limited operational mileage. Overall, the reinforced drives and housings eased the breakdown rate, raising combat readiness, but the Panther’s finale still required cautious handling.>>65543838>the bending stress on the Panther sprocket drive pinion/gear teeth driving at 5 km/h and using the full 700HP (Up a steep hill) is 96,100 PSI while the stress on the teeth of the Tiger’s Sun gear and satellites is 18,600 PSI under the same conditions.No space (see bottom left) as well to make it larger as a mid life improvement. Could have potentially went down the route of straight cut planetary gearing but that never went anywhere.
>>65543828So basically more teeth == more gooder?
>>65543564It made sense for a German tank in WWII, as their limiting factor was a lack of fuel, decent crews, ammunition, steel, factory space, etc. It was a pretty good WWII heavy tank design, not worth the reputation it gained in allied and nazi propaganda or postwar revisionism, but it worked well enough.
>>65543938Bad to good sliding scale:>Drivetrain components designed for originally lighter design>Anemic housing for gearset (flexes and allows misalignment accelerating stress and wear)>Inadequate quality steel (any reason incl. late war production, declining production quality from strategic bombnig, etc)>Insufficient bearing elements/"substitutions">Tiny straight cut gear (input)>Small straight cut gear>Tiny straight cut gear (input) with planetary output>Sufficiently rigid housing for gear and bearing components>Small straight cut gear (input) with planetary output>Drivetrain components designed for target weight and load of the design with some overhead margin for material tolerances, production variation, etc...>Medium helical cut gear (input) with planetary output>Herringbone helical gears>Drivetrain components designed for originally heavier and proven design
>Albert Speer wrote in November 1944 “On the Southwest Front (Italy), opinions are in favor of the Sherman tank and its cross-country ability. The Sherman tank climbs mountains that our Panzer crews consider impassable”. Why would Panzer crews, operating Panther tanks, consider mountains impassable when their tank had a better power-to-weight ratio and superior terrain crossing ability compared to the Sherman?
>>65543658>just get a girlfriend broFuck off chad.
>>65543564Nah the Panther was better little bro, heavy tanks were already archaic by the 1940s.
>>65544256>Panther was better>destroys forward drive
>>65543938Bigger = gooder
Out of interest, how come you don't hear the same level of 'reliability' bleating about the Jagdpanther? It's the same chassis, isn't it? Not to claim it WAS more reliable (I genuinely don't know) but any mention of Tiger or Panther is invariably followed by "when it was available"; the TD doesn't seem to have that pavlovan response.
>>65543837That graphic is shit.
>>65545444NTA but care to elaborate further?
>>65543564https://youtu.be/nR-jxuqfY2s
>>65545439Tactical employment would be one factor, my guess. More likely to be motoring around at lower power settings or parked behind hedgerow while preparing an ambush. Defensive bias means they'd also benefit from interior lines of travel (shorter routes, favorable grades/surfaces) more frequently.
>>65545439>Jagdpanther >Tiger I Same chassis? Who told you that retardation?
>>65543717>>65543934>that final drive designWhy was something like this not immediately flushed by engineers out in stress testing back in the prototype phase
>>65543736Panther's final drives were cheap as chips, and about as fragile as chips compared to the Tiger's final drive.But Germany didn't have much of a choice, they needed a gorillion 50 ton tank final drives for the panther and they needed them 6 months ago.
>>65545439>Out of interest, how come you don't hear the same level of 'reliability' bleating about the Jagdpanther? It's the same chassis, isn't it?Jagdpanthers got special snowflake final drives, that only very late in the war were used on regular panthers.
>>65545878Loose use of language on my part. I shouldn't have brought up the stripey cat in the same sentence.
>>65543610>readiness reportsA heavy tank battalion fielding Tigers had it's own organic maintenance company. Same as what an entire regiment fielding Panthers or Panzer IVs had. You better hope they'd have better readiness rates with effectively three times the maintenance manpower per tank.>>65545920The Panthers design was fine for what it was... before Hitler ordered the armor to be increased to the tune of adding another ~10 tons of weight to the entire vehicle. right before the whole thing entered mass production.
>>65546075>before Hitler ordered the armor to be increased to the tune of adding another ~10 tons of weight to the entire vehicleNot this stupid bullshit again.Hitler asked for 20mm more armor on the turret and hull front. Which if you actually do the maths of how much steel that physically is, is about 1-3 tons.The Panther's phat-ass weight is just because physically it's a large fucking tank. It's tall, wide, and long as hell. On the bright side it means it can carry about 70 rounds of ammunition, which is quite a lot when you realize how huge those cartridges are.
>>65546094>physically it's a large fucking tankThis.Everyone thought Germany decided to field a second heavy tank when they encountered the Panther for the first time. It was only later the allies found out it's supposed to be a medium tank.
>>65546098>>65546094You do understand that in order to utilize sloped armor, you MUST make the tank physically larger to maintain the same internal volume as a tank that doesn't utilize sloped armor?That's why the Panther is dimensionally large
>>65546094>Hitler asked for 20mm more armor on the turret and hull front. Which if you actually do the maths of how much steel that physically is, is about 1-3 tons.Your math is both shit and oversimplified to a retarded degree because that increase also means numerous changes throughout the rest of the tank simply to compensate for the shifted center of weight.But hey, keep calling the documented facts "stupid bullshit" if you like. Just makes you look like an ignorant retard who thinks he knows better than the people who actually designed and built the damn thing.
>>65546111Sure, but none the less the physical size of the tank is why it's so fucking heavy, more so than it's armor thickness.There's tanks almost half it's weight, yet more armored lmao.>>65546113Cope and seethe you illiterate faggot. Adding 20mm of frontal armor to a Panther doesn't add 10+ fucking tons to it.To remove 10+ tons from a Panther tank would leave it with some bullshit like 40mm armor all around.
>>65546120>tanks almost half it's weight, yet more armored lmao.Almost half eh? Very cute
>>65545920Space/geometry/offset reasons from my understanding.
>>65545936>Jagdpanthers got special snowflake final drivesmore detailed info would be appreciated(couldn't find in Spielberger)
>>65546417They may or may not have gotten improved production versions where better heat treat was done and at an earlier point than the rest of the Panthers. Their reliability was still awful late war overall. Report is an excerpt of 2 Panther Gs, 2 Jagdpanthers and a Bergepanther.
>>65546470>better heat treat was done and at an earlier pointok thanks
>>65543717>>65543934I'm a watch repairer and that gear reduction really rustles my fucking jimmies.
>>65543564Related news, the Saumur Tiger runs again, 131 is no longer alone.
>>65543564Sherman was probably the best AFV of the war.Tiger was the best heavy/breakthrough tank which then gut pressed into a dozen rolls it wasn't designed for.Churchill was probably the best infantry support vehicle, slightly outperforming the Sherman when it came to attacking strong points, jumbos are too rare to be considered.The best mobile gun system was probably either the StugIII or Hellcat. All this while taking deployment date and utility during the war into account rather than just raw specifications. Panther variants should have been the best but it was a maintenance queen.
>>65546681No one asked
>>65546681If they really wanted a breakthrough tank that bad, that could stop and fire effectively, they should have canned the interleaved wheels and instead developed a gun-stabilizer. The Americans managed it for their most mass-produced tank, the Germans probably could have developed something for their elite breakthrough panzer.
>>65546698>The Americans managed it for their most mass-produced tankHardly ever used or even trained on how to use it. On the other hand, you're asking the Germans to ditch one known technology to adopt something they didn't have yet, an open ended ETA is not what you want at a time like that. Plus, you're ignoring some of the benefits of that interleaved wheels arrangement, such as reduced ground pressure, and incidentally be a form of layered armor for the lower hull sides
>>65543564The problem was never that a specific German design was bad, it was that they couldn't pick one design and stick with it.
>>65546698The Americans didn´t need a breakthrough tank because they had god-tier production and logistics and uncontested aerial superiority on the tactical level. There wasn't any point in shifting design and production from Shermans to Tiger-knockoffs when the average American CO could just call in some P51 Mustangs to level an enemy position whenever they felt like it
>>65546698Stop and fire isn't really a problem with breakthrough tanks. The Tiger I's intended role is very much akin to MPF with armor. A Jumbo Sherman with a 105mm or 25pdr (hypothetical configuration) is very similar to what would have been a fit at the time. Something protected enough to survive early war AT guns (and expected evolution), sufficiently mobile and armed with a fortification busting gun. The 88 happened to be "the right fit" at the time over the stubby 75mm. Unironically a "turreted StuH 42" is another contender configuration.The Tiger I just happened to have all the right things going for it to be accepted in the end and serve as long as it did. It just got pressed into the heavy tank role because it was good against early war tanks and mediums due to the armament, armor and gradual move towards being a heavy tank rather than a breakthrough tank.
>>65546643Awesome
>>65546773Yeah, it evens out ground pressure (pic), but then again a modern MBT has very similar ground pressure with just normal roadwheels and they roll around just fine. I still think the bigger reason for going with interleaved wheels was a smoother ride for short-stop firing tactics.
>>65543828>compare it to the Sherman which had the growth potential to become a JumboPeople tend to forget the jumbo had massive issues and couldn't be used for any lengthy period of time.>>65543837Did an AI or an Indian make that graphic? Wtf is this LARP?
>>65546470>>65546417>>65545936>>65545439Read Doyle and Jentz if you want to talk about tanks, you niggers.
>>65546681>Churchill was probably the best infantry support vehicleBrit detected.The Churchill was trash.>inb4 but muh one story about climbing that one mountainkill yourself (in sentiment)
>>65548095I literally said the jagdpanthers got special drives.
>>65543658and do not forget, the sherman is inferior to the tiger.no, cargo ships manned by gays and chairforce as well as fat ass trucker trucks dont go into the equation.tanks, we are talking tanks.picrel got quite some dakka dakka'd at itbut the tiger swallowed it all up.
>>65546598AVOIR PEUR
>>65548161War is not a pokecum battle, lil anon. Tanks don't go one on one while you grab your balls and scream like a twink. Tanks work with infantry, planes, arty etc. The US had an overwhelming superiority in all of these, so they didn't need a heavy tank that will fuck up logistics stretching back across Europe, the Atlantic and continental USA.
>>65550137holy copeI guess Soviets should have never upgraded to the IS-2 either huh?also why would a heavy tank "fuck up logistics" anyways? in 1944 americans introduced>a new Sherman variant with a different gun>a fat Sherman with the same gun>a entirely new light tank>a new tank destroyer with a new gun, based on the chassis of the M10
I feel like you could say SLUT in German and get away with it alot and not even have to say SLUTfaustenfest or SLUTglimenshutz.
The Tiger's carved itself a niche into history. It's like a T-Rex. Big, bad, the Tiger has become visual shorthand for WWII, and I doubt that is ever likely to change all that much. Like how even if Spinosaurus or Giganotosaurus are bigger, T-Rex will always be the king of the dinosaurs.
>>65550176>I guess Soviets should have never upgraded to the IS-2 either huh?Is the IS-2 an upgrade? To what? Is the IS-2 designed for an anti-tank role? Or was it used more in a siege/breakthrough role? As the anon above said, not like your pokey-man battles, kid.
>>65550763the IS-2 and T-34/85 were direct responses to the Panther and Tiger II realize it's not 1:1 and no-one claims this but going>x isn't the only thing that matters so x doesn't matter AT ALLis just retarded
>>65548095That's still a pretty vague reference.>based on 654th battlefield report of how far they drove the vehicles>"strengthened" [?]>'23 drive sprockets'What's needed is an engineering report from the company that manufactured those sprockets, what material(s) they were machined/cast from, how they differed specifically from earlier Panther drive gears/sprockets etc.
>>65546781All the Europe war participants used the tanks/tank designs they had on hand and were able to mass produce for the battlefront. Prior to the Sherman, the allies had a grab bag too
>>65554213Even the Sherman had to be built with like five different engines, including some absolute abominations.
>>65554560Nonsense. Shermam was the best tank of whole of history. Perfect since its very first prototype and never had any problems what so ever
>>65554680Seething krautboo detected.
>>65548161>the 60 ton tank is superior to the 35 ton tankwhoa....
>>65554560The sad thing is, the Brits were supposedly impressed by how reliable the Chrysler Multibank was, in comparison to their own tank engines.
>>65554803>the Britscontinued with derated R-R Merlin-derived tank engines into the 1950s and followed that with the Leyland L60 multifuel that was a good idea but weirdly executed
