I LOVE this TANK Thread

For some reason that reminded me of something an instructor told us during trainup for route clearance: "In the neverending race between warhead and armor, the warhead always eventually wins." It was meant as a caution against assuming our armor was invulnerable. Seven IED hits later I will be eternally grateful that race wasn't concluded against the armor around me.

On a somewhat related tangent- does anyone know the etymology of the term tank? I was told what i have always assumed was an urban legend regarding the origin of the term as it relates to armor having to do with mislabeled cargo. Details are a bit hazy.

There is a Sherman tank parked on the grounds of a little cemetery in Princeton, Minnesota, where my FIL is buried. I was shocked at how crudely made it appeared up close. The castings and welds looked similar to your photo.

The British coined the term "tank" to describe their newly created armored, tracked weapons carrier in WWI. They chose this term to create uncertainty... to mislead the enemy that the vehicle was used to transport water.

It was a stealthy term in its day.

Here is Wiki's more detail discussion on the origin of the term, "tank". The first explanation is most commonly accepted...

Great thread! The armor of WW2 has always intrigued me.

Cannon fodder for the Russians:
(From Wiki)

German "Elefant" (Ferdinand)
some info:
The two Porsche air cooled engines in each vehicle were replaced by two 300 hp Maybach HL 120 TRM engines powering two generators that drove two electric motors which in turn powered the drive sprockets. The electric motors also acted as the vehicle's steering unit. This so called "petro-electrical" drive delivered 0.11 km/l off road and 0.15 km/l on road at a maximum speed of 10 km/h off road and 30 km/h on road. Besides the high fuel consumption and the poor performance the drive system was also maintenance-intensive; the sprockets for example had to be changed every 500 km.

I've always had a soft spot for the old Mark IV.

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Can you ID this tank thread?

the male or female?

They come in both sexes? :huh

I'm not sure what you mean.

Like the "Can you ID this fighter jet?" thread.

But with tanks!!!!

I think it's a reference to the ID this fighter thread.

NFE and MoBill will kick your ass. Bet SB68 is no slouch either.

Is there a way to simply change the thread title? Never had to do it before.

Guess who is looking at hybrid combat vehicles now? Hint: We are. Any records on what happened when damage shorted the power supply to the body?

They did actually - in those days they were called male or female depending on their armament/weight/size.

SturmTiger

See here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_IV_tank

The "Cannon Fodder" destroyed 320 Russian Tanks at a loss of 13 on the first Day of the ""Battle of Kursk". They were only stopped by Russian Artillery and Infantry when they had no Infantry support by Germans...

Combat history
All but two of the 91 available Ferdinands were put to use in the Battle of Kursk, the first combat the Ferdinand saw. Although they destroyed many Russian tanks, they performed quite poorly in other respects. Within the first four days nearly half of the vehicles were out of service, mostly due to technical problems and mine damage to tracks and suspensions. Actual combat losses to direct Soviet action were very low as the Ferdinand's very thick armor protected it from almost all Soviet antitank weaponry. However, at this point in its development the Ferdinand lacked a machine gun or any secondary armament, making it vulnerable to attack by infantry. Most total losses of the Ferdinand occurred during the Soviet counter-offensive after the Kursk offensive, many damaged Ferdinands had to be abandoned as they were too heavy to tow and others were lost to mechanical breakdown during the retreat.