I like the idea.
What about adding a snorkel and using them to raid enemy ports ?
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What about adding a snorkel and using them to raid enemy ports ?
Brilliant, I always knew you have a German soul.
But, certainly there is also room for some torpedos ?
Totally. I think we could also modify the grenade launcher to throw depth charges, making it able to destroy not only enemy ships, but also enemy superheavies stupidly used in static submarine port defense.
We could call them : U-tank.
Too heavy for a parachute, maybe a glider? And you can modify the glider with pontoons on the bottom of the skids for naval operations, like a subs ballast tank, so you can go hull deep in the water. This would be especially effective for the torpedoes, and will allow the sonar to operate much more effectively for the depth-charge launchers. After adding two outboard motors to enhance her speed, I might recommend adding two 37mm AA guns to the back half and a radar sweep to prevent air attacks as well. This will be the E-Tank variant, essentially a heavily armored frigate mounting a 5" main gun perfect capable of amphibious landings and moving ashore under it's own power after the pontoon skid is dropped. Sea Lion is now a go!
Excellent, if we use skies instead of skids it will also be an asset in mountain warfare.
This was actually a thing in the mountain divisions. They would take a heavy panzer, air drop it to the top of the mountain, and run it like a downhill skiier through the enemy lines at very high speeds to punch a hole in the enemy lines.
If there happened to be a handy ramp on the downhill run, the tank can actually go airborne like a ski jumper and fire several shots before landing, creating an almost impossible target to hit from the ground. Upon landing, you now had a maus in your house!
Here is an image of a high-speed Mountain Panzer unit spearheading a 'Ski Blitz' down the mountain as part of Manstein's high speed withdrawal from the Caucusus in '43; because of the angle you can't actually see the skis, but these tanks can reach in excess of 100 mph on the dowhill run.
Excellent. But shouldnt we improve on the fact that the Maus is airborne at times ? How about wings to make it fly further ? This also beggs for bombs.
Imagine the tank jumping out of its avalanche over enemy troops, bombing them and then diving into the sea to torpedo enemy ships ?
Or how about giving it real big wings and engines and call it the Amerika tank ? *hint hint*
Imagine the tank jumping out of its avalanche over enemy troops, bombing them and then diving into the sea to torpedo enemy ships ?
Or how about giving it real big wings and engines and call it the Amerika tank ? *hint hint*
Is von Braun involved in the project? Because the germans badly need standardization, i.e. they should use the Maus chassis for spy satellites too.
I don't think a piston engine can do the job. I think the solution would be mount the Maus on a platform on top of four V2 rockets launching simoultaneously to put the Space Maus in a low-earth orbit. A controlled re-entry can be acheived using several ram-jet engines from the V1 that could be fired in sequence. This will allow a controlled flight path where bombs can be dropped with pinpoint precision before the Maus lands and forces the entire state it now occupies to surrender. So, that will require 48 Space Maus, 184 V2, several hundred 2,000 KG bombs; in addition to the E-Maus amphibious landing force and the U-Maus terrorizing the shipping lanes. Given this, I don't see how America can survive.
Von Braun you say ? *head explodes while thinking about the possibilities of the worlds first rocket tank*
(that was really funny)
Yes, and by strapping external speakers to the Maus and blasting Strauss at full volume (the Oddball Variant), the Fledermaus will also serve as a psychological warfare unit as well. The optional paint-shells it fires can create artwork and murals on public buildings that will give the Maus purpose after the war.
Ja ja! Am deutschen Wesen soll die Welt genesen. Franz Josef Strauss shall bring the kultural Endsieg over the degenerate Judeo-Bolshevik Mickey Mouse Untermenschen. All Hail!
Shut up
I shouldn't post in such serious threads after an evening at the bar of an all inclusive vacation hotel
You aren't going to get a superheavy tank that moves 10-40 km/hr. In practice, the superheavy tanks that were built had difficulty exceeding 5 km/hr. You can make a very very large vehicle with the power to weight ratio to go faster. That's easy. The hard part is putting it on a surface it won't sink into, and finding a drive mechanism that can handle the abrasive wear of handling the weight while moving quickly. This can (in theory) be mitigated by having extremely large and wide tracks to distribute the weight of the tank, so it can go into softer ground. By soft I mean softer than a foot of steel reinforced concrete on top of several feet of gravel, in good soil. That's about a minimum if you expect more than one of these things to travel on the same road more than once. The problem with that is that the tracks themselves are enormously large and complex - so much so that simply keeping them functional is quite a challenge. If you look at real life superheavy vehicles that exist, in pictures while they are moving, you discover the following:
the crawler that moves US space launch vehicles:
Moves only on a specially prepared gravel surface. The road it goes on is gravel, so that they can regrade and smooth it after each time at passes by - they tried concrete early on during the Saturn program, but it kept cracking the concrete no matter how they poured it, so they decided that making the road disposable was a better way to go. The people walking alongside it are there to make sure the tracks don't suddenly fail. if they do, their job is to ensure the vehicle is stopped ASAP to make repairs.
Giant Draglines:
This one moves using the 'feet' on each side of it, and rests on the large circular center piece while the feet are adjusted. The 'road' that was made for it was created with a bulldozer to get rid of trees and brush, then a grader to smooth it, then a roller and stomper to compact the ground, which can be seen in the rear left of the picture. It can only pass over one time before the road needs to be reconstructed. The people around it are there to make sure it doesn't sink into the ground as it moves. The other vehicles are there to reinforce any area of the road that looks as if it may be sinking underneath of it.
A large mining shovel finally something that moves on tracks like a tank. It weighs about 250 tons, so it's a good stand in for a giant tank too Suitable for use on solid rock surface only - smaller vehicles go in and remove all the dirt from an area before this equipment comes in and works on and in rock only - sorry - probably not suitable for a tank that's intended to go offroad.
So bottom line- superheavy tanks, are only somewhat mobile, and then under ideal circumstances. The rest of the time they are NOT moving. Moving one from point A to point B requires that the trip between those places be carefully planned and routed. Andre Bolkonsky's idea of using them as barely mobile pillboxes is about right.
e-100 speed-23 km/h. tiger two 35 km/h, challenger 1-2 about 50 km/h. even maus was faster than 10 km/h.You aren't going to get a superheavy tank that moves 10-40 km/hr. In practice, the superheavy tanks that were built had difficulty exceeding 5 km/hr. You can make a very very large vehicle with the power to weight ratio to go faster. That's easy. The hard part is putting it on a surface it won't sink into, and finding a drive mechanism that can handle the abrasive wear of handling the weight while moving quickly. This can (in theory) be mitigated by having extremely large and wide tracks to distribute the weight of the tank, so it can go into softer ground. By soft I mean softer than a foot of steel reinforced concrete on top of several feet of gravel, in good soil. That's about a minimum if you expect more than one of these things to travel on the same road more than once. The problem with that is that the tracks themselves are enormously large and complex - so much so that simply keeping them functional is quite a challenge. If you look at real life superheavy vehicles that exist, in pictures while they are moving, you discover the following:
the crawler that moves US space launch vehicles:
Moves only on a specially prepared gravel surface. The road it goes on is gravel, so that they can regrade and smooth it after each time at passes by - they tried concrete early on during the Saturn program, but it kept cracking the concrete no matter how they poured it, so they decided that making the road disposable was a better way to go. The people walking alongside it are there to make sure the tracks don't suddenly fail. if they do, their job is to ensure the vehicle is stopped ASAP to make repairs.
Giant Draglines:
This one moves using the 'feet' on each side of it, and rests on the large circular center piece while the feet are adjusted. The 'road' that was made for it was created with a bulldozer to get rid of trees and brush, then a grader to smooth it, then a roller and stomper to compact the ground, which can be seen in the rear left of the picture. It can only pass over one time before the road needs to be reconstructed. The people around it are there to make sure it doesn't sink into the ground as it moves. The other vehicles are there to reinforce any area of the road that looks as if it may be sinking underneath of it.
A large mining shovel finally something that moves on tracks like a tank. It weighs about 250 tons, so it's a good stand in for a giant tank too Suitable for use on solid rock surface only - smaller vehicles go in and remove all the dirt from an area before this equipment comes in and works on and in rock only - sorry - probably not suitable for a tank that's intended to go offroad.
So bottom line- superheavy tanks, are only somewhat mobile, and then under ideal circumstances. The rest of the time they are NOT moving. Moving one from point A to point B requires that the trip between those places be carefully planned and routed. Andre Bolkonsky's idea of using them as barely mobile pillboxes is about right.
The E-100 was never completed, so we don’t know how fast it might have been. The consistent problem for all the nations in WWII was the automotive drivetrain of actual tanks greatly underperforming in reality when compared to designed and expected speeds. Even the Americans who easily had the best mechanical expertise for drivetrain development often had disappointments.
The Tiger II and challenger are both smaller than what the opening poster wishes to discuss.
In all cases however there is an enormous difference between theoretical top speed on a flat straight well paved road (the numbers you are quoting) and actual speed off-road in a field with mild grades, drainage ditches, steering, bushes, etc. Speed under realistic field conditions is often somewhere around 1/2 to 1/3rd of the maximum theoretical speeds. Actual usable field speed are just i was referring to - not theoretical test speeds.
The tiger II had realistic field speeds of 15-20 km/hr - a far cry from its expected road performance of 35-38 km/hr performance. It could actually make 45 km/hr, but only briefly before having to slow down to prevent issues with overheating the transmission oil, throwing tracks, etc.
As for the Maus itself:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panzer_VIII_Maus
The ‘weakened motor field’ meant higher speed but lower torque, so not applicable to conditions in the field. Given the 1/2 to 1/3rd rule that usually applies to field speeds, the Maus would likely have achieved between 4 and 7 km/hr in the field in actual service.
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Tests with e-100 with mock turret of original weight proved that it could go 23 km/h. yes, it was never completed, but prototype was tested. and that means that all tanks are that as well. so most ww2 tanks were going 15-20km/h at most in combat?
Think of how much this would simplify the logistics. You wouldn't need to load up all your mechanics in a truck and have them go set up a machine shop where the tanks will be going. They could just walk beside the tank and perform maintenance constantly.
Yes sir. Obviously they could go faster in a ‘march’ on a road but once they have to leave roads to go off-road the deploy, either to attack, or defend, or avoid air attack speed drops tremendously. The rule that a tanks off-road speed is 1/2 to 1/3rd of its on road speed is pretty firm, even in the modern day.
In reality that’s a maximum. In most terrain at most times tank commanders would usually go even slower to try and avoid hard to see obstacles, and to give their gunners an opportunity to shoot. A lot of the WWII era tanks had less than great suspension systems as well. If the ground was rough they might have to slow down to avoid damaging the suspension, or avoid injury to the crew. Those padded helmets and jackets you see in a lot of pictures of tank crews (then and now) are to keep the crew from getting beaten unconscious or breaking bones while going over rough terrain.
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