Talk:Tiger I

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[edit] Penetration figures

Some of the figures in the below paragraph I think are wrong:

"Tigers were capable of destroying their most common opponents, the American Sherman, or British Churchill IV at ranges exceeding 1,600 m. In contrast, the Soviet T-34 equipped with the 76.2 mm gun could not penetrate the Tiger frontally at any range, but could achieve a side penetration at approximately 500 m firing the BR-350P APCR ammunition. The T34-85's 85 mm gun could penetrate the Tiger from the side at over 1,000 m It could also penetrate 100mm from 1km away=Tiger frontal kill. This does also not mention the gun's HVAP ammo. The IS-2's 122 mm gun could destroy the Tiger at ranges exceeding 1,000 m from any aspect. It could penetrate 100mm from over 2 km away but with some leeway for angle this should still be higher than 1000m.

The M4 Sherman's 75 mm gun could not penetrate the Tiger frontally at any range, and needed to be within 500 m to achieve a side penetration. What about British supply of M71 APCBC shot? The British 17-pounder as used on the Sherman Firefly, if firing its APDS round, could penetrate frontally at over 1,500 m. The US 76 mm gun, if firing the most common APCBC ammunition, could not penetrate the Tiger frontally at any range yes it could, with penetration figures I have seen saying around the same for the 85mm., and needed to be within 1,000 m to get a side kill. However, if the 76 mm was firing HVAP ammunition (usually in short supply), frontal penetrations were possible at 1,000 m."

The Sanctuary Sparrow 07:41, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Cite some sources for your figures and we'll correct them. Otherwise we can't. DMorpheus 16:22, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Using this site throughout.

• Using APBC BR-365 ammo Soviet 85mm can penetrate 102mm of armour at 0 degrees from 1000m. APCR BR-365P ammo can penetrate 110mm at 1000m. Zaloga gives a higher figure for this in his medium tanks book but calls it HVAP so I don't know if that is any different.
• Using AP BR-471 IS-2's gun can penetrate 118mm at 2000m and 0 degrees. The APBC ammo for it can penetrate 129mm in same conditions.
• Concerning M71 shot for the 75mm, I first learnt about it from Wikipedia itself:

"A much improved anti tank shell was developed. This was a APCBC (Armour Piercing Capped, Ballistic Cap) shot design. It had a muzzle velocity of 2,600 ft/s (790 m/s) as opposed to 2,030 ft/s (620 m/s) for the older M61 APC shell. US documents1 showed the round as available for both the M3 75 mm and ROQF 75 mm. Other sources2 indicate the shell saw use by the British only. The performance of the new shell was a vast increase: penetrating 102 mm at 500 yards (460 m) at 30 degree angle of impact. Actual availability and usage of this round is unclear. According to some British tables M72 AP had a penetration performance of 114 mm at 100 yards and 102 mm at 500 yards, so it is possible the 30 degrees angle of impact is a transposition error for 0 degrees. This is interesting as US M72 has a penetration performance of 101 mm at 100 yards."

I tried to find out more about this when I went to Bovington Tank Museum but didn't have the time.

• For the 76mm, using AP M79 shot, it can penetrate 109mm at 457m at 30 degrees, so at 0 degrees I'd be guessing about 500-600m for a frontal kill? M62 APCBC ammo can penetrate 93mm at 457m at 30 degrees, so I'd be guessing about 200m for a head-on frontal kill.

I've chosen this source as it seems to hook up nicely with others I have seen. I know the results would be different if we took in hand face hardened armour but since most of the figures are for rounds with ballistic caps the results wouldn't be too different.

Phew. The Sanctuary Sparrow 07:54, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Whoa actually I've just read a book about the Tiger in combat and apparently the 76mm shot could only penetrate at really short (100mm) range. This seems kind of odd to me, as most penetration tables I've seen say it can penetrate about 100mm at 500m. The round does have a ballistic cap so the FH armour shouldn't present too much of a problem, and if it did surely the closer one gets the more likely it is to shatter.

???? Perhaps an expert would like to help out. The Sanctuary Sparrow 16:30, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

Afaik performance of Soviet AP shells was inconsistent during entire war due to poor gunpowder quality - some shipments of shells lived up to the specs, some didn't. Also, ballistic cap isn't the same as piercing cap - it's soft and improves aerodynamics only, not penetration (APBC is not APC, nor APCBC) 195.218.211.20 (talk) 21:33, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Tank Killer

I think this section seriously needs to be reworked. In regards to the Normandy Infomation it contains many errors. The Germans had around 2500 tanks deployed (roughly over 900 Mark4s, 650 Panthers, 600 StugGs, 120 Tiger 1s and 200 other tanks). Thus the 1400 tank figure is incorrect and on top of that has no source to back it up. The 2500 tank figure and the rough breakdown is from the book "British Armour in the Normandy Campaign 1944" By John Buckley.

Also there is no source for the Allied/German tank losses being 3:1 in any way. Allied losses were not far above German tank losses at the end of the campaign. According to US reports tank losses were roughly 1,537 and British Tank losses were Total = 1,568. That comes out to about 3100 tanks lost. German losses are hard to find but very few of their tanks made it out of Falaise. Most source put it over 1800 tanks lost and usually over 2000 tanks lost. At best you are looking at 1.5:1 ratio, and if losses were higher then 2000 below a 1.5:1 ratio. So in effect a 3:1 ratio is not possible and though I don't plan to debate this on the main page, I feel the Tank Killer section should be edited to remove many of the unsupported facts that is present in the article. Thus until the author can provide some sources to back up the supposed 3:1 ratio and the 1400 tank statistic I will remove that section of the Tank Killer section. No need to create new myths about WWII. 74.12.251.136 00:33, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Wokelly 00:31, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Don't forget that many, many german tanks were lost to allied airstrikes (both hard and soft kills), while most of allied tanks fell prey to german (anti-)tank guns. 195.218.210.156 (talk) 22:23, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Source? I don't think Allied aircraft knocked out many German tanks. They kept them from getting built and from getting supplied, which is just as good. Regards, DMorpheus (talk) 16:14, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Post campaign analysis made by the air force confirmed that the majority of tank destroyed in Normandy was not because of the air force.

It is in fact a myth, which still persists to this day even though there is no evidence to support the exaggerated claims made by the air forces. --EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 09:34, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Methinks that "post campaign analysis" must be about hard kills only. Also a lot of german memoirs state many tanks directly lost to allied airpower, many lightly damaged (or not damaged at all) tanks abandoned and whole panzer divisions paralysed w/o any fuel supply 195.218.211.20 (talk) 21:23, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Funny stuff

Wikipedia is funny. Soviet records are not accepted and german are accepted, especially considering how germans were exposed during battle of Kursk for their manipulation with losses record. Again, wikipedia gets funny sometimes, so many tiger fans, it is simply amazing how some people are gettting such a hard time accepting that it was Soviet IS-2 that was the most powerful tank of WW2, at least in a tank vs tank duel or tank vs tank engagements. Heinz Guderian's order not to engage soviet heavy tanks in open tank vs tank battles and orders to act only in ratios of no less than 2 to 1 in favor of tigers is not enough for someone, still not convincing? And why is it mentioned at the end of article about 10:1 losses to Tigers. Should it not note that it was on western front? Should it not say it was against MUCH lighter tanks? Why does it not mention that a lot of those kills are due to german's better crew training? Once again, Wikipedia still remains a biased source if you ask me, ok, you want to state some fact, but hey, state the whole picture, not just what makes Tiger look good. As for citation that SU-152 was penetrating Tigers, or, rather ripping turrets off even with anti-concrete projectile exactly how it says, through sheer force, go to SU-152 article, everything is there. And the fact that SU-152 was not a stopgap against german tanks is first of all obvious, since it is a HUGE overkill againt any german AFV of the war in terms of direct hit and it was mentioned not once in British documentaries, which are avaliable on YOUTUBE. Also, could someone please tell me how to cite sources, because I added some information, for which I have sources, but can not source it. In a nutshell, real short introduction.99.231.46.37 (talk) 03:42, 3 June 2008 (UTC)Pavel Golikov

First, a friendly reminder that new comments should go on the bottom of the talk page. If you're going to contradict the German numbers, please provide a reliable source stating otherwise. From what I understand, it was common practice to only include the tanks that were completely destroyed in the losses, while those that can be recovered and repaired are not (much the same as in the US Army). That likely addresses the discrepancy between Soviet and German figures. As for the 10:1 ratio, it clearly states that even a ratio that high would not be sufficient for the Tiger to defeat the Allied production capability. As for comparing weights of tanks, the Sherman was actually a few tons heavier than the main Soviet tank, the T-34. The Sherman Firefly was actually over 6 tonnes heavier, and the Churchill was 12 tonnes heavier. And if you're going to reduce it all to crew training, you might as well not include any statistics about combat performance, because without the crews, they're worthless 30 tonne+ paperweights.

As for adding sources, you can use a basic <ref> "Place source information here" </ref> template. There are other, more specific templates for online citations, as well as books, etc. Parsecboy (talk) 04:04, 3 June 2008 (UTC)