Early/mid Tank Armour

[Inhapi 0]

Can anybody recommmend a good source on the various types of armour used in tanks before the "age of the composite armour".

 

I know it is basically all steel, but then, there is probably no metal that can have so many different qualities like steel, certainly during the later half of the 19th and the first half of the 20th centuries.

 

Thanks a lot.

[JasonJ 0]

There's a US military report in 1945 called Metallurigical Study Of Enemy Ordnance about German and Japanese armor,etc. Might be a good starting point.

[Stuart Galbraith 0]

Kenneth Mackseys 'Tank Vs Tank' gives a very nice overview of the armour/firepower race from the birth of the tank up to the present day. But to the best of my recollection it doesn't go into metallurgy.

 

I read a good book by a commander of a Cromwell that went into Germany in what he latterly found was a mild steel training tank. That was an interesting read.

[Inhapi 0]

Kenneth Mackseys 'Tank Vs Tank' gives a very nice overview of the armour/firepower race from the birth of the tank up to the present day. But to the best of my recollection it doesn't go into metallurgy.

 

I read a good book by a commander of a Cromwell that went into Germany in what he latterly found was a mild steel training tank. That was an interesting read.

 

Wasn't that the guy wh'os tank got peppered by 20 mm rounds (flak vierling ?) and immediatiatly saw something fishy: the small caliber rounds were not reflected by the armour but stuck in the steel plates. IIRC, he then went to the ordanance depot to find out what was special about this tank and found out that it was a mild steel prototype. But his crew did not want another (i.e. and armoured one) tank ?

Edited April 24, 2019 by Inhapi

[Stuart Galbraith 0]

 

Kenneth Mackseys 'Tank Vs Tank' gives a very nice overview of the armour/firepower race from the birth of the tank up to the present day. But to the best of my recollection it doesn't go into metallurgy.

 

I read a good book by a commander of a Cromwell that went into Germany in what he latterly found was a mild steel training tank. That was an interesting read.

 

Wasn't that the guy wh'os tank got peppered by 20 mm rounds (flak vierling ?) and immediatiatly saw something fishy: the small caliber rounds were not reflected by the armour but stuck in the steel plates. IIRC, he then went to the ordanance depot to find out what was special about this tank and found out that it was a mild steel prototype. But his crew did not want another (i.e. and armoured one) tank ?

 

 

Thats the one. It was also faster than any other Cromwell in his regiment, to the point of being able to do Dukes of Hazard style jumps.

 

It kind of illustrated neatly, speed is a kind of armour, and it did them proud.

[Inhapi 0]

There's a US military report in 1945 called Metallurigical Study Of Enemy Ordnance about German and Japanese armor,etc. Might be a good starting point.

 

Thanks, looking for it now online

[JasonJ 0]

No problem, good luck finding it.

[Mobius 0]

This site has many discussion threads on WWII tank armor.

https://forum.axishistory.com/viewforum.php?f=47&sid=a4ce15b93cc76c7be866815586890254

[Inhapi 0]

thanks