that right sea cadet. look total different and the challenger 2 has the better armour. it was design by the same guy how gave the US amry chombon but the would now were to imporve it better the any US Army scientists. so it would believe that the challenger 2 is better.
it supose to do with the fact in the challenger it had tungtens rod in it in layers i guess they replace them with du rods or a combine them in different layers.
were the abrams have had bolt on du plates to what i have read.
the many reason know country expect the Britsh army have used it is the fact it use a none nato weopon in the form of a 120mm rifled gun. which in my thoughts is one of the best if not the best anti tank gun out now. it fire charm 1&3 and hesh which i like.
that why the greece did not order it ever with it win most of the trails and same in Australia.
the gun is one of the reason in most tank compertion that the challenger 2 is place low then others as it is slow fire only a round every 5 seconds.
when on fire range it out shots all other tanks. this maybe down to a the crew or it could just be down to the fact rifled gun are more accurate with more first shot hit then any other tank.
mean more first shot kills. as it has the longest comfirmed kill in the gulf war 2003 at 2.3mile. and the longest overall tank to tank kill is take by the older challenger at a 5100m no other tank has a kill that long. this was at night the kill was made i have read.
so why then do most of you all think a tank design in the 70s not name any names "abrams" can bet a tank design in the 90s. As it is the news of this genations tanks in service with a country
one flaw with the abrams is the hull design it does not take kindly to being upgrade cheaply and quickly like most other tanks.
that why the challenger 2 wins.

but you forget Japan. All of their tanks were undergunned, tin clad, weakly powered.

Yes,we had poor technology of tank.
In Nomonghan our type97 couldn,t defeat to soviet BT and in Guadalcanal your tanks Ｍ4 and Ｍ3 neither.
We had too poor transportation to carry heavy tank.
Practicably, We could carry under 13ton tank.
Our tank often broke down though the United States tank was dependable.
Weapons of Japanese army were too poor.

Thats True, but Japan didnt need that many tanks. Most of the fighting were on small islands or in terrein unsuitable for tank warfare. I suspect the Japanese were probably right not to invest to heavily on tank warfare.
There were really only two places Japan could have made use of tanks, China and the Phillippeans.

Had I been the Japanese I would have concentrated on mobile AT-systems like a Bazooka for close in work and a more modern range of field artillery for infantry support. The Japense real problem is that they lacked suppressing fire weapons like semi-auto rifles, SMGs (the type 100 SMG came to late) or Heavy Rifles like the BREN or BAR. All they had were LMG, that despite the designation of 'light' were not too easy to lug around.

Originally Posted by mmarsh

Thats True, but Japan didnt need that many tanks. Most of the fighting were on small islands or in terrein unsuitable for tank warfare. I suspect the Japanese were probably right not to invest to heavily on tank warfare.
There were really only two places Japan could have made use of tanks, China and the Phillippeans.

Had I been the Japanese I would have concentrated on mobile AT-systems like a Bazooka for close in work and a more modern range of field artillery for infantry support. The Japense real problem is that they lacked suppressing fire weapons like semi-auto rifles, SMGs (the type 100 SMG came to late) or Heavy Rifles like the BREN or BAR. All they had were LMG, that despite the designation of 'light' were not too easy to lug around.

Uh, you are perhaps forgetting all the fighting in China, Manchuria, Indonesia? Not exactly tiny islands. Japan could've done better in the tank department. Thankfully, they didn't. They had about as much an idea how to use tanks as they did subs - lucky for us.

It was a matter of priorities. their steel went into the fleet. remember, japan never had the economy to really push the war, much like Italy. Just as an example of how they had no production co-ordination; they issued three major calibers of pistols, 7, 8, and 9 MM, they issued 2 type 89 machine guns in 7.7mm, both were different guns and with different cartridges. they issued 20, 23, and 25 MM guns.
the army and navy seemed to hate the other more than the enemy.

Originally Posted by Doppleganger

The Sherman was not a 'light support' tank it was a designated medium tank.

The Germans produced rather more than 435 Tigers, 1,355 to be precise, and 485 King Tigers were built.

What serious defects did the T-34 have exactly?

Sometimes I wonder where you get your info Cadet Seaman.

Ok sorry, wires got crossed. I was reading on the Tiger II. Only 489 where made, 492 including the three prototypes.


And yes the Sherman was designated medium.

Originally Posted by warhappy100

yesterday worst M3 Grant/Lee,Panzer MKIII,M551 Sheridan&M60A2 these
last 2 for the gun/missle launcher set up.
Best today Leo2A6 along the with A5 for $ reasons those that use it are getting there moneys worth. But the M1A2 and CH2 stand alone for protection though the facts that both use DU in armor makeup has me placing them in there categroy in regard to protection.

I agree with everything but the M551. There was mixed feels about it in Veitnam and it was used by the 82nd into the 80's (M551A1).

The M3 Grant/Lee was actually very effective in the early part of WWII. Although the sponson gun had a limited traverse, it's 75mm gun made short work of the early German armor. The British used it to great effect in el Alamein.

The Panzer III rolled through France and the low countries in a literal "lightning war". I don't see how anyone in their right mind could call it a bad tank.

The Sheridan and the Patton were both effective tanks and although better things came later, they were hardly failures.

Surprising how little so many of you tank "experts" seem to know when you keep mentioning the same poorly selected choices. I've had few people agree with me yet about the Soviet multi-turreted tanks being the worst of all time (as their attempted use clearly showed - I say "attempted" because they didn't do a damn bit of good except add to Russian misery). There can be no arguement though about it. M3s, Mk IIIs, M551s, and M60s all kicked ass. The multi-turreted tanks only got their asses kicked, overun, and frozen dead.

The M3 Grant/Lee was very effective in North Africa in the hands of the British. It was superior to the Matildas and Crusaders not to mention the Pz II Pz III and the various tanks it faced.

The Sheridan was a good tank, it was designed as a Airborne Light Tank similar in concept to the obsolete 'Infantry tanks' of WWII. Its job was to support infantry and was not intended to face Russian Heavy Armor. So to compare it to MBTs is unfair. T46/47/48 Patton was an average design. It did terriably against India in the 1965 War and very well in the hands of the Isrealis. Basically its success depended on how it was used, not a bad design but nothing to write home about either.

As for the Multiturret Russian Tanks such as the T-28, it actually did OK in the Spanish Civil War where it faced the Pz I, but by the Russo-Finnish War it was outclassed by Finnish AT-Guns. By Barbarossa is was already out of production, the Russian War Machine had moved on to the far superior T-34.

I still go with my original vote as the worst tank which was the Polish TKS Tankette series.