pick ur favorite world war II armored vehicles, post reasons why

Germans made the best and the most advanced tanks in WWII, and the most propably still do. The only bad thing was lack of german manufacturing capability and since advanced features often complex construction which increased manufacturing times.

Russian T3485 has it's legend but it is mostly only legend. Tank was so called massproduction tank which only purpose was to be quicly manufactured and outnumber german tanks.

Something about products of german tank industry and their users tell kill counts. We know many german tank aces like Otto Carius or colonel Franz Bäke, and combat situations where only few german tanks destroyed dozens of T34s, and no need to mention herr Wittman.

For example straightly from achtungpanzer.com:
"One of those actions was five-day battle in January of 1944 at the "Balabonowka Pocket", where Panzer-Regiment Bäke was credit with destruction of 267 Soviet tanks, while losing one Tiger and four Panthers."

T34 bad features:
-Bad sights
-Bad command system
-Bad visibility outside
-No radios
-Overemployed tank commander
-Low quality armor steel since ancient manufacturing systems (high concentration of coal -> weaker)
-Compared to caliber AP ammunition was under efficient (T34 with 76mm)

Good features:
-Fits for fast massproduction (simplified construction)
-Sloped armor (not unique feature in WWII)
-Effective aluminium diesel engine

You should also list the bad features of German armor. Such as that it constantly broke down, was too heavy for long distance high speed manouver, and most simple of all - was so complicted it couldn't be produced fast enough. All of what you say it true, but was eventually negated by what I just listed. The T-34 wins because although in quality it was not a match to the Tiger I and Tiger II, it was far superior in reliability, speed of manouver, and mass production. The Germans would've been better served to have kept to a modification of the Panzer IV - give it sloped armor and perhaps wider tracks for Russian steppes and they would've been able to make many more tanks that worked well and ran fast.

Originally Posted by Charge_7

You should also list the bad features of German armor. Such as that it constantly broke down, was too heavy for long distance high speed manouver, and most simple of all - was so complicted it couldn't be produced fast enough. All of what you say it true, but was eventually negated by what I just listed. The T-34 wins because although in quality it was not a match to the Tiger I and Tiger II, it was far superior in reliability, speed of manouver, and mass production. The Germans would've been better served to have kept to a modification of the Panzer IV - give it sloped armor and perhaps wider tracks for Russian steppes and they would've been able to make many more tanks that worked well and ran fast.

Yes, i had a hurry and no time to write longer post.

General bad features of german tanks:
-Unrealiable engine (PzV)
-Complex and expensive construction combined with lack of production capability, that itself doesn't make german armors bad.
-At early war too light armor and weapons

German tanks weren't the best ones to manufacture and PzIV wasn't the best product of german tank engineering since it's light and unsloped armor, but personally i prefer StuGIII serie, PzV later models, Tiger II, Jagdpanther and in some cases Jagdtiger.

Everything that had a 100mm or bigger main gun showed up too late in World War II to have much of an impact on the outcome. Sure, there were better tanks than even the King Tiger, but they were still very new on VE day.

Originally Posted by Charge_7

You should also list the bad features of German armor. Such as that it constantly broke down, was too heavy for long distance high speed manouver, and most simple of all - was so complicted it couldn't be produced fast enough. All of what you say it true, but was eventually negated by what I just listed. The T-34 wins because although in quality it was not a match to the Tiger I and Tiger II, it was far superior in reliability, speed of manouver, and mass production. The Germans would've been better served to have kept to a modification of the Panzer IV - give it sloped armor and perhaps wider tracks for Russian steppes and they would've been able to make many more tanks that worked well and ran fast.

Guderian, when he was Inspector General of Panzertruppen, recommended that German factories cease production of Panthers and Tigers and instead focus on the long barrelled Panzer IV, because many more could be made, they were very reliable, and they could be repaired in their sleep by the tank crews. Of course, Hitler would have none of this but Guderian had excellent reasons for recommending this course of action.

When you think about it, Germany's greatest victories came about when neither the Panther or Tiger were in service with the Wehrmacht. Germany would have been better served to scrap the development of the Tiger II and instead focus on making the Panther and Tiger I more reliable and easier to build.

Just to add, that I don't believe the negative factors you listed outweighed the positive factors when it came to the Panther or Tiger. Both were able to dominate the battlefield and it was only the greater application of air power and the eventual lack of fuel supplies that prevented either tank from having a greater influence over events than they did.

Yep, the later tanks took the "blitz" outta blitzkreig.

As to your last point, you have some case for an arguement there, but still they could not be produced fast enough. That really is what it boils down to. 1400 Tigers vs 50,000 Shermans made and not even counting the T-34s yet alone other makes.

the best were the tigers from what i seen... but i do like the shermans cuz they have lasted the longest in service

I was thinking that maybe this should be sperated in self-propelled artillery and tanks. Its kind of hard to compare the two. But overall I like the JS-3 even though very few were made by the end of the war.
http://www.battlefield.ru/is3.html

the best tank overall, i think is the pz IV H version

it has mobility, a very reliable engine and easy to repair chassis

it has wider tracks than previous IV versions, giving it an advantage in traction

it is armed with a longbarreled 75mm cannon, said in achungpanzer.com that it could pentrate up to josef stalin 2 tanks and below

the side skirts, got to love those, makes heat wewapons very worthless aginist and is a hassel to soviet anittank infantry

magnetic paste on armor is a burden on soviet antitank infantry as well

easy to produce means alot more could be made

armor is sufficient in which it could survive t-43 shots and in some cases could survive even 88mm shots, together with mobility it is a good advantage

the best part of all: huge ammo allwance, at the end of the war soviet heavy gunn vehicles, could only carry 28 ammo, while the pz IV H could carry around 40 and more rounds, very good advantage as german goes into its late war and its badly mauled supply lines

a combination of these advantages and it makes it the best tank of wwii i think




another good tank is the KV-85, with similar features like the PZ IV H

it was realized by germans to make bigger better tanks when they saw KV 1's invincibility