Best Tank Destroyer/ self-propelled gun

[MacArther]

The panther derivative was also much cheaper to build. All of which makes it difficult to understand why only 430 were produced during the war

From the various books I've read, it would seem that the reason for the low production count was because the Western Allies were focusing a good portion of bombing and fighter bombing missions to taking out the Jadgpanther's production sites.

[Mobius]

Originally Posted by Soren

Glen, you are still clueless about which you talk. You're a gamer, I had that figured out from the start.

First of all your criteria citings are completely wrong.

These are the true criterias used by each country:

German test criteria
2/3rds (66 %) of the projectiles fired must penetrate the plate completely, ei. 100% of the projectile.

German test data actually required that the best quality round penetrate the plate five times in a row in a condition where the HE was capable of detonating properly. When you see that the Tiger 88mm Pzgr 39 penetrates 120mm at 30 degrees and 100m, that means that the best quality 88mm ammo penetrates 120mm/30 degree five times in a row at the velocity associated with 100m within a velocity of 10m/sec.

Originally Posted by from Datenblatten:

"The effect of the projectile inside the tank and the probability of hitting the target are not considered in these graphical charts;thus only the COMPLETE PENETRATION WITH THE TOTAL EFFECT INSIDE THE TANK IS CONSIDERED. As a rule, this effect is of annihilating power when using armor-piercing shells with a high-explosive charge. When using hard core projectiles, steel or soft iron core projectiles, or hollow charge projectiles, completely annihilating effect cannot always be expected with a single shot, because the crew, located in the dead space of the tank, cannot be hit under certain conditions. A LIMITED EFFECT, WITHOUT PIERCING THE TANK BY THE PROJECTILE (effect produced by back-spalling of armor plate and punching holes (Stanzpfropfen) is frequently achieved with plates that are 10% thicker than the thickness presented in the graphs."

This usually is considered to be 80% criteria.

Originally Posted by Soren

Glen, you are still clueless about which you talk.
British test cirteria
50% of the projectiles fired must completely penetrate the plate, ei. 100% of the projectile.

British Criteria seems to be 80% too.

[Mobius]

Originally Posted by Soren

Again quit posting bullsh*t Glen.

At Aberdeen the penetration performance of the 8.8cm KwK36 L/56 & 8.8cm KwK43 L/71 against vertical 240 BHN RHA armor at 100m was as follows:

8.8cm KwK36: 162mm
8.8cm KwK43: 232mm

Is this Aberdeen data from documents you obtained from Aberdeen or from a book that quotes it being from Aberdeen? I'm just curious as to why Aberdeen posted tabular data in meter ranges in the 1940s while all other original documents I have are in yards. But there is one book that seems to have mixed up yards for meters for Aberdeen German gun data.

[PJay]

I must admit I haven't read all the posts.
How about the Brit Archer? 17 pdr gun and it can retreat in a hurry. Served post-war for a while.

[Juha]

Hello PJay
Archer is one of my favourites. Not that it was the best, but it was so British. It had good points. It was compact with very heavy punch, 17 pdr was a very effective A/T gun, as you pointed out the rearward pointing gun had its merits. The rearward pointing gun also made it difficult to misuse the vehicle. Many TDs had the problem that because they had tracks and gun, infantry officers often thought that they could be used like tanks.
Bad point was that it was too compact, driver could not be on his seat when the gun was fired, otherwise he would loose his head, that was a tactical handicap.

Some 655 was made and used in NWE, but IIRC units prefer Achilles (M10 regunned with 17 pdr) but Archer wasn’t a bad A/T vehicle.

Juha

[Soren]

The German criteria demanded that atleast 2/3rds (66.6%) of the same type of rounds fired at the target had to completely penetrate the plate in order for it to be considered as the mean penetration performance for that type of projectile at said range. By comparison US criteria only demanded that 50% were partial penetrations while the British demanded that only 50% of the rounds fired had to penetrate completely.

The Soviets demanded 2/3rds of the rounds to penetrate the plate, but wether it was completely or just partially is unlcear, and the fact that the Soviet couldn't manufacture good quality steel also had an impact on the results.

As for the Aberdeen results, they were all converted into results by meter range, which is easily done if you got the penetration performance of the round at 4 different ranges with 500m intervals.