Armored Fighting Vehicles version M4 - are we going with that? Sure, man.

[DoctorMonkey]

You can understand the desire to get out though, especially after the introduction of a high velocity lump of metal and its friends into your rather cramped fighting space that no doubt caused consternation and irritation for all involved. 

British crews won't, so long as the tea-making Boiling Vessel isn't damaged

Its happened before - they just button up and wait for support as per doctrine, move the tank back towards ftiendly lines if they can. Well trained crews who trust in the firepower and willingness of their support to come back for them will obey their training and survive.

Which I guess is one of the reasons why recovery vehicles are often made on the same chassis complete with armour as the tanks they support?


If memory serves, the only Challenger 2 loss was due to being shot by another Challenger 2 in the turret... but looking at the Wikipedia page about it, it was a HESH round hitting the commander's cupola and causing fragments to enter the turret leading to the deaths of two of the crew and the subsequent fire that wrote off the tank. I had thought they were hit by a "fin" round in the rear of the turret - in other words in the ammo bin. Does anyone know if an equivalent tank (Leopard 2, M1 Abrams) has been hit like that?


(I do hope none have as I wouldn't wish harm on the soldiers making up the tank's crew)

It's kind of an odd question, but it came about thinking about those loss numbers for American crews from WWII.  For every Sherman "destroyed" with five man crews, the average was something like only 1.2 casualties per.  So what do the other 3.8 crew go do with themselves, typically?  Especially when you can take more than one serious hit and keep operating.

This is what happens when you mistake an average for an actual. The crews would, I believe, reform with those personnel still "operational" forming new crews with colleagues similarly inconvenienced.

[marauder648]

There's a fair few vids of modern Western MBT's getting hit by ATGMs in the Middle East, but again, won't link them here (because they can be a tad grisly as you know that inside that rapidly burning metal box 3 - 5 men are burning alive).  But they tend to end with jets of flame roaring out of them.

[Kidd]

Which I guess is one of the reasons why recovery vehicles are often made on the same chassis complete with armour as the tanks they support?

Not quite. Thats the equivalent of BT "I want all my lancemates to move 4/6/4" - when its made of the same chassis you just know it can go wherever its customers go and pull what needs pulling. When this rule of thumb isn't adhered to problems arise - such as the M60-based M88 wrecker which needed upgrading to M88A2 to adequately handle an M1 Abrams by itself.

There have been more penetrations of Challys than writeoffs - I was thinking of the one pierced in the belly by an RPG maiming the driver. Crew sat tight and collected a dozen more RPG hits while waiting for help.

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

If memory serves, the only Challenger 2 loss was due to being shot by another Challenger 2 in the turret... but looking at the Wikipedia page about it, it was a HESH round hitting the commander's cupola and causing fragments to enter the turret leading to the deaths of two of the crew and the subsequent fire that wrote off the tank. I had thought they were hit by a "fin" round in the rear of the turret - in other words in the ammo bin. Does anyone know if an equivalent tank (Leopard 2, M1 Abrams) has been hit like that?

Wasn't there an M1 in the first Gulf War that got stuck in a mud hole, so the platoon tried to destroy it?  I recall hearing that two other Abrams fired at it multiple times but the only damage they inflicted was igniting the ammo, which blew out the CASE but left the tank still intact.  Recovery vehicles were able to successfully pull it out the next day and it was repaired and put back into service, IIRC.

[ColBosch]

My training did not include the appropriate times to de-ass the track - that's something taught at the unit level, post-OSUT - so I'll have to wait for one of the more experienced treadheads to comment.

[The Eagle]

Before I went to AIT for Intelligence Analyst training, I was at OSUT for M1 crewmen and my drill sergeants there loved to throw around the line "death before dismount."  I have no idea how serious they were about it; it first came up when discussing the proper way to hang from the bustle rack while speeding along so you can take a "Class 1 Download" over the side of the tank without stopping.

[Cannonshop]

[DoctorMonkey]

Yay, lemme redirect that shot into my hull/turret vulnerable space...

[Matti]

Because when tanks go, they tend to go very messily, once a shells inside, there's nothing to stop it from hitting what ever the hell it wants, along with a cloud of razor sharp, exceptionally hot metal.  Or a jet of superheated metal.

I have been told (by my father) that penetration can also create temporary vacuum of space that kills the crew but otherwise leaves tank relatively intact for salvage. Also penetration can result a toxic hazard in form of dust which is not good to breathe in.

[DoctorMonkey]

I have been told (by my father) that penetration can also create temporary vacuum of space that kills the crew but otherwise leaves tank relatively intact for salvage. Also penetration can result a toxic hazard in form of dust which is not good to breathe in.

I think that is similar to the concept of damage from high velocity bullets in flesh
Certainly there might well be pressure changes that would not be nice to experience

[Matti]

It's kind of an odd question, but it came about thinking about those loss numbers for American crews from WWII.  For every Sherman "destroyed" with five man crews, the average was something like only 1.2 casualties per.  So what do the other 3.8 crew go do with themselves, typically?  Especially when you can take more than one serious hit and keep operating.

Some of the crew casualties didn't happen inside the tank, but rather outside of it. British Sherman crews had more serious casualties per tank lost. Difference: American crews had helmets, Brits had berets.

[DoctorMonkey]

Some of the crew casualties didn't happen inside the tank, but rather outside of it. British Sherman crews had more serious casualties per tank lost. Difference: American crews had helmets, Brits had berets.

but points were being awarded for style...

[Starbuck]

something a bit different, no photos but posters from WWI.

[DoctorMonkey]

I have a book called The Tank Commander Pocket Manual which has some stories from tankers from WW2 as well as some background on doctrine etc


One part by a tank commander, at the time of Normandy in June 1944 he was Troop Corporal and a tank commander in the Northants Yeomanry - his unit used Cromwells rather than Shermans but... he describes coming across one of the other tanks in the squadron were "brewed up" and found the crew had one man uninjured, one dead and three badly wounded. They put the four surviving crew on the back of their tank and withdrew them back until they could hand them off to other units. The other brewed up tank crew appears to have survived without injury as, as the writer puts it, none of them were listed as casualties.


The same man was wounded later in the Normandy campaign and returned to his unit 10 days later to a new tank and a new driver.

[tomaddamz]

Yay, lemme redirect that shot into my hull/turret vulnerable space...

That would be true in the slower velocity regimes using an APC type projectile, in todays threat enviroment velocities are much higher and armor failure is not displacement or strain failure but mutual ablation, and most AP projectiles are using a flat nose that is designed not to ricochet at large angles to the normal.  A modern APFSDS penetrator will have to chew through the whole LOS thickness.  Considering that this is a NERA or NXRA bulging plate array it actually injects more material laterally against the penetrator making it pinch like a saw into bending wood.

[CDAT]

Wasn't there an M1 in the first Gulf War that got stuck in a mud hole, so the platoon tried to destroy it?  I recall hearing that two other Abrams fired at it multiple times but the only damage they inflicted was igniting the ammo, which blew out the CASE but left the tank still intact.  Recovery vehicles were able to successfully pull it out the next day and it was repaired and put back into service, IIRC.

Story as told to me by my Drill Sergeants was that it got stuck up past the turret ring, the rest of the platoon tried to pull it out, but could not, so they were going to destroy it. Put flammables and spare ammo on the turret floor and dropped a thermite on it, but the fire suppression system put it out. So then the rest of the platoon shot at it, all they managed to do was pop the blow out panels, even at point blank they could not penetrate the armor except for the thin back side of the turret. At this point they were told to wait for recovery as the ground war was over. In the end it they said it took four wreckers (M88), and the three other tanks from the platoon. And it was combat ready again within 24 hours (pulled the turret and put a spare on).

Before I went to AIT for Intelligence Analyst training, I was at OSUT for M1 crewmen and my drill sergeants there loved to throw around the line "death before dismount."  I have no idea how serious they were about it; it first came up when discussing the proper way to hang from the bustle rack while speeding along so you can take a "Class 1 Download" over the side of the tank without stopping.

From my experience with a professional force I would say it is very serious. Now a lot of semi trained crew will abandon their tank as others have said even if they are not disabled. There were time when I was still in Armor that most of the crew did not touch the ground for days at a time. The driver would get out and check the track when we stopped moving, when it was chow time the driver who was already on the ground got food for the crew, everyone would sleep on the tank, and as you covered above "Class 1 Download" was also done from the tank.

[marauder648]

I know this isn't tanks but can we take a moment to admire the work on these models and the effort put into the painting?

https://imgur.com/gallery/CoRsM

[ANS Kamas P81]

Needs more tanks.

[Kidd]

Well, here's at least half a tank

[Daryk]

Needs more tanks.

Aside from the excellent detail overall, the one random 'mech makes the whole 3rd world scene scrolling through. 

[Kidd]

I know this isn't tanks but can we take a moment to admire the work on these models and the effort put into the painting?

https://imgur.com/gallery/CoRsM

wow 70s Malaysia vibe strong

[Feenix74]

Beautiful work, the Mitsubishi Heavy Industries split-system air-conditioner gives it very nineties-noughties feel for me.

[Weirdo]

Story as told to me by my Drill Sergeants was that it got stuck up past the turret ring, the rest of the platoon tried to pull it out, but could not, so they were going to destroy it. Put flammables and spare ammo on the turret floor and dropped a thermite on it, but the fire suppression system put it out. So then the rest of the platoon shot at it, all they managed to do was pop the blow out panels, even at point blank they could not penetrate the armor except for the thin back side of the turret. At this point they were told to wait for recovery as the ground war was over. In the end it they said it took four wreckers (M88), and the three other tanks from the platoon. And it was combat ready again within 24 hours (pulled the turret and put a spare on).

WAIT.

That thing's fire suppression will put out thermite?!

[glitterboy2098]

might have just kept the thermite from igniting when the vehicle was hit.

and IIRC those were the 105mm equipped models. though the A1 upgrade IIRC actually increased the armor protection at the same time it switched to the a bigger gun, so the results might be about the same with the later models.

[Fat Guy]

Actually no. There were no 105 equipped M1s in Desert Storm. Even the Marine's were replaced with Army A1s out of the European war stocks.

[sadlerbw]

A bit late with this one, but I think it was Marauder who was mentioning that tank ammo doesn't so much explode as it burns real fast. This is quite accurate. When not confined in a gun barrel, smokeless gunpowder is fairly stable, but will burn quite happily once you get it started. As a less grisly example than some videos, here are some soldiers disposing of unused mortar charges:

https://youtu.be/MN61kYwilnE

Not exactly an explosion, but hoo boy do they burn. Certainly not something anyone would want to be sat next to inside a tank.

[Garrand]

Actually no. There were no 105 equipped M1s in Desert Storm. Even the Marine's were replaced with Army A1s out of the European war stocks.

To be even more accurate, there WERE 105mm armed Abrams in Desert Shield but were all replaced with -A1s before the ground war kicked off, just in case there are any conflicting photos out there (and there are...)

Damon.

[marauder648]

A bit late with this one, but I think it was Marauder who was mentioning that tank ammo doesn't so much explode as it burns real fast. This is quite accurate. When not confined in a gun barrel, smokeless gunpowder is fairly stable, but will burn quite happily once you get it started. As a less grisly example than some videos, here are some soldiers disposing of unused mortar charges:

https://youtu.be/MN61kYwilnE

Not exactly an explosion, but hoo boy do they burn. Certainly not something anyone would want to be sat next to inside a tank.

Thats a really good video!  Also this kind of fire is obviously hot as all hell, and because it burns so intensely, it melts metal.  HMS Defence was hit during the Battle of Jutland and a fire was started in her wing 7.5-inch turret which flashed back to the magazine and set off the propellant.

The wing magazine then set off the bow and stern 9.2-inch guns magazines and it all burned.  She sunk within 5 - 10 seconds, its thought she exploded but her wreck was found upright on the sea floor, in remarkably good condition.  What happened was that the deflagration of her magazines basically melted through her hull and keel and she just dropped down like a thrown rock.

[Baldur Mekorig]

Vehículo de Combate Transporte de Personal

Thats correct, VCTP, or in english, Personal Carrier Combat Vehicle.

Sadly a lot of the variants only exist in schematics (like the VCDA), but the TAM are getting modernized. Heck, we even got  our own IIC upgrade!

[CDAT]

WAIT.

That thing's fire suppression will put out thermite?!

No the fire suppression put out the fire they started in the tank to destroy it. It did take some damage, but did not destroy the tank as they had hoped it would.