Were German tanks over engineered?

[Yodasgrandad]

I read alot about German tanks recently and am wondering if they needed more time and quality control to fix or remedy alot of issues with their tanks?

I.e. would a Tiger tank made in the 1930's be better than the ones made in 1942-44?

[stg 44]

I read alot about German tanks recently and am wondering if they needed more time and quality control to fix or remedy alot of issues with their tanks?

I.e. would a Tiger tank made in the 1930's be better than the ones made in 1942-44?

Depends on what features you want them to have. They usually were rushed during the war, so the 'cats' were teething and had major issues in some cases due to being upweighted and then rushed into service, the most notorious being the Panther with a final drive being designed for a 30 ton AFV, while the production model weighed at least 43 tons. That and the straight cut of the gears were just begging for damage.

[Paul Lakowski]

German prewar tanks were designed to last 25 years , so yes they were overdesigned .....this did not change until 1941/42.

[Kingfish]

A Tiger built in in the 30s would not have been a Tiger, it would have been a Panzer IV.

It was only after experience in combat against the allied tanks that the final form of the Tiger emerged from earlier prototypes.

[Sheldrake]

I read alot about German tanks recently and am wondering if they needed more time and quality control to fix or remedy alot of issues with their tanks?

I.e. would a Tiger tank made in the 1930's be better than the ones made in 1942-44?

The short answer is no.

The German companies involved in making early German tanks of the 1930s struggled to make the bigger tanks. The so called heavy tractor was very unreliable. Henschel, the company that built the Tiger would not commit to building tanks in 1929 citing their lack of experience with heavier vehicles and unwillingness to commit to projects outside the norms of the motor industry.

Two companies Krupp and Rheinmetall were commissioned to build a heavy tank. Here is the Krupp PzKpfw NbFz VI "heavy tank" deployed in Norway largely for propaganda purposes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neubaufah ... eug%22.jpg

Even though they were beter armed than the Pz IV these tanks were not used on the decisive Western Front

[maltesefalcon]

Why is this discussion in the What If section?
Should be in the Panzer section IMHO.

[stg 44]

A Tiger built in in the 30s would not have been a Tiger, it would have been a Panzer IV.

It was only after experience in combat against the allied tanks that the final form of the Tiger emerged from earlier prototypes.

Not quite:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neubaufahrzeug

[Ifor]

Why were the companies struggle and why so inexperienced? Was is due to the Versailles treaty?

[Sheldrake]

Why were the companies struggle and why so inexperienced? Was is due to the Versailles treaty?

The Versailles treaty forbade the Germans from building tanks from 1919, and they hadn't built many during the war. The source for my comments is Sotmr of Steel the development of German and Soviet armoured doctrine. This covers the developments made by the Reichswehr and Nazi goverments. http://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/boo ... 0100610430

[Ifor]

Thank you,for that much appreciated. The book has now gone on my absolutely essential list.
I remembered the treaty restrictions, I'm just surprised that the rest of German industry didn't pick up the development under a different name

[maltesefalcon]

German prewar tanks were designed to last 25 years , so yes they were overdesigned .....this did not change until 1941/42.

Seeing as this thread seems to be staying put please allow me to add my coments.

German pre-war tanks consisted largely of the PzI And PzII models.
(2678 out of 3493 on inventory 1/9/39)

Only 98 were Pz III and 211 were Pz IV.

(They also had 198 Czech tanks which are moot to this discussion since they were not German designs.)

The point is that for the most part I would say that Germanys pre-war tanks were not overengineered. The Pz I and II proved to be nearly useless in combat siutuations. PzI was so fragile it could not even survive a long journey. Quite a few broke down in the Anschluss where not a shot was fired at them.

The larger pre-war tanks would hardly qualified as over engineered either. Both needed (and received) considerable improvements, especially in their main armament.

[Paul Lakowski]

if they were designed to last 25 years they were by definition over engineered. Each new gen was only 10 years.

[maltesefalcon]

if they were designed to last 25 years they were by definition over engineered. Each new gen was only 10 years.

Perhaps we are splitting hairs over semantics.
During the development of the Panzer force, it may have been the stated goal to have tanks engineered to last twenty five years in service. From a pure design point I would agree that it was over engineering to set this as a target in the design phase, and a mistake to do so.

Having the tanks actually survive in service 25 years is quite another matter. Virtually none of the prewar German designs survived the war as originally designed.

The late model Pz III and IV were so radically different from the prewar versions it would be lke comparing chalk and cheese. So in practical terms, they were actually under engineered as they needed improvements based on combat experience, or they were removed from front line service.

I am aware that some Panzers did in fact survive long enough to fight in the Mideast wars vs Israel. But these examples bore little resemblance to the original prewar designs. It was those designs I was basing my earlier comments on.

[Paul Lakowski]

German scientists told Wehrmacht that if they relaxed the target specs of an weapon design by even 10% they could triple the production output . This was rejected and the best weapons were built, something that Hitler demanded over mass produced weapons.

[T. A. Gardner]

There is also the fit and finish aspect of German tanks. They had very high quality armor plate, elegant welding, and lots of extra "bits" installed.

For example, manufacturers could have done away with many of the vision ports and flaps on early models to simplify production. Switching things like seat from leather to canvas should have been done the day the war started. Keep quality where it mattered, and get rid of frills and "nice to have" stuff immediately.

The Czech Pz 38 was a much simpler vehicle than the Pz III, yet it was able to generally fill the same role early in the war. It's a clear example of how the German designs were over engineered and too high of quality were it really made little difference.