Recommended reading on the panzers & other vehicles

[Doom]

The entire Militarfahrzeuge by Walter J. Spielberger, series of books are worth the price. If you want to know how a panzer was made, these books pretty much show it.

[cmpnorge]

Some of you got the first issue at Beltring this summer.
No. two is ready !
Atricles on geman and allied vehicles



Rolf

[cmpnorge]

Some of you got the first issue at Beltring this summer.
No. two is ready !
Atricles on geman and allied vehicles



Rolf

[bam]

I'm listing some out-of-print oldies, you have to hunt ebay for these, and newer stuff. For prices, check USA Amazon vs. UK Amazon.
'Last of the panzers' by Auerbach [1/2 of the 'Panzerwrecks' crew], from Arms&Armor press's Tanks illustrated series, #9.Late panzer pics.
MBI publish interesting magazi-books about Czech origin German tanks- Hetzer, 38T , 35T, and a book about 1945 battles in czeckoslovakia. They mix Pics, Drawings, devolpment and usage discussed. Good detail.
Anything by Jentz & Doyle. Panzertracts series is acme-stuff! Find 2 vols of Panzertruppen, and their pre-Panzertracts era 'Museum Ordnance specials' by Darlington Press. Any Osprey Books authored by these 2 are very good, e.g.Tigers I, II, Flammpanzers.
The later[double-digit] Nuts & bolts series are good. The latest,19 & 20, are a near perfect fusion of pics, drawings, development, usage and modern pics of museum vehicles.
From Japan, the 'Groundpower' mags. superb pics makes up for jap text. My fave is #123 all about rockettry!
Also oriental in origin, the 'Achtung Panzer' series and 'Panzers in Saumur' are bi-lingual and very good at showing the differences between each ausfuhrung of all panzers.
My favorite, must-buy-before-seeing, best publishers are 'Leaping Horseman' , 'RZM' & 'Panzertracts'.

[bam]

Oh i forgot to mention Lannoy & Charita's 'Panzertruppen', pubd by Heimdal. Brill rteference for panzer division/regiment/abteilung/kompanie histories, great unit markings, pics, commanders. I use it often...

[FKDeane]

My copy of Panzer Tracts No.15-1 on the Leichter Schuetzenpanzerwagen (Sd.Kfz.250) arrived in the post today, so here are a few initial comments and highlights.

So little real information has been available on the Sd.Kfz.250 that this Panzer Tracts had be important. Previously only picture books were available with the only attempt to document the Sd.Kfz.250 being the short lived Total Detail series which was mainly based on observable detail. The Panzer Tracts team have, as usual, dug out a huge amount of new primary documentation which is reflected through out this book.

Nowhere are the popular post war nick-names “Alte” and “Neu” to be seen. Jentz and Doyle only used the designations found in wartime documents - Ausf.A and Ausf.B

It will take time for a reader to absorb so much new data but there are some startling facts

• A small number of Sd.Kfz.250 0-Series were completed in 1940, then nothing happened until 1941 when the Czech factories such as BMM started to supply riveted armour chassis and mass production of the Sd.Kfz.250 Ausf.A commenced

• Then there were two completely different Sd.Kfz.250 Ausf.A – one with the Sd.Kfz.250/Z Aufbau with different angles, visors and many other features and the regular one with the Sd.Kfz.250/E Aufbau.

• Finally the Sd.Kfz.250 Ausf.B appeared in 1943

Interior photos published in a wartime manual have been reprinted before but Jentz and Doyle are publishing the originals in large format so that for the first time every gasmask, strap and container is visible. There are lots of new photos – the one on the cover shows what Jentz and Doyle say is an “unidentified variant with an MG-Sockel 41 for mounting a single MG34 for defence against aircraft”

There are 15 pages of drawings showing various combinations of chassis, Aufbau and equipment that will allow anyone model any version in detail. Building on the style of the earlier Panzer Tracts on the Sd.Kfz.251 Hilary Doyle has drawn a further selection of interior items, radio racks, mortar base, the Fernrohrstuetze und Sitz from the Beobachtungspanzerwagen and a late war steel antenna base for the Sternantenna. There are drawings of three Sd.Kfz.250/9 variants – two Ausf.A one with Sd.Kfz.250/Z Aufbau from early 1943 and a second with the Sd.Kfz.250/E Aufbau from late 1943 (After the Sd.Kfz.250 Ausf.B was introduced!) and the Sd.Kfz.250 Ausf.B with the Haengelafette like the Sd.Kfz.234/1.

There is the usual detailed history, organisational data and translated experience reports. This 84 page book is published in the USA at a cost of $27.95. For Europeans this is only about €20 which is great value.

Fred

[attachment=0]PTSdKfz250.JPG[/attachment]

[Rein]

Do not buy the DVD "Swedish AFVs from 1921 to 1999" http://www.afv-interiors.com/pages/home.html
De term DVD is misleading, it isn't a DVD but a 2 Gb big pdf file.
70% is in swedish language, the rest is English.
The very small video's qua screensize are embedded into the pdf file. This file is protected so you can't print or copy anything.
the video's are not subtitled.
A very small part handles about the foreign tanks (and that's why I bought this shit)
30 pounds is a lot of money, there are much better products for this price.

[FKDeane]

Dear Rein,

I absolutely stand over my recommendation of the DVD publication by Jonas Brane “Swedish AFVs 1919 to 1921”. I am delighted with the quality, content and the “cubical panorama” concept. Others that I have spoken to are more than happy with this DVD publication with its refreshingly new material and techniques.

Certainly each of us may have different buying criteria but I consider £29.95/c€35 to be a normal price for any decent book.

I cannot understand your criticism of the use of the Swedish combined with English.– perhaps you do not buy books with content in languages other than your own? As a European I prefer to have the text in a European language then with a bit of effort I can translate what I need. However, if the subject is interesting I like many am happy to buy books in languages which are beyond my translation ability (e.g. Japanese, Cyrillic alphabet etc.).

A significant part of “Swedish AFVs 1919 to 1921” is on German vehicles evaluated by Sweden. It is amazing to watch the extensive Swedish film of a Panzerbefehlswagen Panther being tested alongside various Allied (Sherman, Churchill) and Swedish tanks of the late war period. Of course, the videos are small but they are supporting the historical content and I have never seen such film before and the evidence of the testing is obvious. The contemporary commentary in Swedish is irrelevant – do you really listen to the commentary on any film?

Copyright law prevents one from copying the content of books that you buy. Obviously, one has to acclimatize to looking at this DVD publication on your computer. But as with many of my colleagues I have spent the last few years scanning my picture collection to hard disk and now I far prefer viewing pictures on my monitor.

Please tell me where else I can find examples what Jonas Brane calls “Cubical panorama -a revolutionary visual technology developed for the medical field” that will allow me view each AFV as if I was inside. I love pointing with my mouse of to examine any part of the interior – this fantastic stuff.

There are 500 pages of history, photos, the Cubical Panoramas and the films of every Swedish AFV but also the Tiger II, Panther Ausf A, Jagdpanzer 38t, Pz.Kpfw I Ausf A, Sturmgeschuetz Ausf.D and about 10 other AFVs from other Nations. I am delighted with my new found knowledge of Swedish developments and the insight into the German vehicles tested by Sweden.

Again I am happy to recommend this DVD publication full details of which are available on http://www.afv-interiors.com

Fred

[Rein]

Is this a promotion talk?

Again I am happy to recommend this DVD publication full details of which are available on http://www.afv-interiors.com
Fred

It isn't a DVD but a PDF file.
this file is so big, that if you want to open or scroll it with a slow computer you have to wait couples of minutes each time.
The video's are from a very small screensizes, and you can't enlarge them. So you have to view this "revolutionary Cubical panorama" with a magnifying-glass.
But everybody have to decide for his own, it's just my opinion.

[FKDeane]

Dear Rein,

I am sorry to hear that you are having technology problems.

It does not matter to me that it is a .pdf file – it seems this is how the guy has secured all the photos etc.

Normally I load "Swedish Armour 1921-1999" on my Laptop. This has a 15 inch screen where the films are displayed at 110 x 88 mm and the Cubical Panoramas at 135 x 104mm so I was very satisfied. I am using Windows XP.

Since I strongly recommended this "Swedish Armour 1921-1999"I thought it would be nice to test it on some different configurations and give you the results.

Our modern office PCs have 21inch Monitors and as I was passing I dropped in and tried "Swedish Armour 1921-1999". The films displayed at 165 x130 mm and the Cubical Panoramas at 200 x 154mm. The operating system is also XP. The processors are different vintages but I have not noticed any problem - page turning is instantaneous, and the loading of a film takes a few seconds. The cubical panoramas come up immediately just like on my Laptop.

Next I got permission to test "Swedish Armour 1921-1999" on my wife’s beloved Laptop – this is an ancient one from about the year 2000. It only has 500mb memory and a very slow processor. Even the operating system is Windows 2000. Normally this is only used for word processing and emails so it also has out of date versions of Adobe Reader and QuickTime which are needed by the "Swedish Armour 1921-1999". The CD/DVD drive is an external one connected through a USB 1 port. Initial loading took maybe 1 minute but thereafter page turning was “almost” instantaneous (1 sec). Down load of a film took about 30 sec and Cubical Panoramas about 15 sec. The screen is only 13 inch but again the films were displayed at 110 x 88 mm and the Cubical Panoramas at 135 x 104mm the same as my more recent Laptop.

I wonder now if there are some settings such as screen resolution that you need to adjust on your computer to get satisfactory results.

Fred

[FRANCY RITTER]

From AHF member Claude Gillono !!

[FRANCY RITTER]

Hello friends!!
A very good book on Italian armoured units (R.S.I) , from my dear friend and Axis member (Barbarigo) Paolo Crippa .



Marvia pub.

http://www.marvia.it/Libri/I_reparti_co ... a_RSI.html

[him.rudkjoebing]

I would like to reccomend the books by Spielberger et. al, each one dealing with a apecific tank (i.e. Pz I and variants etc.), Beutepanzer (incl. a very interesting part on "Baukommando Becker" converting beutevehicles in France for use first in Russia and then in France in 1944). Some of the books also contain history of the use of the vehicles, which units got them, when and where etc.

Also each book is adorned with the beautiful drawings by Doyle.

Though expensive I find these books thoroughly recommendabel.

By the way, I have recently tried to purchase books through Amazon.de, but the shop advertising the book would not send the outside Germany thus negating the whole excercise.

Kind regards and thanking you kindly for help previously rendered

[STURMBOCK]

Panzer tracts "über alles",and W Spielberger by Motorbuch Verlag,its really better to speak german when we need informations about Panzer.....
about Tiger vol I about WH and II about WSS.
http://www.amazon.com/Tigers-Combat-Vol ... 0921991398

http://stonebooks.com/archives/020922.shtml

http://www.books-by-isbn.com/0-921991/0 ... -37-1.html
And the complete collection of Munin Verlag.

[bam]

DAS REICH TIGERS, by W.SCHNEIDER: as good as his Tigers In Combat series, same size & mix of text & pix. I loved it, especially good text detail on the SwSS502 King Tiger spearhead of the Halbe breakout of Busse's 9th Armee in late April 45.

DUEL IN THE MIST pubd by AFV MODELLER. I like it, glad i got it, but its not worth the cost. It is lavish quality, but its material is stretched beyond reasonable limits. Sparse text is blown up so a paragraph fills a page. The pix are all blown up even when quality suffers, especially the many ones culled from newsreel. There are consequtive pages of pix of the same dead Panther tank, from every soldier that came past it. But it is beautifully laid out, and the section tacked onto the end about post July 44 Panther camoflage is brilliant, with the quality of Panzertracts/Panzerwrecks research. A must for Panther-nutters for that alone.

PANZER IV [or Pzkpfw IV] AT THE FRONT, by 8WHEELS GOOD, pubd by Blurb. A very detailed, 5 volume [+ 2 or 3 supplementary vols] pictoral study of all things Pz.IV. The pix are mostly orig unpublished, full-page beautiful reproduction, with accompanying text that points out all the details in great depth, thus giving a history of each Ausfurung and the differences within those Ausfs. Forensic, Panzertracts/Panzerwrecks detail. Should become the bible to replace Spielberger et al.

For fans of 1945 East FRont Panzerwaffe, who may have enjoyed Pazerwrecks 7 'Ostfront', Wydawnictwo Militaria #121, 'Budapest Balaton 1945', this has more shots of late-war Panzers than ANYTHING else. Panthers with I.R. stowage boxes, late-war camo, and a better Muni-Pz IV than Panzerwrecks. Sadly long out of print, but keep trying.