Post war civil use of panzers

[phylo_roadking]

The PzIVs weren't Israeli, they were Syrian, and fought against the Isrealis on the Golan Heights. Syria bought up stocks of whatever they could postwar, from Spain, Turkey etc. They ended up able to field several squadrons of IVs and of StuGIIIs. At least one survivor happens to be in an Israeli armour museum...because, well, the Syrians lost that particular go-round!

[cbo]

Thanks, I've seen French Panthers, Israeli PZ IV's and Finnish stugs. Any other countries besides Germany use Tigers or half-tracks? (New here so feel free to point me to correct threads if this is old ground)

The French had a few Panthers as warbooty while those Finnish StuGs were bought during the war as were the Spanish Panzer IVs that went to Israel via Syria.

cbo

[brano]

Most "Syrian" Pz.Kpfw.IV is from Czechoslovakia (45 pcs.).
http://forum.valka.cz/viewtopic.php/t/5 ... zich-armad

Panthers in other countries (also postwar).
http://forum.valka.cz/viewtopic.php/t/4 ... zich-armad

[phylo_roadking]

Taniwha, see also

http://www.feldgrau.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=21251

[brano]

Czechoslovakian army in postwar years have a few hundreds Sd.Kfz.7/8/9/10/11/250/251/6(?).
Pz.Kpfw.IV - 82 pcs.
Panther - 32 pcs. - only training/army deposit/rebuilding to bergepanzer
StuG III - 103 pcs.(?)
Tiger II - 5 pcs.(?) - only for training to recovery vehicles
Jagdpanzer 38(t) / ST-I - in 15/3/1955 have 249 pcs.

In army deposits exists more vehicles.

[brano]

Guinea - ST-I/ex.Jagdpanzer 38(t) - 3 pcs.(+8 pcs. ?)

[jmehner]

Romania used Pz IV as well as SdKfz 9 and Feldbackofen post war, with the last ovens retired not too long ago.

Poland had a Panzerdraisine in active use for some years, then Yugoslavia had Flakvierling 38 and Flak 36, with some still in use at least during the civil war, and Syria also had some Hummel and JgPz IV, as evidenced by a parade in Damascus.

France apparently sent some SdKfz 251 to Indochina, which were converted in theatre- some photos exist in private hands, but haven't been published so far AFAIK.

[cbo]

Most "Syrian" Pz.Kpfw.IV is from Czechoslovakia (45 pcs.).
http://forum.valka.cz/viewtopic.php/t/5 ... zich-armad

Panthers in other countries (also postwar).
http://forum.valka.cz/viewtopic.php/t/4 ... zich-armad

I like this one - a Rumanian attempt at making a Segway?



cbo

[phylo_roadking]

LOL now THAT is a great pic!

Regarding the civilian use of AFVs after the war...just today I read a magazine article about the postwar use of Shermans - basically asking where did they all go to? I'll paraphrase it here briefly, because its findings are of interest here.

First of all, the use of the Sherman by other postwar-reconstituted national armies soaked up a LOT of armour - just like the running tanks we've discussed above going to various other owners before ending up in Syria. France had some, together with Holland and Denmark. And of course the Americans kept a lot and these equiped their medium armour units for many years, until attrition in Korea got many, or the National Guard just wore them done.

BUT...what everyone forgets is exactly how fast-wearing the average tank was! The article listed Allied armour by engine life....and the figures are frightening! THESE are the average lifetimes of ALLIED tank engines in miles, from the longest-lasting down the list to the shortest lifespan. After this a COMPLETE replacement was necessary, NOT just repair.

Rolls-Royce Meteor - 2500miles (4022km)
General Motors 6-71 diesel - 2000 miles (3218km)
Chrysler Multibank - 1500 miles (2413km)
Bedford twin-six - early version JUST 900 miles! (1448km) later versions 1200 miles (1930km)
Sherman 9-cylinder radial - 1000 miles (1609km)
Stuart(M3) 6-cylinder - 1000 miles (1609km)

The report these figures were taken from was "An Appreciation of AFV Design Problems in 21 Army Group Theatre of Operation NW Europe" by a Colonel Ted Grylls, serving with BAOR in 1946.

Those mileage figures are, lets face it...cr@p. but thats what they did in those days. And after 1945, with the Allies busy dismantling German industry, the factories that produced GERMAN tanks and AFVs would just be - gone. No spare parts except "New Old Stock" if it could be found. The tanks themselves would, on the 7th of May, 1945, be fit for recycling as scrap and very little else after fighting their way back from Russia and france etc. We're all well aware of their problems, and imagine those in the last months of the war exacerbated by very little time for nightly maintenance let alone major servicing.

The answer to the original question would therefore be that very few German armoured vehicles would, by the end of the war, be worth doing anything with, quite simply - except for those very recently off the production line OR that didn't actually see very much if any combat or get moved very often...like Norway's PzIIIs. And the Allies certainly weren't going to repair any they didn't have to!!!

[Taniwha]

That is great info. Taking above into consideration for allied engines I guess the sheer amount of wear on axis vehicles had to be greater and the strain of that heavy armour must have put the life expectancy of a German AFV at a very low mileage indeed.

Anyone have mileage figures for some of the hard working tigers / panthers that got shifted from front to front?

[phylo_roadking]

Taniwha, the wear figures for Axis AFVs, particularly in the second half of the war, would also be prejudiced by the Germans' lack of strategic raw materials including various alloying metals, and their vehicles running on ersatz petrol. Even things like Tigers etc. having to run their engines periodically to keep their batteries charged would shrink the running life of an engine.

Conversely, does anyone have figures by any chance from enginemakers showing how many of what engines were built - as against how many were installed in tanks etc. when those vehicles were new? Would give us an indication of how often engines would....or even could...be swapped out.

[cbo]

Regarding the civilian use of AFVs after the war...just today I read a magazine article about the postwar use of Shermans - basically asking where did they all go to? I'll paraphrase it here briefly, because its findings are of interest here.

Can you give the bibliographical details of the article? I'd like to see it.

First of all, the use of the Sherman by other postwar-reconstituted national armies soaked up a LOT of armour - just like the running tanks we've discussed above going to various other owners before ending up in Syria. France had some, together with Holland and Denmark. And of course the Americans kept a lot and these equiped their medium armour units for many years, until attrition in Korea got many, or the National Guard just wore them done.

Judging from Danish Army records, US tank engines (and tanks for that matter) were readily available in the arms market in the 1950ies. It appears that private companies bought up stocks of spare engines (new and reconditioned) and spares in general and sold them to users around the world. So if you could get your hands on allied kit, getting spares or in some cases used vehicles to cannibalize, you could keep your armour rolling for years.

And after 1945, with the Allies busy dismantling German industry, the factories that produced GERMAN tanks and AFVs would just be - gone. No spare parts except "New Old Stock" if it could be found. The tanks themselves would, on the 7th of May, 1945, be fit for recycling as scrap and very little else after fighting their way back from Russia and france etc. We're all well aware of their problems, and imagine those in the last months of the war exacerbated by very little time for nightly maintenance let alone major servicing.

The answer to the original question would therefore be that very few German armoured vehicles would, by the end of the war, be worth doing anything with, quite simply - except for those very recently off the production line OR that didn't actually see very much if any combat or get moved very often...like Norway's PzIIIs. And the Allies certainly weren't going to repair any they didn't have to!!!

The Danish Army found it impossible to get a ex-German Army SdKfz 251 running properly for tests as an artillerytractor due to the lack of spares. They could be manufactured in Denmark, but with only one vehicle in the inventory, it wasn't thought worth the trouble.Of the few other German tracked vehicles that survived the torch, some did make it into the 1950ies, but they seem to have done very little work, mostly being used for towing things around the depots. The situation was different for wheeled vehicles like trucks and cars, as they used mostly civilian technology, spares for which was apparently readily available and, I assume, was soon being produced again in Germany under allied supervision.

As for German engines, by March 1944 Guderian was happy to report the Panther was finally ripe for use at the front - of course it had by then been in combat for 10 months - and engine failures were on the decrease. Engines now lasted 700-1000 kilometers......! In April 1944, PzRgt 2 could report that the longest distance achieved on an engine was 1700-1800 kilometers. As the reason for their failure was mostly bearing damage and broken connecting rods, one might assume that the engines could often not be reconditioned but were in fact a total loss, only suitable for the steel mill.

cbo[/quote]

[phylo_roadking]

"Classic Military Vehicle" Issue 76, September 2003 Their website is http://www.cmvmag.co.uk

[phylo_roadking]

Engines now lasted 700-1000 kilometers

Lets face it - thats pretty cr@p :lo;, even comparing then with the worst of Allied types...but it also makes you wonder exactly what sort of lifespan they were getting out of earlier panzer types....!

As the reason for their failure was mostly bearing damage and broken connecting rods, one might assume that the engines could often not be reconditioned but were in fact a total loss, only suitable for the steel mill.

That definitely looks like marginal lubrication; I'd assume not in the design of the oiling circuit, or pump capacity, that would be REALLY silly drawing board mistakes....so here in the last years of the war do we see German tanks suffering from the quality of lubricants available to them? I know a little about German erstaz petrol - does anyone know or can direct me to anything about ersatz oil or the Germans' recycling oil? Oil "technology" in itself was something that didn't really keep pace with engine technology during the war, on all sides; lift a container of cheap recycled multigrade off the shelf in even your local supermarket nowadays, and you're holding in your hand something that would be rocket science compared to the straight-grade mineral types everyone used then....that was quite simply battered to bits in some of the high-performance engines that appeared on the ground and in the air during WWII.

(Rods don't usually break because of weak metal; they most often break because the piston on one end of them nips up in its bore through wear or lack of lubrication on the cylinder walls...while the crank turns on OR because the big end goes, again due to lubrication issues...because the Germans were driving hard the use of white metal-lined big end and other bearing caps - like you see them recast in "Das Boot"? - but while cheap and easy to manufacture and replace....they require VERY precise and copious lubrication with large amounts of good quality well-filtered oil.)

As for the longer life of wheeled vehicles - on all sides engines and chassis on a wide variety of these were actually pre-war civilian designs, offered up under tender to the military who issue specifications out - just like aircraft LOL. Usually these specifications were big on longevity, ease of maintenance and long sevice intervals. Most civilian factories dealt with this by simply downtuning their engines to the least possible performance to meet the speed and load hauling specifications! Hence the AEC Matador in the UK was congenitally incapable of breaking the British Army's mandatory convoy speed of 30 miles an hour - but it would do that speed forever! It also meant a lot of wheeled vehicle engines were sidevalves, producing less power than their OHV counterparts but very reliably. Like, for instance - jeeps.

[Meyer]

http://www.dupuyinstitute.org/ubb/Forum ... 00044.html