Why couldn't Germany just create something simple and reliable

>>32523762
because germans

and
>reliable
>t-34

Germans had a horrifically inefficient wartime industry. The least efficient of the major combatants outside of Japan and Italy. The wehrboos like to bone everything muh wehrmacht did but they were absolute shit at logistics.

>>32523762
>reliable
Eh, no tank of World War Two was 'reliable'. It's just that t-34's were easy to fix ( a sign of quality in Russia) and why bother making it last six months, if statistically speaking, it'll be dead in 3?

Back to the point, copying it and producing it wouldn't have been that simple and you'd have ended up with a comparable tank in much smaller numbers.
Plus there's the stereotypical German engineering standpoint, they'd have been too proud.

>Stug
>Pz3
>Pz4
They did. Then the arrogance started to kick in.

>>32523777
Oh and also this.
They were just hilariously inneficient, even Britain and their government went full on efficiency mode better.

>>32523831
British wartime industry was quite impressive desu.

Churned out 7,000+ 4 engine heavy bombers whilst the Germans struggled to come out with several hundred medium bombers.

>>32523762

Because they wanted overmatch?

Panther was made to plink the numerically superior Red Army T-34s at long range.

For which it would work perfectly well.

The idea: Your better tank has 5:1 KD ratio or something, which means if you steamroll, you steamroll harder

Reality: Still dies to what tanks dies to, so its not better

German Reality: Somebody simply wanted to make Kraut Space Magic, aka overcomplex stuff

>>32523762
>reliable like the T-34

rofl

>>32523798
This.


Tiger I and II we're terrible mistakes.

>>32523907

>still dies

And that's the crux of the matter regarding Germany, and the Soviets and French with their super tanks still died early on.

Germany just didn't have the manpower to fight and support the war.

Whilst a heavy tank armored assault is a thing of beauty and pretty much impossible to fight off head on without equal heavies, they still run out of fuel and die to peeling away from the line of attack and taking flank shots.

>>32523762
T-34 wasn't more relaiable it was just destroyed before it broke down.

>>32523932
German tanks are pig fat
is1 and is2 weigh less
even the kv2 is a little lighter than a tiger 2

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>>32523798
But with these tanks they still didn't get one simple, but unbelievably important factor right: Sloped armor.

>>32523762
>Why couldn't Germany just create something simple and reliable like the T-34?
Capitalism.

Easy to fix was the best you could do with the tech of that era so embracing that was win. The US made their gear reliable by the standards of the time, made Sherman etc the right size for areas heavies could not go, and got excellent overall results using abundant Sherman for infantry support. T34 succeeded similarly.

When reliability is not an option, make ease of production and field maintenance your goal. Simple but but not always intuitive. You can build wonderful tanks but too few of them and still lose, so Germany did. Germans can make fine machines but love complexity in vehicles for it's own sake. Interleaved road wheels etc a shit for maintenance when you lose an inboard road wheel.

BTW the US armor branch lost under 2,000 killed in WWII. US tanks were successful.

People obsessed with burning vehicles then as they do today, but all sides recovered and fixed manytanks. Look at the tank overhaul show where they made one Sherman by cutting two range target tanks in half then welding the hull halves together. The design is a breeze to repair and cannibalize.

T34 is a simple vehicle and still sometimes in combat in Ukraine. The design is sound. Wars are not won by autism, they are won by systems of systems. Allied systems of systems were far superior. Individual German vehicles did not save their inferior, broken systems of systems.

>>32524113
>muh sloped armour
They were well aware of its pros and cons. It isn't the most efficient space wise (so cramped tanks, which results in reduced combat capability) and it isn't always the best option. Have a smaller, but thicker flat plate can make more sense than a thinner but larger sloped plate for example.

>>32524219
>Wars are not won by autism, they are won by a system of systems

True poetry right there, Anon.

>>32524288
Look at the front profile of pz II, III, and IV. They could clearly have used a sloped front upper plate using less material.

>>32523762
>reliable like the T-34

t. William Lind

>>32523872
Yep, all on their own, no help from any other nations on production or designs...

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>>32523762

Do you even Daimler-Benz VK 30.02 ?

>>32524562
Not without lengthening the hull or reducing the space inside.
We're talking about the real world here, not WoT.
Go sit inside a t-34, it's a shitty place to fight in.

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>>32523762
Germans had good tanks. It was the whole " I'm going to fight the entire world" plan that wasn't so hot.

>Driving down the street in my Panzer tank
>Sittin' drinkin' Cris' with my bitch Anne Frank
>And when I step into the club’s you know I'm steppin with style
>Raise my left hand, party people say "Heil!"

>>32524662
Yes you could.

As stated look at the front, it looks loke this

__I

You could just put a slope on it instead and infact increase the space inside

>>32524719
>Fight the entire world
Shit, fighting two people at once was a mistake, let alone the developed world.

>>32524738
If you wanted to have that plate sloped, whilst not removing any volume, you'd have to increase the length of the hull. at that point you might as well just have a thicker vertical plate since you're not saving any weight with a sloped plate.
The Germans (correctly for the time) decided that the extra theorerical protection wasn't worth the reduction of volume or increase of size.

>>32524738
or you could tell driver to just angle your hull by rotating it.
germans knew about advantages of sloping the armour before they faced t34s. they chose other layout for different reasons

NEIN NEIN

I AM GERMAN FUCKING AUTIST

EVERYTHING WORK AS PLANNED

ALWAYS

REEEEEEEEEEEE

>>32523762
>Germans
>simple machinery
Good one

>>32523762
Because why do something the easy way?

>>32523777
Oh yeah, this, JFC, substitute standards all over the place.

>>32524119
Socialists not allowed.

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>>32524782

>>32524782
Okay, i drew you a crappy pic.

The black represents the hull of a Pz III/IV

The red line represents the area you could place a angled plate on. As you see you will by placing this plate increase the lenght of the frontal hull plate (blue), but compleatly remove the flat plate above the transmission(green), meaning the total area of armor is reduced and the internal space is increased.

>>32524796
Do you have a source where the germans used this? It feels like WoT to me...

>>32524662
See
>>32524937

>>32524937
You can't just randomly throw angles on a tank. What if you create shot traps?

>>32524569
...yes. What are you trying to imply?

>>32525254
Shot traps are extremly hard to create by angeling the upper plate (not to mention there is nothing the shells could be trapped inside of above my hypothetical plate)

>>32523777
what

efficiency is the one thing germans did best

you do realize germany was getting attacked by 50 million people don't you

>>32523762
>germany engineering anything
>simple

Becuase they're fucking germany

>>32525579
Not really, they had huge problems cooperating between companies/scientists and politicans.

>>32524937
It doesn't seem to increase useable internal space

>>32524782
You can often save overall weight simply by having a shorter roof plate from a sloped glacis. With that said, angled sponsoons are dumb. You could spend that space on a bigger turret ring or ammo stowage, or anything else really.

>>32525579
> efficiency is what the Germans did best
No. Lmao. If that were true they wouldn't be wasting resources on wunderwaffen, and they wouldn't be using a Job Shop approach to manufacturing their tanks.

>>32523762
T-34 was shit

>believing communist propaganda about a deathtrap

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>>32523762
>T-34
>simple
>reliable

>>32524113
>important factor right: Sloped armor.
>can be penetrated with AT gun from 1000 meters
>sloped armor "works"
>guys?

>>32523766
>Still running in many countries to this day

Pretty reliable m8. Some teething problems in the early days, but which tank didn't?

Planned obsolescence like the bearings wearing out isn't the same as unreliability.

>>32525319
That Burgers lent them hundreds of thousands of tons of materials and raw imports for them to use.

>>32525702
German panzers in barbarossa could only penetrate T-34 armor from incredibly close range. They had what was deemed sufficient AT weaponry of the day, but the T-34 caused the Germans to completely re-think how powerful they needed their AT guns to be.

>>32525651
It was excellent for its day. One of the most well-rounded tanks in 1940 when it was first produced. Far superior to anything the US was attempting to build. Were they even building tanks in 1940?

>>32524113

Why is there a soviet emblem on this diagram

>>32526148

It was excellent on paper

Early T34s were lucky to make it to the front line before breaking down.

>>32523762
>reliable
>t34

you do know soviet doctrine sawthe t34 as literally disposssable...

in most cases they did not expect the tank to get through more than one battle...after one battle, they expected them to break down

and apparently they were really weird to drive also...

>>32524937
No, I'm sorry, without increasing the hull length you wouldn't be able to slope the armour enough to make it worth it.

>>32526344

Plus the Germans did investigate into making a PZ IV with sloped front, and realised that would over stress the suspension, and they knew about sloped armour from the Swedish tanks using it that they investigated....

so Sloped armour was well understood at the time by all countries, internal layout and doctrine and fabrication equipment is what dictated if they used it or not

Also Carius talks about angling his Tiger 1 if i remember right

>>32525579
>efficiency is the one thing germans did best

Stop with that meme please

>>32523793
Someone getting his knowledge from an old gaming youtuber

>>32523766
The sole T34 I dealt with was pretty fucking primitive, but it all made sense, in a "Cobble tech together to kill shit" kind of way. Some things looked odd, but nothing looked wrong.

Also, it's really hard to hold up the whole "Slavs were cavemen" gig when they were making a cast aluminum injected Diesel the Germans could not reproduce.

The handful of German armor I worked on was pretty damned goofy in comparison. Traverse mechanisms looked like shit from a '20's Massey-Ferguson, and their carbs were just sheer bullshit. It's like all the work done by Miller was totally ignored.

U.S. armor in comparison was retard grade to deal with. A toddler could keep it running, which means some real fucking work was done to make it so.
Brit was similar til you had to deal with transmissions or wiring.

>>32526384
>sloped front, and realised that would over stress the suspension
That must be some amazing Kraut magic.

>>32525615
Could probably store something there.

>>32526384
>and realised that would over stress the suspension
Makes sense to me as the center of weight is moved slightly forward.

>and they knew about sloped armour from the Swedish tanks using it that they investigated....
What tanks did they investigate? Im a Swede myself and I didnt know we had any tanks with sloped armour.

>Also Carius talks about angling his Tiger 1 if i remember right
Thanks! Didnt know that

>>32523777
That's really a myth. The problems facing the nazi government in the 30s is that they cant finance imports of raw materials for both the civilian and the growing military and arms sector. By using bilateral trade agreements and MEFO bills, they were able to, somehow, pay for both at the same time. They were also able to invest in technology that allowed them to use what scarce resources there actually are within germany (synthetic rubber and fuel, as well as low grade ore).

Sure, Germany conquered many European countries during the war, but it was never able to exploit that because they were, just like Germany dependant on imports. In some cases, Germany had to pay for the conquered countries' upkeep (usually coal). Despite all this, Germany managed to increase its production every year, up until 1945 during the most extensive bombing campaigns known to man.

They made almost 9000 combat aircraft in 1941, and almost 35 000 in 1944. Mainly this was due to allocation of resources and investments into production, some of which started in the 30s but took until mid 40s to take effect. Should also add, that the number of aircraft should be taken with a grain of salt, as Germany focused on producing cheap aircraft by then.

The German economy wasn't by any means inefficient, it suffocated due to a lack of resources.

>>32526137
Not to mention the lend-lease we had with Russia.

>>32526384
>Also Carius talks about angling his Tiger 1 if i remember right
It's strange how rarely angling is brought up considering it was standard practice to do so.

>>32524113
Sloped armor is kind of a meme, it's main benefit is that it helps deflect rounds, the additional LOS thickness is paid for with increased surface area, and reduced interior space, for the same dimensions.

>Germany
>Making a simple and efficient anything

lel

>>32525254
Shot traps aren't this thing that happens randomly and unexpectedly. They're very clearly related to geometry, and have to do with how shots will be deflected when they hit an angled surface. Replacing a stepped front with sloped armor wouldn't create a shot trap unless it ended right under the turret or had something else overhanging it.

>>32525651
If the T-34 was so bad, why do Russian tanks of today have more in common with the T-34 than modern German tanks have in common with their WWII counterparts?

>>32526344
That's only true if the tank designers aren't retarded. A stepped front like the Panzer IV had could easily be converted into a 45 degree slope.

>>32530013
If it was standard practice, there would be little need to mention it in reports. You'd only bring it up when talking to people who weren't familiar with tank warfare.

>>32523762
Because german engineers could create something other than simple things, unlike the ruskies.

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>>32530189
>If it was standard practice, there would be little need to mention it in reports. You'd only bring it up when talking to people who weren't familiar with tank warfare.
That's true, though I also mean in discussions, for instance how everyone often acts as though just because a tank's gun might penetrate the Tiger's armor, that the Tiger would be reliably engaged, even though the Tiger's crew will be doing their best to make sure the enemy doesn't get an opportunity to hit a 90 degree surface.

>>32529522
>B-BUT THE SOVIET UNION COULD HAVE WON ON THEIR OWN! RUSSIA STRONK!

>>32524495
Yes, is pottery.

>>32526148
>It was excellent for its day.
More like it was excellent for a day, mirite?

Germans are genetically opposed to simplicity.
These are the people who think that it's acceptable for a basic serp belt replacement on a Volkswagen to begin with a service position of removing the engine from the car.

>>32526998

The board in charge of deciding what designs got built (can't remember their name for the life of me) were very picky about what they would manufacture.

There was a staggering number of prototypes made for each design that saw service maybe baring the M3 considering that was a "just build something" kind of tank.

>>32523762
Because germans make high quality shit while slavs always go for more DAKA

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>>32523762
Beats me, bud.

>>32526137
If those same resources had been directed to Bulgaria I highly doubt the end result would have been the largest and most advanced heavy bomber fleet in Europe. British contribution was pretty exceptional.

>>32531094
more excellent than any other tanks at the time. Thats the way all new technology works. You release it, its new and better than everything, then someone goes and releases something even newer.

>>32526234
Most tanks have teething problems. Early Pz.III and Pz.IV only had 15mm of front armor... They soon realized that was nowhere near enough.

>>32532767
>high quality shit
that didn't work properly anyway

>>32524611
they should have foused on this on.

>>32530189
>why do Russian tanks of today have more in common with the T-34
They dont.

>>32526234
>Early T34s were lucky to make it to the front line before breaking down.
Well when you got non-existent logistic and the crew were just driving T-26's before then they are indeed lucky to get the front.

True luck is surviving getting away from the frontline when it collapse due the germans blitzkreig you and somehow make it to 1942-43 when the war in the east turns.

>>32524611
Germans sure do love double road wheels don't they?

>>32527861
but Germany suffered hugely from massive inefficiencies in logistics.

During barbarossa they used literally hundreds of different types of vehicles, some of which were even right hand drive British trucks captured in dunkirk. This makes maintenance hell. In addition to this was the fact that the bulk of German logistical corps were composed of horses. Horses and fucking carts. By late war American, British and even Russians had mechanised logistics and German troops still relied on horses.

That's just one aspect of inefficiency. I've read a whole page of memoirs of German soldiers in the battle of the bulge detailing their overcomplicated and often completely ineffectual ways of supplying food to troops on the front. Rather than using ration packs like US troops they depended on hot foot from field kitchens for their meals; everything else had to be scavenged from the local environment. This meant that troops could go for days without a decent meal while they were fighting against Americans fed on chocolate and tinned beef. There is also the fact that even by 1944 on the western front German troops were still equipped with equipment captured during the battle of France while they faced an almost homogenous forces of Americans and a slightly less standardised but still pretty focused force of commonwealth troops, all of whom used large numbers of similar equipment (thousands of Shermans, M1 and Lee Enfield rifles, Chevy trucks) while the Germans fought with their speshul snowflake Tigers, King Tigers, Panthers, alongside PZ. IVs, as well as captured Char B1s.

It just could not be sustained by a country with a tiny mechanical capacity compared to the USA and you ended up with tired, starving troops operating badly maintained equipment facing off against well-fed, well paid, well equipped yanks and slightly less well paid and well fed but still well equipped commonwealth troops. Man-for-man they were almost always worse.

>>32524719
Wouldn't that be "raise my right hand"?

>>32523762
>reliable
> T-34
t-34 crew members will come back from hell make fun of you

Meanwhile, reliable , fast saharianas decimated anglos and their worthless nigger colonials in africa