Ground Pressure

[tools4fools]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

QUOTE]Interestingly enough, I have seen hardly any photographic evidence that these were used in the East. At least, not in any great numbers. The only picture I have ever seen off the top of my head is of a scale model of a StuG III In other words, out of the thousands of pictures I have seen of German tanks in the East and West, to the best of my memory I have never seen one with the track extenders.

Steve

I think there is one pic of a Stug III with Ostketten in Panzer Colors...it's photographed from behind if I remember correct.

But that still makes only 1 in thousands...

Marcus

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[B.B.Toys]

Dear Redwolf,

As shown in pics above Ostketten are special track extensions, not wider tracks per se. I seem to think that some German tanks such as the PzVI had a set of narrower tracks for rail transport (to conform to European railway gauge) that were put on/off at railheads; the wider tank tracks were in fact the "normal use" tracks and not designed to cope with winter conditions.

Dear Steve,

Thanks for responding. I am working away from home but fortunately have a copy of George Nipe and Remy Spezzano¡¦s Platz der Leibstandarte (Christmas present from girlfriend!) to hand. In it I found a goodly number of PzIIIs, StuGIIIs and PzIVs from the Kharkov campaign photographed with Ostketten. Since I¡¦m not sure about the ethics of posting scans of those pictures on the Forum and you and many others no doubt have ready access to this book, I will just refer to pages numbers where I found Ostketten depicted:

pp.38-40--Pz IV

p.93-- StuGIII

P. 97¡Xa battalion of StuG IIIs,, at least five visible in photo (all fitted with Ostketten)

p.99¡XStuGIIIs of Pz.Gren. Rgt. 1

p.107¡Xmore StuGIIIs

p.121-PzIII

p.155¡Xa divisional StuGIII

p.174¡XPzIV of 1st Battalion of Regt. "Totenkopf"

pp.176-177, 178-179¡X2 PzIVs

p.184¡Xa whole bunch of "Totenkopf" PzIIIs (all fitted with Ostketten)

Also of interest: see p. 276--Ice cleats being put on a Marder II(?).

On some of these pictures we see whole Pz. units, platoons but seemingly even whole battalions and regiments of LSSAH, outfitted with Ostketten. Only PzIIIs (and StuGIIIs on their chassis) and Pz IVs seem to have them, which makes sense.

Does anyone here know whether the Kharkov campaign of Jan-Mar, 43 is the first time German vehicles on the famously "boggy" Ostfront were so equipped and what practical effect the extensions had on bogging rates?

I suspect their use yielded mixed results for the Germans but doubt whether any hard data is still available. If these contrivances had been notably effective I suspect the German tanks in the Ardennes, for instance, would have been fitted with them (I hope I¡¦m right in assuming that they were not¡XIt just wouldn¡¦t be right to fit "East Tracks" on tanks on the Western Front ).

I well understand and appreciate that factoring in the use of Ostketten (along with other added equipment) is impossible with the current game engine. And if CMIII is going to be the Mediterranean theater (Yes!), well, the point will become very moot there as well. In that case, I would want the engine to be able instead to simulate the effects of vehicle dust, mirage, sun direction and glare, offer dynamic maps that can turn out not to be what they seemed at first glance, and monitor the consumption of scarce petrol in an operation ¡K (sorry, just dreaming away)

With warm regards and thanks,

Richard

[B.B.Toys]

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