T34 firing procedure

[Other Means]

just watching "Decisive Weapons" on the History channel & a T34 commander is stating how he would line up the sights on the target & the *driver* would shout fire.

seems odd, did the driver also have a sight linked to the commanders periscope?

to make the point, there was a WWII film clip with the driver doing just that.

[Sergei]

Maybe the driver was shouting that the T-34 is on fire?

[Other Means]

i'm reasonably sure it wasn't Russian for "Mihail, i've always loved you".

[Mr. Tittles]

Was the loader steering?

[YankeeDog]

I think I know what's going on here.

The commander is probably describing the procedure for firing from a quick halt, which as I understand it was pretty much SOP for the relatively speedy and maneuverable T-34 against the heavier German armor.

So more likely than not, the driver is yelling "fire" to let the commander know that the tank is indeed at a full stop with the brakes set, and he can fire the gun as soon as he has a good sight picture.

Presumably, as soon as the driver hears the gun report, he floors it and gets the tank moving again.

At least, that's my guess. . .

Cheers,

YD

[Other Means]

that sounds reasonable yes. with the engine etc i might be difficult to know your speed etc.

good thinking YankeeDog.

[MikeyD]

Very interesting. I had never hear that before. The driver being the one to yell "fire" might also be linked to the fact that at that moment he had the best view of the battlefield of the whole crew. The loader was busy loading, the commander/ gunner was of course heads down at the sights. Basically, there was nobody topside watching what was going on. I suppose an alternate to 'fire' from the driver would be "Holy crap! Get up top and take a look at this!"

[Mr. Tittles]

No you misunderstand. He was only doing a drill where his part of the drill was to announce a full stop and his 'Fire!' alert was just that it was safe to fire without motion. The TC/Gunner may have had a command of 'Target!' that would alert the driver to come to a halt before the driver declares 'Fire!'. Once the driver felt the recoil, and barring a command from the TC to remain still, he would get it in gear and move on.

He was not designating targets.

[stikkypixie]

This gets me thinking, why can't a T34 fire on the move, or can it and is it just a waste of ammo if it

did?

[YankeeDog]

A T-34 certainly *can* fire on the move, but you'd be lucky to hit anything smaller than a barn. Like most WWII-era tanks, the T-34 lacked any stabilization system to keep the gun on target while the tank was moving.

CM tanks will fire on the move, but generally speaking accuracy sucks, as it should.

Of WWII-era tanks, US designs like the Sherman were a bit better of because they had gyrostabilizers, but from what I've read, accuracy was still pretty poor when moving and it took a pretty well-trained gunner to make proper use of a gyro-stabilized gun. This doesn't mean that the gyro system was useless -- at the very least it would help the gunner keep the target visible thorugh the sights, if not actually in the crosshairs, allowing him to fire more quickly once the tank did stop. It was still a far cry from modern stablization systems.

And judging by accounts I've read here and elewhere by M1A1 Abrams crewmen, even modern MBTs with complex gun stabliization systems have a hard time firing on the move unless moving quite slowly or on a very flat surface or the like.

So to me it's not surprising that for most WWII tanks, shooting from a "firing halt" was SOP.

Cheers,

YD

[Skolman]

Maybe he shouted "ready to fire!" or he meant that the tank set on fire so the commander would shout next "bail out!!!!"..... or he ordered the MG gunner to fire?

[John D Salt]

Originally posted by YankeeDog:

[snips]

Of WWII-era tanks, US designs like the Sherman were a bit better of because they had gyrostabilizers,

Recall that the first tank to carry a gyro-stabilizer was the 1937 model of the Soviet T-26. It doesn't seem to have done much to improve its combat performance. The Sovs returned to stabilization with the T-54A.

The US seem to have given up on stabilization after the war; as far as I can tell, no post-war US MBT carried a stabilizer until the M60A3.

The Brits introduced the first two-axis stabilizer in Centurion in 1945, and all British MBTs have had it since.

I wonder how much good it all does. PRO document WO 291/90, "Firing on the move from tanks", says:

"With existing British tanks the effectiveness (hits per minute) of shooting on the move is never greater than 1/2 that of stationary fire under similar conditions and is often 1/20 or less. The Westinghouse gyro stabilizer produces some improvement".

I suspect that a skilled gunner with the 2-pounder on the free-traverse mount would have done just as well.

It appears that the reduced effectiveness of firing on the move is as much due to decreased speed of loading as to aiming difficulties.

British tank workshops by 1945 were returning tanks with non-functioning stabilizers as 100% ready, which tells you something about how useful they were thought to be.

All the best,

John.

[MikeyD]

Don't forget, the vast bulk of tank work is chucking HE in the general direction of infantry. With HE, like the game of horse shoes, 'close' still counts for points. A gyrostabilized gun on a moving Sherman was probably good enough to put HE into church steeples and -quite literally - the broad sides of barns. And it was probably good enough to keep an anti-tank gunner's head down as well.

Otherwise, you just have to look at old film footage of the wildly pitching barrel ends on T34s moving at speed over relatively gentle ground to realise shooting on the move was an almost impossible affair.

[rexford]

Firing on the move has a low accuracy due, in part, to the effect of random angle changes to the vehicle as it moves.

If one is shooting at a target at 600m and the gun is aimed right at the center of the enemy tank, and just before one pulls the trigger the vertical angle of the tank changes by plus 1 degree due to a tiny ant hill, the shot overflies the aim point by about 10.5m!

From what I've read, the Sherman gyrostabilizer did not instantly correct for vehicle angle changes as it moved but took a small time. Here is a tidbit from the Sherman gunnery manual FM 17-12 re: Firing While Moving:

"Drive at a constant speed: acceleration and deceleration upset the action of the stabilizer. Drive in a straight line, otherwise the gun yaws as the tank turns. The driver warns the gunner when rough terrain is ahead. When going over rough terrain, do not "fight" the gun (attempting to keep it on target by spinning the elevating handwheel), but wait until a constant speed is regained and the action of the stabilizer has smoothed out."

And how bout this:

"Even with a stabilizer, the gun does not hold constantly on the target. Watch the swing of the gun through the target and fire as the proper sight setting crosses the target."

So as one is charging around a bend and beating a path towards the side of that unsuspecting Tiger the stabilized gun is bouncing around even when the going is straight and the ground seems flat. Cause the tank is changing angle ever so slightly and the stabilized gun is moving around too to compensate in a never ending back and forth.

[Other Means]

this TC last night said that they did fired on the move. he also said "the German's didn't fire like we did, 1, 2, 3. they would always stop & aim".

so it looks like they were trying to get as many shots off as they could while driving for cover/angle.

[leakyD]

Originally posted by Other Means:

this TC last night said that they did fired on the move. he also said "the German's didn't fire like we did, 1, 2, 3. they would always stop & aim".

so it looks like they were trying to get as many shots off as they could while driving for cover/angle.

that makes sense.

as the russian optics were below par, stopping to shoot prolly didn't help THAT much on the attack, at least at range.

as the russians would have 3+/1 odds, sheer volume of fire would probably have been more helpful in keeping the germans heads down unitl they were close enough to actually hit something.

and the idea of firing on the move might have something to do with their attack doctrine: 50 tanks firing on the move during an attack is better than 10 tanks firing still accurately.

oh, and as for stabilizers, they still suck. unless you moving on flat ground and under 20km/hr. well at least on the bradleys they suck. firing on the move over "open" ground is a bit of a nightmare. well, at least if you want to hit anything.

[Joachim]

Originally posted by Other Means:

this TC last night said that they did fired on the move. he also said "the German's didn't fire like we did, 1, 2, 3. they would always stop & aim".

so it looks like they were trying to get as many shots off as they could while driving for cover/angle.

Makes sense too me.

a) "Every shot must count"

If you have lots of tanks firing in your general direction getting hit is just a random process. It does not matter if you move or stand still.

c) If you have impenetrable frontal armor, you can afford to halt.

d) The gunner can assist in actually spotting targets while on the move. Not concentrating on targets far away ignoring that well-hidden ATG nearby.

Gruß

Joachim

[MikeyD]

CM most probably reflects pretty accurately what's going to happen when you shoot on the move with WWII gun laying systems. HE will maybe fall in the general vicinity of your target but shooting AP would be like trying to play a game of darts while bouncing on a pogo stick. Russians probably fired on the move because they had nothing to lose in the attempt. Their T34 was likely the brew-up before their ammo rack was depleted anyway. Germans were always looking back over their shoulders at their supply chain and couldn't afford to waste ammo.

[leakyD]

I think to simulate this kind of tactic/doctrine it would be nice to have a:

MOVE-TO-CONTACT, MOVE or even FAST-TO-CONTACT, FAST/MOVE combined command.

[Redwolf]

The Shermans just had more ammunition to blow and had a higher emphasis on supression of unseen targets.

The gyrostablizers of this kind do not really help firing while the tank is actually moving.

What they do help with is driving a bit and on the next stop finding the gun still layed to the same target you left it at at the last stop.

They would also help firing on the move on soft but large bumps, but while that would work better than without the gyro you still wouldn't hit a tank-size target.

But supressive area fire while moving across a field is probably reasonable - which is what the Sheran tanker in Europe often wanted.

[Joachim]

Originally posted by leakyD:

I think to simulate this kind of tactic/doctrine it would be nice to have a:

MOVE-TO-CONTACT, MOVE or even FAST-TO-CONTACT, FAST/MOVE combined command.

Shoot&Scoot works all forward, too.

But it somewhat lacks on the "halt on contact" procedure. It stops at the designated point and fires - which might be too late. But there are rumors this is better than nothing.

[stikkypixie]

Yes but with shoot and scoot if you put the scoot point forward it MOVEs to it, and sometimes you want to FAST MOVE.

[Joachim]

Originally posted by stikkypixie:

Yes but with shoot and scoot if you put the scoot point forward it MOVEs to it, and sometimes you want to FAST MOVE.

Ah yes... I bet there was sumfink else. If you want to make it perfect, use the following procedure (lots of micro-management):

Firing halt at the beginning of a move:

10secs increments - press pause

Other increments- experiment with the amounf of waypoints and pause commands to achieve a certain delay.

Firing halt during a move: Involves 2 turns.

a) Have some move/fast/whatsoever command active from last turn.

Add new waypoints so the command delay for those makes up roughly the pause you want.

Too complex? Sure. But priceless if it actually works.

Gruß

Joachim