John Kettler Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 I don't know how specifically the present game internals track "immobilized" results, but it seems to me that, barring, say, sinking into a quagmire or quicksand, taking an engine or gearbox hit, or having both tracks knocked off through a variety of means, that with one track left, an immobilized vehicle ought to be able to pivot to some degree by applying forward or reverse power to the remaining track and turning using the shattered side as the pivot. I've read quite a few accounts where this was done and seem to recall that Barkmann even managed to get his Panther to cover with one track broken. I don't know how hard this would be to implement, but it would be cool chrome and would definitely add to game excitement. Am also hoping to see towing provisions in CMBB. The present absence of an "Abandon" command really hurts, for if a battle's lost badly enough, not only does the often intact vehicle go away, but so too the high morale crew which stays with the immobilized vehicle--at double points. Would love to hear from tankers about one track pivot capability. Regards, John Kettler Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sir Uber General Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 Good call John! Also re immobilisation, when would tanks use the tow cables they carry? Would they say tow another tank into battle (thats crazy the answer should be no:)? Or just use it for recovery purposes? Are regular battle tanks able to tow other tanks with busted tracks? or do those tracks need to be first respaired before the tank can move? Sorry, getting away from the origianl topic a bit here Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stalin's Organ Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 A lot of immobilisations ARE bogging in, and who's to say "track hit - immobilised" isn't KO'ing a whole transmission? There are also "track hit" results that do not immobilise - does anyone know whether they alter max speed at all?? I'd suggest the Panther you mention got one of them - as it was clearly not immobilised!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stalin's Organ Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 A lot of immobilisations ARE bogging in, and who's to say "track hit - immobilised" isn't KO'ing a whole transmission? There are also "track hit" results that do not immobilise - does anyone know whether they alter max speed at all?? I'd suggest the Panther you mention got one of them - as it was clearly not immobilised!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Splinty Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 I used to be a Mechanized Infantryman so I know a little about this. If a tank is immobilized with a busted track it can only move in a wide circle around the broken side and unless it's on concrete or solid rock it's probably only going to do that until it runs off the broken track at which point it's going to bog itself down very quickly. As for the pivoting part,pivot or neutral steering is accomplished by moving one track forward and the other track backward thus turning the tank around it's own center point, which is why only tanks with the right kind of transmission and final drive system could do it. As far as I know a crew would have to at least jury rig the tracks for towing purposes, otherwise the tank would dig itself in when the towing vehicle tried to move it. And I highly doubt anyone would try to pull a tank into battle, although I'd guess it could be pulled into a defensive or ambush position. Again this is based on my modern day experiences and not from any knowledge of WWII era recovery practices. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Kettler Posted July 2, 2002 Author Share Posted July 2, 2002 Most interesting! Crab pivots are possible, at least on reasonably firm ground. As for towing, German tankers at Kursk were specifically forbidden to stop and do this, implying that the practice was common in combat. I've also seen copies of German war art showing an ARV based on a deturreted Panzer III towing out a tank while under fire. Finally, if towing were available in the game, I would be dragging immobilized vehicles off the board, or at least as far away from the enemy as I could. For operations or the new linked QBs, though, I might very well drag an immobilized vehicle into a good position. This is exactly what the Russians did with some of their damaged armor at Kursk, digging it in as antitank pillboxes. I'd love to do a scenario in which infantry had to babysit a disabled tank until it could be retrieved. In addition to an abandon command, there should be a provision to order that a functioning crew destroy the vehicle or gun before leaving. Regards, John Kettler Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sig Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 Hello. Just curious: how long does it take approximatively to a/ repair a track with say, one broken link? or b/ to tow a tank (battle vs calm situation)? Additional questions: does the time it takes depend on the type of track? And if yes why? (barring the weight difference of the links). If some panzer-grog or former tanker could answer, I would be very interested to know. Thanks. Sig Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pacestick Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 A tank with a busted track can only drive in a straight line and not turn. The method is to apply steering to the missing track side whilst idling forward or rearwards. Once the tank has run off the damaged track there is a chance of the road wheels digging in but most would take their chances rather than sit in an immobilised tank under fire. I would say the damaged panther spoken about would have reversed back the way it came using this method. The way an armoured vehicle turns(not pivots) is by applying braking on one side while the other side's track keeps turning. With a track missing and no braking applied to the missing track, the vehicle remains immobile and all that happens is that the drive sprockets on the damaged side spin feely. I have no idea how long it would take a crew to fix a broken track on a WW2 vintage tank but I can tell you it takes a very good crew about 30 minutes to replace damaged/broken link on a M113 armoured personel carrier which is a hell of a lot easier to work on than a tank track. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kuma of Finland Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 Just adding my thoughts here. Most of my text is just speculation so feel free to skip I've read from some WWII war novels about tank crews fixing their tracks under fire. One example I remember (don't remember the book, though) is where a Finnish T-26 team (T-26 is a Russian copy of a British Vickers tank) had to jump out to put the fallen track back on the wheels. They were in the middle of the tank battle and had to do it quite fast with a large wooden pole. But I can't recall that they actually repaired a broken track under fire. From the same books I've read how abandoned tanks would be rescued with other tanks (either Finnish or Russian, whoever could make it first) - under fire again. There were only few tanks to fight with so every single extra asset was precious. At least T-34's have been tugged like this. And a note about turning in place: reading from forum here I've learned that not all WWII tanks could turn in place (forwarding the other track while reversing the other). I guess most of the CMBB tanks are the "old type": stopping or slowing the other track while other is still forwarding -> larger turn radius. Feel free and happy and joyful to correct me /kuma Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kmead Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 There are several issues here. First as has been pointed out, once you run off the end of the track you will likely dig in unless you are on pavement or hard ground. You are also likely to move in an arc while on the remaining track and as most WW2 tanks couldn't pivot in place anyway. The next major issue here is time. Even a long battle of 60 turns would not be enough to recover a tank much less repair a track under fire. To tow a tank requires that several crew member exit the tank, take off a very stiff cable attach it to the pintles of both vehicles (and reposition the one working vehicle in the process which requires unbuttoning). Then moving both vehicles to a place of relative safety. In all likelyhood this would be under fire expecially in any of CMBOs games and just as likely with CMBB. You also take the very real risk of bogging the operable vehicle or even causing a mechanical failure of the second vehicle. You also have to have two vehicles or like size or a tow vehicle that is bigger than the towee (meaning a Panther to remove a Panther, Tiger for Tiger and so on). As for fixing a track in place, all tracks weigh a ton, literally. If you look in some of the old pictures (of TIger 1s in particular as they changed tracks after rail transport and added the outer row of bogey wheels after the movement so there arel lots of pics out there of the work) you can see how they used to change a track with a cable wrapped around the drive sprocket to pull the track back over the tension bogey. On a tank without idlers (like the Panther, Tiger or an M113) it would pull the track back over the tops of the bogey wheels relatively easily (considering the bogeys weren't turning and the rubber is grabbing the track). On a vehicle like the Sherman or Chaffee with idler wheels to carry the track back to the drive sprocket you had to lead the track up and over to some degree each idler. Once the track gets to the drive sprocket you reengage it with the teeth and draw the vehicle forward slowly until the two ends of the track are near each other in front of the first bogey wheel. The crew also would have to loosen the tensioning on the tensioning bogey to create slack for the next step. You then have to align the track ends and hold them in plane to drive te pin in with a sledge hammer. This is really hard work for the whole crew and takes alot of time and finesse with really large objects that have no interest in cooperating. All in all, I believe that BTS/BFS were correct in not having this in the current game and presumeably not in CMBB. The time span and the likerlyhood of being under fire makes it very unlikely to do any of thes things in game. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Visom Posted July 2, 2002 Share Posted July 2, 2002 I don't know anything about this, but logically it would be hard to get any movement at all unless you're on a paved road. My reasoning is based on how easy it is to bog down when you have tracks and they are moving roughly straight ahead. Now, without the track how much does the ground pressure increase? 5 times? Add to that that you now will try to pivot. Quite easy to see how the tank will dig into the ground fairly quickly. I assume the risk for throwing the other track would increase as well and maybe there's a risk of damaging the wheels on the side without a track. And last, I guess most crews repaired thrown tracks themselves. It was hard work, but if you tried to pivot with one track only it would be a nightmare if even possible. Therefore I think it would be very extreme cases when anyone would try this. [ July 02, 2002, 08:56 AM: Message edited by: Visom ] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zukkov Posted July 3, 2002 Share Posted July 3, 2002 good topic. if you have questions about why things are the way they are in this game, you should bring them up and let the experts(that's you guys) discuss them. now i have a question. it's a little off topic for this thred, but somewhat related. i'm currently in an op. in battle 1 i had a sherman immobilized, but in battle 2 it was fixed and able to move. then in battle 2 the same tank was bogged near then end of the scenario and remained so during the setup phase of battle 3, meaning it was stuck where it ended up on the previous battle. does this make sense to ya'll? is there a random chance immobilized/bogged vehicles will be fixed/unbogged for the next battle?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pacestick Posted July 3, 2002 Share Posted July 3, 2002 Originally posted by zukkov: good topic. if you have questions about why things are the way they are in this game, you should bring them up and let the experts(that's you guys) discuss them. now i have a question. it's a little off topic for this thred, but somewhat related. i'm currently in an op. in battle 1 i had a sherman immobilized, but in battle 2 it was fixed and able to move. then in battle 2 the same tank was bogged near then end of the scenario and remained so during the setup phase of battle 3, meaning it was stuck where it ended up on the previous battle. does this make sense to ya'll? is there a random chance immobilized/bogged vehicles will be fixed/unbogged for the next battle??Yes there is. Whoever created the Op sets the chance of recovery when he creates it. My experience has been that an immobilised vehicle has about a 50/50 chance of being recovered during Ops that have the recovery chance on excellent. I have never had a bogged vehicle remain bogged between battles, they usually are abandoned if close to the enemy deploy zone for the next battle or completely recovered and available for deployment along with any reinforcements. The same applies to tanks that are gun damaged. If you leave them near the front they are usually abandoned between battles. It is a good practice to drive them as close as you can to your edge of the map to increase the chances they will be recovered and repaired for the next battle Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zukkov Posted July 3, 2002 Share Posted July 3, 2002 thanks pace. i guess i should consider that a lucky tank(or unlucky, depending on how you look at it). by the way, that same tank managed to unbog himself, but has now been gun damaged. no doubt with the run of luck(good or bad? hmmmm.. i'd say both) he's had so far, he'll be fixed once again in the next scenario. lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sparky Rat Posted July 3, 2002 Share Posted July 3, 2002 one thing ive tried doing with limited success is useing another non-disabled tank to push the imoble one into a slightly better posistion but only on dry days AND usually not very far. cordially, Sparky Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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