Halftracks and Molotovs

[Spanish Bombs]

Was playing a scenario the other day as the Russians. My opponent moved some HTs near a woods and I was able to get 3 'top penetrations' of a 250/1 halftrack by molotovs within about 60 seconds. The result: nothing. The fires just burnt themselves out, apparently.

Maybe I'm overestimating the power of a Molotov Cocktail, but it seems to me that getting a liter or so of burning kerosene into an open topped vehicle with lots of flammables inside would almost certainly result in a knockout of some sort. I don't think I even caused a crew casualty, come to think of it. I imagine there could be MC 'duds' or something, but it strikes me as a bit much for 3 of them in quick succession to not kill a halftrack.

Has anybody else had the same thing happen? I didn't see it in a search on the board. What about Molotovs - how much damage could they do? What did they have to use for fuel - kerosene? Isn't diesel fuel difficult to alite, and wasn't that the primary Soviet fuel? Just wondering.

[Slappy]

The same thing happened to me, and I have a rant somewhere in the tips and tricks forum about it.

I don't understand how a molotov hit on an open top vehicle can do no damage. The HT didn't even slow down!

I suppose the logic will be that the bottle didn't break, but three?

[Cameroon]

I thought the logic might be more likely that it didn't hit any of the crew. There's a lot of open non-vital space in the back of a half-track.

I'm not saying what you saw was right or wrong, just offering a possibility

[V]

how about the bottle hit the top, but the flame did not spread as you would have liked it?

the bottle hit and broke as planned but the enemy crew did well to put the fire out quickly?

maybe the wick went out on the way down?

maybe Ivan forgot to light it?

what I'm saying is that there are many variables. I will admit that 3 hits, that fast, with no knock out is odd, and I would imagine that it is very rare. You could probably not duplicate it.

Make a test scenario and see what happens...

But I would just chalk it up to bad luck.

[Grisha]

It's possible they burst outside the crew compartment, such as the hood. But, three misses into the crew compartment - that's rough. I just can't believe that a coke bottle full of flammable liquid and a flame, bursting in an HT crew compartment would be anything other than catastrophic to those in the compartment. Here's hoping they all hit the hood.

[Spanish Bombs]

An early morning bump, because I'm still wondering about this.

I did go back and retreive the game files from my recycle bin, and would be happy to send them to anybody interested. Send me an email. A few clarifying points - it was a 251/1, not 250/1 as mentioned above. There was a 'top penetration' about 20 seconds into one movie, which in part caused the HT to back up near a platoon of partisans. At the beginning of the next turn, my partisans opened up on the HT with all they had, molotovs were being thrown left and right. Two more 'top penetrations' within the first 20 seconds of the next movie. Also, I confirmed from the end game map that there were no crew casualties.

I'm all on board with the 'many variables' notion. I wouldn't mind knowing what the variables are or might be, though. As for the 'hitting the hood' suggestion, I'd buy that but for the 'top penetration' reports. I assume that is an indication that the molotov has made it into the crew compartment.

[Madmatt]

The problem more or less is that the message you get is rather vague. A top Penetration message for a Molotov (and I have petioned Charles to work on the wording) really means that the bottle did indeed hit the top quarter of the vehicle.

It could also mean that:

The bottle broke open and spilled the fuel as intended but the ignitor did not light the fuel.

The bottle didnt break open.

The fuel was dispersed over a non critical area or did not splash on the vehicle itself.

The bottle bounced off the armor and then broke open.

And about a million other possibilities.

The issue here is the message wording. We used to have it that NO message was given with a Molotov attack, but that wasnt very good either. Charles recoded it to use the shell impact wording which technically is correct but the "penetration" wording is a little unclear to be sure.

While this is not changed in v1.01 I will see what I can do for v1.02

Madmatt

[Paddington]

Maybe they hitted the side of the ht?

[Slappy]

Thanks Matt. I will now officially stop ranting about this topic and sit on my hands until 1.02.

Nice follow up.

[MikeyD]

Don't underestimate the effects of those molotovs. For all you could tell the crew could've been paniced or routed and may be useless for the rest of the game. I remember playing the demo, despite my best efforts to stop him a PzIII had raced to the final flag. When the game was over it turned out the tank had actually been routed and had driven there in a blind panic! Score one for me.

[ October 24, 2002, 09:52 AM: Message edited by: MikeyD ]

[John D Salt]

Originally posted by Spanish Bombs:

[snips]

Maybe I'm overestimating the power of a Molotov Cocktail, but it seems to me that getting a liter or so of burning kerosene into an open topped vehicle with lots of flammables inside would almost certainly result in a knockout of some sort.

I don't think that Molotov cocktails are really all that lethal. Petrol bombs used in riots in the UK proved themselves so impuissant that they were removed from the list of "firearms" some years ago; I believe that the only soldier killed by a petrol bomb in NI was killed when a Pig drove over him as he rolled on the deck to extinguish the flame.

PRO document WO 291/308, "Effectiveness of flamethrowers on military personnel", makes the assumption that a gallon of burning fuel in contact with a person will kill them -- a pretty safe assumption, you might think, but a gallon is considerably more than a litre.

Someone I knew at university in the early 1980s was a member of a re-enactment group, and they (rather irresponsibly, in my opinion) used to throw real petrol bombs during some of their re-enactments. During the course of one of these, a petrol bomb hit him on the leg, splashing it with burning petrol. Thanks to the stout serge of his German naval infantry uniform, he escaped injury simply by wiping his leg on wet grass.

Even though I think there is good evidence that Molotivs are not especially effective, I would urge you not to try this at home.

Originally posted by Spanish Bombs:

[

[snips]

What about Molotovs - how much damage could they do? What did they have to use for fuel - kerosene? Isn't diesel fuel difficult to alite, and wasn't that the primary Soviet fuel? Just wondering.

I understand that Diesel oil was their usual flamethrower fuel, but I would have thought that that was little use for Molotov cocktails.

All the best,

John.

[Spanish Bombs]

Thanks for the prompt answer, Madmatt.

I'm not sure, though, which part of this thread is my favorite: Madmatt's detailed explanation, or when John D Saltused the word "impuissant" in his informative post.

[Panzer Leader]

I liked the "simply wiping his leg on wet grass" part, myself. Ahh, if only all the weapons of war were so easy to avoid.

[JAT]

I liked the "naval infantry". Can they walk on water?

[tar]

Re: Molotov Fuels

I would expect that gasoline (petrol) would be the fuel of choice, perhaps mixed with some motor oil so that it would stick better.

Diesel and Kerosene are very similar fuels (kerosene is a bit lighter), and neither ignites very readily as a liquid.

-Tom.

P.S. I too, was way impressed by "impuissant".

[offtaskagain]

From personal experience molotovs really aren't all that spectacular. I experimented with some friends about them (don't ask why) and we were rather disappointed. The fire burns out fast, doesn't stick very much and can be easily put out. Depending on the bottle they can be fairly tough to break too. We only got them to break if we smashed them against rocks or on the glass face of the targetted computer monitor. The monitor didn't even suffer any scorch marks on it even when the flaming gasoline splashed on it. It just goes out too fast. The only way I can see any of my molotovs disabling a vehicle is if one broke on the engine deck of a tank and dripped down and ignited fuel vapors. I doubt they burn long enough to ignite any ammunition, but I'm not so dumb as to experiment with that. As John Salt gave an example of, a bit of burning gasoline splashed on clothing can be extinguished fairly easily (im my experience :eek: ) . If it landed on exposed limbs or someones head though, thats a different case. So my view is your either have to ignite fuel vapors or splash on the skin of a crew member to have any real effect on the vehicle.

[Foxbat]

Russian Molotov cocktails are either filled with "KS" (f which I'm not sure what it is, but it self-ignites and seems rather nasty stuff, maybe phosphor disolved in some liquid?). Or they are filled with a fuel mixture (probably petrol mixed with diesel).

Bottles are either half a liter or 3 quarts, so don't expect these to set a half-track ablaze and engulf the crew in flames.

[ October 24, 2002, 08:30 PM: Message edited by: Foxbat ]