Path: spln!rex!lex!extra.newsguy.com!lotsanews.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!nntp.abs.net!news-out.visi.com!hermes.visi.com!gemini.tycho.net.POSTED!not-for-mail Approved: sci-military-moderated@retro.com Return-Path: news@fusnwr02-lrs.fusion.bt.com Delivery-Date: Fri Oct 26 15:36:32 2001 Delivery-Date: Fri, 26 Oct 2001 15:33:57 -0700 for <sci-military-moderated@retro.com>; Fri, 26 Oct 2001 15:32:41 -0700 (PDT) id 15xFHE-0001Pc-00 for sci-military-moderated@moderators.isc.org; Sat, 27 Oct 2001 00:16:32 +0200 Fri, 26 Oct 2001 23:16:31 +0100 (BST) To: sci-military-moderated@moderators.isc.org Newsgroups: sci.military.moderated Subject: Re: WWII Armor types From: John D Salt <john.salt@NOSPAM.btclick.com> References: <i3qB7.152293$5A3.52800604@news1.rdc2.pa.home.com> <a516ee75.0110252036.230ea683@posting.google.com> <5dcb47db.0110260556.1019019@posting.google.com> Organization: Your Company Message-ID: <Xns9146E26944A3ABaldHeadedJohn@62.172.195.196> User-Agent: Xnews/4.06.22 Date: Fri, 26 Oct 2001 22:16:30 GMT X-NNTP-Posting-Host: 213.123.248.157 X-NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 26 Oct 2001 23:16:30 BST Content-Length: 5486 Lines: 114 NNTP-Posting-Host: 778d884e.newsreader.tycho.net X-Trace: 1004150213 gemini.tycho.net 440 205.179.181.194 X-Complaints-To: abuse@tycho.net Xref: spln sci.military.moderated:39848 cray74@hotmail.com (Mike Miller) wrote in news:5dcb47db.0110260556.1019019@posting.google.com: >> I believe that the Schürtzen plates were originally >> intended to disrupt the powerful Soviet 14.5mm anti-tank >> rifle bullets, although they were also effective against >> HEAT warheads. > > That's two people now who have claimed the Schurtzen plates > were to disrupt Soviet 14.5mm anti-tank rifles, while > another has called it nonsense. What's the story? I've only > heard of the armor skirts being used to defeat HE and HEAT. Much as it pains me to disagree with so authoritative a source as Tony Williams, the "Shurzen versus 14.5mm" story can, IMHO, only be a misunderstanding. We have done this before in this forum, I think; since when I have learnt a wee snippet more, which may be of interest. I have reason to believe that the misunderstanding arose in the following manner. A book by the estimable Walter M Spielberger on the Pz III (or possibly the StuG III; I don't have copies, I confess that I read the relevant passages from copies on the shelves in Motor Books in Swindon) stated that Schurzen had been tested against 14.5mm ATRs, but not against HEAT weapons. This oddity was picked up and, in the slightly modified form of "Schurzen were intended to protect against 14.5mm ATRs", and bruited abroad, not least by the librarian at Bovington tank museum, an authority who commands considerable respect. No notice was taken of the statement in the other Speilberger book (StuG III or Pz III, whichever it wasn't last time) that Shurzen were fitted to protect ahainst HE and HL (which I take to mean Hohlladung, hollow-charge) shells. Regardless of the provenance of the story -- and I would be very interested to hear of sources that cannot be traced back to those mentioned above -- sensible persons should pay it no regard. The arguments for and against, as I have heard them rehearsed to date, are as follows; the weight of evidence is in favour of the traditional view, that "bazooka plates" (as Anglophones used to call Shurzen) really were meant to protect against bazookery weapons. 1. Look at the material. Shurzen were made of thin mild steel or wire mesh. In terms of ballistic protection, this is next to worthless (and possibly worse -- but we'll come to that later). As a burster plate to detonate HEAT rounds, though, it's fine. 2. Look at the positioning. If the intention were to act as spaced armour and do the normal job of cap-stripping or penetrator-breaking, there would be no need to mount the Shurzen plates on those cumbersome rails far from the main armour. It would have made more sense, and saved weight, to mount the armour closer, in the style of the Pz III driver's plate. There is no need to undergo the risk of plates getting knocked off in close country -- as often happened in Normandy -- unless it is desired to obtain a good, long stand-off distance, as one would against HEAT. 3. Look at the HEAT threat. It has been alleged that there was no significant HEAT threat to German tanks on the Russian front when Schurzen were first fitted. Not true; apart from artillery weapons, the Russians fielded the 82mm aircraft rocket and the similar LMG rocket-mine. Bazookas were also sent to Russia by lend-lease, and captured Panzerfausts were used when obtainable. 4. Look at the ATR threat. The penetration performance of PTRS and PTRD rounds was marginal against the 30mm side armour of the Pz III or Pz IV Ausfs of the mid-war period onward (I cheerfully refer readers to Tony Williams' excellent book, "Rapid Fire", Appendix 1, which gives the most generous penetration performance for these weapons of any source I know). It must be borne in mind that a significant overmatch of the armour is needed to stand a good chance of a kill. Now, here's the new bit; in conversation with a chap from Chertsey, I came across a story about unexpected ballistic behaviour of a Browing .3" round, a truly venerable round about which one might think there is little new to discover. The round was being tested against armour for a covert ops vehicle. Trials with the round fired against the bare armour showed that it would not penetrate. Alarmingly, though, trials against the same armour showed that it started to penetrate when the camouflage materials for the covert role were placed over it. This was quite unexpected. After some investigation, it was determined that the effect of the camouflage was to strip the jacket from the .3" round, thus converting it into a sort of impromptu APDS round, and enabling the cores to make a few penetrations. I surmise that the Germans, being clever chaps, may have tumbled to the fact that a similar effect might have operated on the tungsten-cored (APCR) 14.5mm Russian ATR rounds passing through Shurzen. In order to make sure that their new HEAT protection would not render them suddenly vulnerable to ATRs against which they were previously all but immune, it would have made sense to run a test or two. So, to conclude, all the evidence I can find points to Shurzen being, as you would expect, designed to protect against HEAT. Mind you, the 14.5mm idea is not the daftest idea I have heard to explain Shurzen. An intsum I have seen for 30 Corps in 1944 reported Shurzen being fitted to Pz IVs, and stated that this was done to diguise them as Tigers. All the best, John.