Sloped armor: A simple feature that saved many lives

sloped armor the history of tanks during the first world war tanks appeared as a new type of weapon designed to break the stalemate on the battlefields of the western front even though they failed to meet the task tanks brought about a revolution in warfare during world war ii 21 years later since they first appeared it was apparent tanks would become a dominant force on the battleground but there had to be a way for the enemy on the opposite end of the tank barrel to somehow destroy or take the weapon out of action and so began the race between construction of the armored vehicles and construction of anti-armor weapons as anti-armored weapons developed and became more effective tank designers had to improve the vehicle's protection by making it thicker and harder to penetrate alongside this however was a far more innovative implementation which achieved the same results this being sloped armor in the years before and during the early stages of world war ii the principal way of penetrating tank armor was by using kinetic energy penetrators as with any other body the kinetic energy of an anti-tank round is proportional to its mass and velocity more precisely it's a product of one half of the object's mass and the square of its velocity the higher one of these the more powerful the round and in turn its capability to force its way through the armor once the round penetrates the armor the target is destroyed by either the heat and the pressure produced or the scattering of round particles otherwise known as shrapnel over time the caliber weight and velocity of the anti-tank rounds increased creating some powerful tools and combating tanks to increase the tank's protective capabilities constructors equip tanks with thicker armor plates to match the increasing kinetic energy of the rounds the drawback of producing thick armors was that it increased the overall weight of the tank more importantly it required more steel which also meant higher production costs sloped armor countered this problem as with angled armor plates constructors achieved better protection while retaining the same thickness of the armor sloped armor provided more than one benefit to the protection of the tank the most obvious was the increase of the armor thickness more precisely the relative or the line of sight thickness when a round hits the armor plate it transfers its kinetic energy along its horizontal axis the line of sight in vertical armor plates the thickness along the line of sight is the actual thickness of the plate in sloped armors the line of sight thickness is higher than the actual and relative to the slope angle the higher the angle of the armor slope from vertical the higher the relative or the line of sight thickness in 60 degree sloped armors relative thickness is twice as high than the actual that means kinetic energy rounds had to penetrate twice as much steel if the armor plate was upright most often sloped armor plates were applied to the frontal part of the tank since this was the most likely direction of attack a sloped armor plate offered better protection on the given area of the tank but provided no weight and material savings this was largely due to the fact that compared to vertical plates slope armored plates had to be longer to cover the same height a combination of slope plates used to envelop a section of the tank was beneficial for material savings however the reason being that rounder shapes have a smaller surface area relative to their volume than rectangular shapes therefore making tanks with spherical turrets provided either savings and material or a thicker armor for the same amount of material for this purpose tank constructors use cast curved turrets or those composed of angled plates the disadvantage of such designs was that it made the inside of the tank significantly more cramped by applying sloped plates the overall volume of the tank interior was reduced as well soviet tanks known for their sloped turrets were very cramped and uncomfortable for the crew inside another benefit of the sloped armor was its ability to deflect the projectile upon impacting a vertical armored plate the kinetic energy penetrator transfers all of its energy to the plate this is because the direction of the penetrator is perpendicular to the surface of the target plate in the case of sloped armors due to the inclined surface of the plate only part of the penetrator's kinetic energy is transferred to it thus reducing its penetrating power this is when the occurrence of deflecting or ricocheting is possible the lighter and slower a projectile is the greater the ability of sloped armor to deflect it such was the case with armor piercing shells in world war ii bullet-shaped kinetic energy penetrators with relatively low velocity if you want to experience a tank with sloped armor yourself check out world of tanks today world of tanks is a free-to-play pc game whether you want to rush in guns blazing or stealthily sneak up on your opponents in world of tanks there are over 40 maps to choose from so whatever your gameplay style is you'll find a tank that matches join over a hundred million players battling it out with their teammates against the other side's tank militia as you play you aren't experienced and use it to modify and upgrade your tanks to face a global community of players who range from novice to pro using models and vehicle characteristics from history gives world of tanks a real authentic feel and if you want to see your favorite tank in real life don't forget to check out tankfest in dorset from june 24th to the 26th visit the world's biggest tank museum and see how it matches up to your world of tanks specialized design join world of tanks today with the invite code tank mania and receive one tank to add to your permanent collection plus three rental tax 250 000 credits and seven days of premium access a difficulty when designing the sloped armor came about when it was discovered that the way the projector would impact the armor plate was very difficult to predict instead of deflecting the round could slide along the plate partially deflect change the path inside the armor or get bent upon impact whatever the case was however the sloped armor would still provide better protection than vertical armor the first ever tank to utilize slope armor was leonardo da vinci's famous war car his design showed cone shapes used in the upper areas of the vehicle the first modern tank to apply the sloped armor was the french 1917 schneider ca1 which used a sloped front most section of the hull the so called glasses plate sloped armors were also used in some of the first armored cars typically with much thinner armor plates examples of these being the russian gebroff renault and the british lancaster armored car the most distinctive armored car of the interwar period with almost entirely sloped body work was the german sd-kfc 231 in this same time period the first tanks entirely built on the principles of sloped armor appeared these were the french samoa s-35 and the renault r-35 both having slope armor made of castile the use of sloped armor saw more extensive use during world war ii as the conflict and weapon technology progressed arguably the one actual example of an almost perfect utilization of the sloped armor was the legendary soviet t-34 tank when it first entered service in world war ii its armor was groundbreaking sloped armor plates were used on all four sides of the hull with the front plate mounted at a perfect 60 degree angle from vertical the t-34's turret was cast steel with sloped sides and the back was round shaped even though the quality of the manufacturing was at the best of times questionable the armor of the t-34 was probably the best there was at the time in the early stages of the war a single t-34 came under heavy fire from a german 37 millimeter pac-36 anti-tank gun the german crew reported to have to fire 23 rounds against the soviet tank and only managed to jam the tank's turret ring german panzer iii tanks with the 37 millimeter campfire and cannone 36 tank gun were also almost useless against the t-34s german tank crews noted that their guns were effective at only short ranges aiming from the flank or rear and getting a direct hit as perpendicular to armored plates as possible being leaders in using sloped armor the soviets used the design on almost all of their tanks including the t-60 t70 and later the is-2 and is-3 heavy tanks the success of the soviet sloped armor design impressed the germans who had their first experience in dealing with the now often feared t-34 their most powerful tank the tiger one had an entire body work composed of flat welded armor plates however the german engineers realizing the effectiveness of sloped armor implemented a completely different design on its successor the tiger ii it had a home made of sloped armor plates and a rounded turret the lessons they learned about sloped armors in the first years of the war on the eastern front the germans applied to other tank designs most notably on the tank destroyers jak panther and jagged panzer 38t hetzer the allies too used slope armors in their armored vehicle designs angled armored plates were used on shermans m10 tank destroyers and the majority of the armored cars and troop carriers as the war went on the sloped armor began losing its advantages primarily due to improved large caliber anti-tank guns for example the german 75 millimeter pac-40 anti-tank gun and tiger's 88 millimeter guns could penetrate t-34's frontal turret at ranges of 3 900 feet or 1200 meters at practically any angle by the end of the war it became evident that sloped armors were becoming obsolete especially when new types of anti-tank rounds entered the scene rounds with shaped charges and especially the high explosive anti-tank rounds could relatively easily penetrate steel armor plates regardless of the thickness and angle the development of these rounds revolutionized anti-tank warfare tanks became vulnerable to new weapons that an infantryman could carry rather than fixed weapons requiring a crew to operate the basic principle of increasing the protection of the armor by inclining it was now no longer enough those designing the next generation tanks had to develop or refer to new materials that could withstand the impact of high explosive rounds this led to the introduction of new types of armor such as ceramic armors composite armors and reactive armors many of which are still used in modern tank designs [Music] [Applause] you

Channel: Simple History

Views: 3,186,253

Keywords: simple history, animated history, educational, education, sloped, armor, technique, tank, spg, armor protection, anti-tank, kinetic, shell, thickness, rha, t-34, sherman, tiger, tiger 2, panther, wwii, wwi, leonardo da vinci, Schneider, CA1, warfare, rpg, panzerfaust, cumulative, armored car

Id: CslIZBTYQ4U

Length: 11min 23sec (683 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 21 2022