"Myths about the Sherman real or not. " Topic

Truth vs fact about the Sherman. Interesting…

YouTube link

Amicalement
Armand

My favorite part was when you take the slope of the Shermans front hull it is almost the same thickness as a Tiger.

IMHO the Serman gets a bad rap.

A blast from the past!
TMP link

My favorite fact about the Sherman. At least one (more?) Russian Guards Tank Brigade had it's T34/85s replaced by Shermans. I suspect it was due to the reliability of the Sherman compared to the T34s. If you breakthrough you do not want to leave most of your tanks broken down along the road.

It's too bad that the 76mm turrets for the Sherman could have not been put into production sooner and sent to Europe as an upgrade kit for the Sherman 75s. Not needed in the Pacific Theater.

Not much there that is quite as revolutionary as he would like to think….most of that has been raised over the years on these very forums.

I have it queued up to watch… Thank you

Chirstot is right however still a very good presentation and excellent summary, especially for those who have not seen some of this. Since a talk it is perfect for putting on while painting up some miniatures.

That was excellent information and consistent with what we've found while researching our next release. Thanks for posting!

Nearly every myth in that video has been codified in countless wargames, including many of the most widely played games today.

The differences between various tanks has been magnified by Hollywood and Gamer Convnetional Wisdom. But as the video states, tactics and "who fires first" was at least as important.

"Laser Beam 17 pdrs" and "Indestructible Tigers" are part and parcel of most games. We just haven't hard found any evidence to support such myths.

All of which makes for more entertaining games. If the meta allows one player to utterly negate an opposing player's gear there's no reason to play the game. Finer shades of gray provide more interesting tactical challenges when your tank's armor isn't automatically impervious to everything on the battlefield or your gun doesn't automatically brew up every target.

Happy you enjoyed it boys!. (smile)

Amicalement
Armand

I don't know what games you're playing, but in no game I've played are Tigers indestructible or 17pdrs like laser-beams.

"One "Myth" about the Sherman is its reputation for mechanical reliability. And while it's true that it was very reliable in comparison to OTHER TANKS, it still wasn't all that reliable. I was reading about how an American armored division was pulled out of the line and shifted a couple of hundred miles to another part of the front and over half its Shermans broke down on the way.

Yet the Shermans of 7th, 11th, Guards, 1st Polish and 4th Canadian Armoured Divisions (as well as 4th, 8th, 30th, 33rd and 2nd Canadian Armoured Brigades) managed to charge across France and Belgium with relatively few mechanical issues and after a few days' consolidation were back to full strength…

Don't underestimate the mystical power of the REME in such a feat, wielding lump hammers with the skill of a surgeon's scalpel ;>

The myth about the Germans being afraid of Patton when in fact they hadn't heard of him was a good one too!
My great uncle was in REME and was a great fund of info on the various allied equipment. Bottom line most of it wasn't that reliable. Sherman better than most. Even soft skins broke down with monotonous regularity. The sort of reliability we take for granted with modern cars didn't exist during WW2.

Id say most of that was new for me, I enjoyed it :)

Happy for that my friend!. (smile)

Amicalement
Armand

Mostly rubish. I think most know that the "cute" names for allied tanks were rarely used (except Honey which Robert Crisp of Brazen Chariots came up with). A good short hand is M4/7.5 & M4/7.6L for "Shermans" and M10/7.6L & M10/7.6XL for tank destroyers.

As for armor, he seems to have discovered "slope". WoW. He considers only the M4 hull not turret and yes M4's had about 80-90mm of effective armor better than a PzIV with 50-80mm of frontal armor but not as good as a Tiger I with 110mm of frontal armor. So lets call em PzIV Medium, M4 Medium(+) and Tiger/8.8L Heavy(-). M4 had good armor for a medium but its not the same as a Tiger.

The M4 problem is the 7.5L38. And here the guy really goes off. No a US 7.6L48 is not as good as a 7.6L55 (17pder). He's using accuracy tests for Discarding Sabot not normal ammo. Easy Discarding Sabot had some wobble problems at range (latter fixed). Its not reflective of the weapons accuracy. On June 14,44 Wilfred Harris knocked out 5 Panthers at 800m with 5 rounds from a 17pder. It took gunner Elkins 4 rounds to knock out 3 Tigers. A very accurate weapon though hampered by back blast in dry conditions. But the US 7.6 was even worse as the initial batch did not have muzzle breaks.

His penetration data is also skewed. His comparing the penetration numbers of the US 7.6 using HVAP to the 17pders normal ammor stats – apples and oranges. HVAP rounds are very rare maybe 3 per tank in '45. The normal 17pder rounds are much better than the normal US 7.6 and can punch a Panther or Tiger (very dicey for a US 7.6). The Brits had to cram into a normal M4 turret – not perfect but they managed it while the US redesigned the M4 turret to take the inferior US 7.6. Brits recognized need for better AT weapon and did what had to be done – thank goodness they didn't listen to this guy.

He greatly exaggerates both German initial numbers and losses at Arracourt. Nor does this battle prove the M4 was better than a Panther – only that better crew qualtiy is more important than technical matters. He also only considers US M4s v. Tigers in his claim that it only happened three times – he ignores the Brits who faced Tigers in Normandy – sparing the US from having to do so. You need to consider all match ups of M4s v. Tigers – not just the US ones to evaluate there relative merits.

Tigers are nearly invunerable barring critical hits from US 7.5 and USSR 7.6. But by 44 this begins to change – in large part thanks to the UK 17pder!

The Mustang was a marraige between a US plane and a UK engine. Too bad US ordinance could not have been convinced to marry the M4 with a new turret designed to take the 17pder.

TomT

The APDS point is well made. Only 3% of rounds produced in '44 were APDS. The standard APCBC had as good armour penetration as the US 76mm HVAP.

Anyone interested in an impartial account of the Sherman tank as a weapon in the tank-versus-tank role should read the official WW2 history of the US Ordnance Department, "On Beachhead and Battlefront" (freely available on the web). I am fascinated by the way in which certain Sherman aficionados are ever so anxious to point out Arracourt as a confirmation of the Sherman's supposed prowess versus the big German tanks, but these folks never seem to discuss its performance, for example, in the 1945 Battle of Puffendorf on the Roer Plain.

Don't get me wrong. The Sherman had many merits as a weapon of war – just not remotely in the anti-armor role.

B