"Early war anti-tank rifles" Topic

Specifically thinking of Finland's Winter War, so Boys ATR v say a T26 or T28.

What kind of damage could they do?
I presume you could do some sort of mobility kill, like maybe from an engine shot, or maybe take out a crewman or something.
Perhaps something like this (though I presume this si from an anrti-tank gun)
link

I can't imagine an ATR would cause a tank to "brew up" or catch fire like a Molotov Cocktail would.
How does your favorite rule handle ATR v early tanks?

If you strike any ammunition or perforate a fuel line or tank there's every chance the tank will brew up.

It seems that the drivers were a preferred target for ATRs.
A 50 caliber or similar round could do some damage.

Billy
Based upon some training videos I saw in my law enforcement career, I thought it was really hard to ignite fuel by small arms fire. I have seen many videos where hand guns striking fuel tanks don't do anything.
Was the ammo different? Maybe the caliber makes a difference?

Yes, the ammunition was quite a bit more powerful than pistol, or even rifle, rounds. The Boys fired a 735 grain projectile at 2450 fps and could penetrate nearly an inch of armor at 100 yards.

rmaker,
Understand. But would it ignite fuel like an HE round?

The 14.5-mm Soviet atk rifle round had an incendiary tip, with the aim of trying to cause a fire in fuel or amn. As far as I know, the .55-inch and 7.92-mm British and German equivalents did not have such a feature.

Gary

Your presumption is correct; the idea was to kill/disable crew or immobilize the vehicle. The training manual for the Boys explicitly states this and even notes that it is unlikely to seriously damage an enemy vehicle.

Looking at 1939-40 contemporaries, the round for the German PzB 38 and 39 originally had a tiny vial of tear gas, with the intention being that the round would penetrate the crew compartment and, in addition to any casualties from ricochet, spalling, and fragmentation, the gas would force the crew to abandon the vehicle. The Polish wz.35 didn't even use a penetrator, but instead flattened on impact and allowed the kinetic energy to punch a hole or, failing that, create spalling on the interior face. Neither of these would be as effective as a solid penetrator at damaging an engine, transmission, or track link, but that points to how they were intended to be used, e.g., defending from a frontal attack.

The main task of the antitank rifle is to stop the tank. Not to destroy it.
Soviet instructions for antitank rifles recommend firing at a tank from several antitank rifles simultaneously, from different directions. Fire is fired head-on at the observation devices; if the tank hits an obstacle, it is fired at the bottom, at the cannon and machine guns. Under the turret ring in order to jam it. It is preferable to fire at the side or rear, trying to hit the engine, chassis elements, fuel tanks.
The superiority of the antitank rifle over the antitank artillery gun is its low visibility and high maneuverability. It is difficult for a tank to detect and hit such an enemy, located in cover. Without infantry support, the antitank rifle can cause a lot of trouble for tankers, especially if the defensive line is significantly saturated with this weapon.

Former Wehrmacht Lieutenant General E. Schneider wrote: "In 1941, the Russians had a 14.5 mm antitank rifle… which caused a lot of trouble for our tanks and the light armored personnel carriers that appeared later."

Former Major General F. von Mellenthin noted: "It seemed that every infantryman had an anti-tank rifle or anti-tank gun. The Russians were very clever in disposing of these funds and, it seems, there was no place where they were not found."

Generally it took multiple penetrating hits from ATRs to disable a vehicle as the individual rounds are so much smaller than a normal AT round.

Interestingly, in the recently re worked WRG 1925 to 50 rules, even if an ATR notionally penetrates a target, it still needs to roll a 6 to actually knock it out.

It's like killing your opponent in hand-to-hand combat with a thin knitting needle. In any case, you need a lot of luck and, most likely, a lot of attempts.
So yes – it's rare.

From the memoirs of an anti-tank gunner:

First battle:

- And then their tanks came at us. Not many. Only six of them. One per "angler" – nothing! We'll cope! We move our "fishing rods", choosing the moment to shoot. We divided the targets, as agreed…
There was only one tank per gun. And not some "tigers", but ordinary T-III and "Pragues"… We fired from three hundred (meters), as we were taught, and after each shot we were sure that the tank was kaput. But it kept going and moving and had no idea that it was kaput, only sweeping the terrain with machine guns. After the tenth shot, I even started to pray to myself that at least one would catch fire, and they were as if charmed. What's the matter? They completely destroyed us then. And the whole battalion would have been finished if we had escaped. But then the help we were waiting for arrived. They pushed the Fritz back to the starting points. How many of their tanks did we burn, you ask? We burned one. Not enough? Yes, I thought it was a blessing. I got my first "Courage" (medal "For Courage") for it. Am I the only one who knocked him down? Who knows now, maybe I did. I shot at it too. But there was no one else to receive the medal except me. All the other armor-piercing men were either killed or seriously wounded.

- And then we studied. Yes… While we were marching to Stalingrad, we were learning all the time. Eight defensive battles, and after each battle, the armor-piercing soldiers were written off. But God had mercy on me. Three tanks were credited to me. Moreover, Makarenko and I captured two tanks and they were almost serviceable. Italian tanks. And the macaroni (Italians) are weak warriors. A correspondent from Moscow snapped us for Krasnaya Zvezda (an army newspaper) against the background of a tank. Here's a photo for you to prove it. So, somewhere around winter, we learned to hit them with "fishing rods." Not only us. The infantry Vanyas learned too. With grenades. But it was more difficult for them than for us.

– Armor penetration? Do you know what this is? Or do you, like your theoretical friends, think that to destroy a tank, it is enough to drill a hole in its side? So what if it has a hole? It is not a ship and will not go to the bottom because of it. It fought without a hole, and it will continue to fight with a hole. Who among the crew would catch a runny nose from a draft… Yes… The tank also needs to either break some mechanism behind the armor, or injure the crew, or best of all, set it on fire, damn it! So you bite it with a "fishing rod" over and over again. Sometimes after a battle you count a dozen holes in it, and it still crawls along as if nothing happened, and does not think about burning. And then some reporter passes off these holes as a triumph of our weapons, and fairy tales for children appear about how our weapons are so powerful that they can easily turn a German tank into a sieve. And if it had caught fire after the first one, how many lives would have been saved? That's why I say that the best anti-tank rifle is an anti-tank gun. Or "farewell, Motherland" (45 mm), and even better "fifty-seven" (57 mm) or "seven-desat-six" (76 mm). Their projectile is more significant. It will penetrate the armor and drag along a cloud of shrapnel, or explosion gases. So it will break or set something on fire.

- And from the anti-tank rifle only point-blank and hit the chosen places … At the (fuel) tanks, for example. So those with stronger nerves let them in (closer). Then they hit where they needed to. In 1943 we had an armor-piercing gunner named Maxim Malov. About ten, or maybe twelve, tanks were registered for it. He was even nominated for the Hero title, but he punched some lieutenant in the face while drunk, and all his victories were taken away from him, his awards were taken away, and he was sent to a penal company. Yes… That's where he apparently died. Why am I talking about him? Well, the point is that he never opened fire on tanks further than 100 meters away. And only on the sides, at the gas tank; or along the crowns of the drive wheel. And not at the tracks, as your "club" (military history enthusiasts' club) teach. He carried around a whole pack of leaflets on how to destroy German tanks, and he drew the diagrams himself. He practiced on knocked-out tanks. Oh, it's not that easy – to hit the right spot on a moving tank with an open sight, and not even with a rigid gun mount, but with a bipod!

link

According to statistics, it took about 15 shots to stop a tank…

Video of a Soviet anti-tank rifle being tested against an armored personnel carrier. By the way, since 2014, these rifles have been actively used by rebels in Donbass to destroy light Ukrainian armored vehicles:

YouTube link

Turn on English subtitles.

As you can see in the video, a bullet from an anti-tank rifle hitting a gas tank causes a fire.

Thanks everyone

Some interesting reading Cuprum, thanks for that.

My father's unit thought the boys a heavy, awkward, shoulder bruising heap of junk.
They "lost" theirs and each replacement until they stopped coming.
They spent 1941 guarding Manchester airport rather than fighting Jerry. They might have had a different opinion if they'd faced pz2.
Then they joined the chindits so not so much armour there either.

I would think that an AT rifle round smashing through the armor would encourage the crew to bail out, even if it didn't much damage the tank.

Shooting at the M113 from the PTRS anti-tank rifle. Alas – only in Russian. But there is a view inside the combat vehicle when it is hit by a bullet.

link

And at the same time – shelling of the same M113 from DShK and Browning M2:

link