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Tanks on Safehold

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Re: Tanks on Safehold
Post by Silverwall   » Sun Mar 07, 2021 12:45 am

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Erls wrote:Also, one point I may have forgotten to mention... Think of Tanks as yet another technology demonstrator. If Charis builds a 20 ton tank with a 4 inch breechloader that is protected against anything smaller than a 3 inch cannon - that can also travel at 25 miles an hour - everyone else is going to want one. And you cannot make said 20 ton tank without a robust industrial base as well as a solid grasp of steam and/or diesel.

It would be, along with their oil-powered cruisers, the biggest reasons why the rest of Safehold will embrace petroleum.


You do realise that we can't build a tank to that spec now right? 3" cannon = 75mm and 4" =100mm the closest we have to such a tank now would be the T54/55 series built in the mid 50s and they weigh 35+tons
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Re: Tanks on Safehold
Post by Louis R   » Sun Mar 07, 2021 4:14 pm

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Actually, I suspect that we _could_ come pretty close to that spec now - weapons, armour and drive-train components can all be made much lighter than was feasible in 1955 - although I think 20T would be pushing the envelope really, really hard. Mind you, nobody would want to given that the smallest weapons it would have to face are 105mm, with 120 & 155mm awfully common.

Given the composite materials that would be needed, of course, I'd agree that you are entirely correct in saying it's beyond the capability of anybody on Safehold.


Silverwall wrote:
Erls wrote:Also, one point I may have forgotten to mention... Think of Tanks as yet another technology demonstrator. If Charis builds a 20 ton tank with a 4 inch breechloader that is protected against anything smaller than a 3 inch cannon - that can also travel at 25 miles an hour - everyone else is going to want one. And you cannot make said 20 ton tank without a robust industrial base as well as a solid grasp of steam and/or diesel.

It would be, along with their oil-powered cruisers, the biggest reasons why the rest of Safehold will embrace petroleum.


You do realise that we can't build a tank to that spec now right? 3" cannon = 75mm and 4" =100mm the closest we have to such a tank now would be the T54/55 series built in the mid 50s and they weigh 35+tons
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Re: Tanks on Safehold
Post by Erls   » Sun Mar 07, 2021 9:59 pm

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Ok, so I was off on the tonnage.

My basic point remains, however. A tank with 2" steel plating and even a 2" gun that can travel at 10 MPH for 150 miles would be a fantastic technology demonstrator.

It would serve a functional and unique role in offensive combat. With no other nation having anything similar in their order of battle, all the tank has to do is traverse trenches and defeat small arms.
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Re: Tanks on Safehold
Post by Brigade XO   » Mon Mar 08, 2021 6:59 pm

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If you want to get more performance/defense out of the tanks, try putting more slope to the armor. Early tanks, heck, most tanks, have mostly been a lot of flat surfaces which depended on thickness of iron/steel to defeat things fired at them. If you can get a projectile to ricochet off the turret and/or front slope or side of the vehicle you are going to be able to survive a lot more things. Not as it they are going to (yet) have to deal with various armor penetrating explosive shells but you get the idea.
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Re: Tanks on Safehold
Post by Dilandu   » Wed Mar 10, 2021 2:07 pm

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Erls wrote:Also, one point I may have forgotten to mention... Think of Tanks as yet another technology demonstrator. If Charis builds a 20 ton tank with a 4 inch breechloader that is protected against anything smaller than a 3 inch cannon - that can also travel at 25 miles an hour - everyone else is going to want one. And you cannot make said 20 ton tank without a robust industrial base as well as a solid grasp of steam and/or diesel.

It would be, along with their oil-powered cruisers, the biggest reasons why the rest of Safehold will embrace petroleum.


Please, stop giving RFC ideas how to make battles even more boring than they are now.
------------------------------

Oh well, if shortening the front is what the Germans crave,
Let's shorten it to very end - the length of Fuhrer's grave.

(Red Army lyrics from 1945)
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Re: Tanks on Safehold
Post by Hildum   » Sun Mar 21, 2021 11:08 pm

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mhicks wrote:The thing that limited the size of Tanks on earth was the with of the standard size of railroad track/cars. With the standard size of rail being set by the standard size of horse drawn carriages... Earth set the size to be the width of two horses side by side. But what about the distance between two Draft Lizards pulling a cart being set as the width of the Safehold rails? tanks are going to be MASIVE!


While this is a common myth, in fact there are many different rail gauges, none of which are particularly related to the width of a horse (or two).
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Re: Tanks on Safehold
Post by Hildum   » Sun Mar 21, 2021 11:12 pm

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Erls wrote:
mhicks wrote:The thing that limited the size of Tanks on earth was the with of the standard size of railroad track/cars. With the standard size of rail being set by the standard size of horse drawn carriages... Earth set the size to be the width of two horses side by side. But what about the distance between two Draft Lizards pulling a cart being set as the width of the Safehold rails? tanks are going to be MASIVE!


Do we know what gauge Charis has gone with for their railroads? I would assume that Siddarmark and the United Provinces, at least, followed suit - although maybe Siddarmark went narrower due to concerns about their mountain passes? And did Dohlar follow Charis' lead or go with their own gauge?


Wouldn’t canal transport be more practical at first?
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Re: Tanks on Safehold
Post by Silverwall   » Thu Apr 01, 2021 3:16 am

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Hildum wrote:
mhicks wrote:The thing that limited the size of Tanks on earth was the with of the standard size of railroad track/cars. With the standard size of rail being set by the standard size of horse drawn carriages... Earth set the size to be the width of two horses side by side. But what about the distance between two Draft Lizards pulling a cart being set as the width of the Safehold rails? tanks are going to be MASIVE!


While this is a common myth, in fact there are many different rail gauges, none of which are particularly related to the width of a horse (or two).


While rail logistics did limit tank development it was only really a factor by late WW2. The real limit on the size of a tank is the power generation of primitive engines coupled with a quirk of tank track design that means that there are only a small range of width to length ratios that are steerable. overly long tracks for the width between them warp and tear too much. In fact on a safehold scale the low life expectancy of the track is likely to be the real limiting factor.
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