Comets instead of Shermans.

WI the Comet tank prototype was ready by November 1943 (instead of Feb '44) and was ready for service by March 1944. The first tanks are equipping the 11th Armoured division by May.

By D-Day the British Second army has some Comets (not many yet) and fewer Shermans.

How does this affect the Normandy campaign? Did the poor quality of tanks fielded by the Western Allies make a lot of difference in the end?

IMO it would have been a big morale boost to the frontline units to know that they had a tank that could deal with the Germans on more or less equal terms. It may even have led to a breakthrough earlier in Normandy and maybe a slightly shorter war.

Part of the problem with Normany is it's not tank country, with engagements occurring at brutally close ranges. It might make the post breakout stage of the battle faster but it doesn't really seem likely to help with the hedgerows much.

Agreed, what was needed in Normandy was someone to realise that the bocage made for a perfect killing ground and then to insist on more Rhino bulldozer equipped tanks to smash through the hedges and flush the Germans out. Once the Aliies breakout their superior numbers and airpower will be decisive, having a better tank will certainly help matters though.

Sounds like a job for Percy Hobart.

Plus I don't really see how they can speed up the Comet that much. It was already a very high priority project and the British had learned lessons about rushing tank design and testing earlier in the war with the Crusader, Cavalier and especially Covenanter. They were not going to make that mistake again they took the time to make sure the Comet was right and it showed.

They might (maybe possibly) have pulled the date for in full service with armored divisions in from Late November/Early December 1944 to September/October by changing priories of production, and we don't know enough about what the offsetting losses would have been. I looked online briefly but could not find any documentation about what factory or materials the Comet used. I can guess that it would have impacted Sherman Firefly production since they used the same gun, it is possible that it would have impacted Cromwell production leaving a gap, it is also possible that it would have impacted Aircraft production if the limit was high performance engines, or ship production if the limit was steel. Basically we can guess but it would be fairly hard to cut as much time off of a major project even in peace time as you are suggesting, in war time when there is not the slack in the economy to let resources move around to accelerate the project it becomes that much harder.

Tom.

The problem with the Comet is that it's a great tank for 1942, but by 1944 it's outclassed. It has decent mobility and armor, although the decision not to slope it was idiotic, but the gun (the 77mm) is inferior to the 17pdr, the US 76mm, and the German 75mm (both L48 and L71).

What the British should have done is step up 17pdr production and stick one in every Sherman they could lay hands on. That gives them massive numbers of a tank with good reliability, good mobility, adequate armor, and a gun that can take on anything except a Konigstiger nose to nose.

If they want something better than a Sherman they need a bigger tank. Start with something the size of the Panther (about 45 tons), put a better engine in it, mount a 90mm or 3.7" gun on it, and now you have a definite contender. It won't be ready for production until late 1944, but when it shows up it will be more than welcome.

dgharis said:

The problem with the Comet is that it's a great tank for 1942, but by 1944 it's outclassed. It has decent mobility and armor, although the decision not to slope it was idiotic, but the gun (the 77mm) is inferior to the 17pdr, the US 76mm, and the German 75mm (both L48 and L71).

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I don't think the Comet was outclassed at all in 1944. Maybe you are thinking of the Cromwell.

dgharis said:

but the gun (the 77mm) is inferior to the 17pdr, the US 76mm, and the German 75mm (both L48 and L71).

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The 77mm was at least the equal of the US 76mm if not slightly superior. It was better than the L48 but obviously could only compete with the L71 by using APDS projectiles.

According to my ref. (which is quite basic, and decades old), the Comet design by Leyland Motors didn't start till July '43. This desgin of a new 'heavy cruiser' to be armed with a new gun - a shorter version of the 17 pdr. First tested in Feb '44, with deliveries starting from Sept '44. It wasn't until after the Rhine crossing in early '45 that the Comet saw action. Proving at last to be a successful British tank, being both fast and having a highly accurate gun.

But why, July '43? Why wait for 'battle experience'? Surely, decripts from enigma etc., would reveal German tank developments - if even by the requests if certain bridges in Italy can tan 50 ton tanks! So the arrival of the Tiger in North Africa should have straight away set things in motion. Which gives us about six months, maybe nine with intel luck!! Hence, IMHO D-Day seems pushing it but, a month or two later could be doable.
But just to make it interesting, let's have the Black Prince to go with it (with a Meteor engine) - to replace/augment the Churchill.

Devolved said:

I don't think the Comet was outclassed at all in 1944. Maybe you are thinking of the Cromwell.

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Mea culpa; you are right.

merlin said:

According to my ref. (which is quite basic, and decades old), the Comet design by Leyland Motors didn't start till July '43. This desgin of a new 'heavy cruiser' to be armed with a new gun - a shorter version of the 17 pdr. First tested in Feb '44, with deliveries starting from Sept '44. It wasn't until after the Rhine crossing in early '45 that the Comet saw action. Proving at last to be a successful British tank, being both fast and having a highly accurate gun.

But why, July '43? Why wait for 'battle experience'? Surely, decripts from enigma etc., would reveal German tank developments - if even by the requests if certain bridges in Italy can tan 50 ton tanks! So the arrival of the Tiger in North Africa should have straight away set things in motion. Which gives us about six months, maybe nine with intel luck!! Hence, IMHO D-Day seems pushing it but, a month or two later could be doable.
But just to make it interesting, let's have the Black Prince to go with it (with a Meteor engine) - to replace/augment the Churchill.

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The Comet was in essence a product improved Cromwell. That they took the troble to redesign the 17pdr to make it it fit, no only shortenning the barrel but critically going to the trouble of designing a shorter round to reduce the recoil forces show how much of a compromisse it was. If they had been lucid enough to antecipate the needs of the 44 battlefields in late 42 they could have just gone on to the Centurion, wich is a "clean sheet of paper" aproach to the Cromwell replacement requirement and was developed in paralel with the Comet...

If you bring the Comet forward by a year you may as well have a different tank with the same name. This is because the only plausible way to do so would be to accelerate the development of its predecessor, (the Comet was a 1943 design for a 1941 specification).

The Cromwell has a long and convoluted history, starting with specifications drawn up in mid 1940 (the unsucessful Cavalier). This suffered from an underpowered engine and led to two sucessor projects a about 6 months later, the Centaur (which I think used the same or similar engine to the Cavalier) and the Cromwell.

The big stumbling block was that it was impossible to get the production facilities up and running any earlier, the solution therefore to provide a different engine. Around this time there were proposals to use a derated Perigrine engine (as was used on the Whirlwind) but this did not meet up to the desired power specifications.

I can only see one way of doing this.

Leyland is persuaded to adopt the Peregrine its 1941 specification as a stopgap engine without even considering the liberty, this could bring production of a Peregrine engined Centaur forward to say September, the month the first shermans enter British service. Even now we can see butterflies inthe Comet's design.

The Centaur has better armour than the Sherman but the Sherman has a better gun against soft targets (the 6 pdr with the later types of ammo iirc had similar anti tank performance to the Sherman's 75mm but obviously sufferred in range). Given its late entry the Centaur may be regarded as a failure to be learned from ITTL. This may butterfly away the conversion of the 6 pounder for 75mm ammo.

Earlier service entry for the Centaur means more time to revise the design for the Comet. It was originally inteneded that this tank be equipped with a Long Barrel High Velocity 75mm gun, but its turret ring was too small. An extra 3 or 4 months design revisions might result in a very different tank, at the minimum TTL's Comet would have the gun that was originally intended for it, at least initially with a larger turret, there might be more room for a Firefly style modification of the 17pdr's breech, meaning that the later Mark II comets would be equipped with this gun instead. An extra 3 or 4 months might even lead to the incorporation of sloped armour into the design.

Charioter

Earlier service entry for the Centaur means more time to revise the design for the Comet. It was originally inteneded that this tank be equipped with a Long Barrel High Velocity 75mm gun, but its turret ring was too small. An extra 3 or 4 months design revisions might result in a very different tank, at the minimum TTL's Comet would have the gun that was originally intended for it, at least initially with a larger turret, there might be more room for a Firefly style modification of the 17pdr's breech, meaning that the later Mark II comets would be equipped with this gun instead. An extra 3 or 4 months might even lead to the incorporation of sloped armour into the design.[/QUOTE]

Surprisingly, after having failed to fit a powerfull enough gun to the Centaur/Cromwell series, the British managed to convert a number after the war to take the 20pdr from the centurion creating the Charioter. If only they had done it earlier...

AdA said:

Surprisingly, after having failed to fit a powerfull enough gun to the Centaur/Cromwell series, the British managed to convert a number after the war to take the 20pdr from the centurion creating the Charioter. If only they had done it earlier...

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The Charioteer wasnt a tank it was a sort of mongrel lash up self propelled anti tank gun. The only way they got the QF 20 pounder (83mm) gun in was by only having a 2 man turret crew, no power traverse and hardly any armour. The commander had to load not something easy to do on the move with the 20 pounder round and do all the jobs a commander has to do. It was an ambush shoot and scoot vehicle that wouldnt have lasted 5 minutes as a tank in WWII.

The german huge heavy tanks were too expensive make enough. The Sherman became ubiquitous. Also, the Shermans fit the roads, were easy to service and didn't guzzle so much gas.

The fuel consumption on the tigers, especially given German resources on Gasoline, were an achilles leg.

I usually hate correcting small things like this, but since I'm in a foul mood, I feel obligated to say that the correct term is "Achilles' heel" rather than leg.

A bit of exaggeration on my part. If it were just the heel! You are right, it sounds wrong.

Basic point is that tanks have to be mobile, and the Tigers were too thirsty to be very mobile.

shoot and scoot is better than shoot and bounce...

fastmongrel said:

The Charioteer wasnt a tank it was a sort of mongrel lash up self propelled anti tank gun. The only way they got the QF 20 pounder (83mm) gun in was by only having a 2 man turret crew, no power traverse and hardly any armour. The commander had to load not something easy to do on the move with the 20 pounder round and do all the jobs a commander has to do. It was an ambush shoot and scoot vehicle that wouldnt have lasted 5 minutes as a tank in WWII.

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It would still be a useful tankdestroyer, with a 17pdr, of course, the 20pdr not being ready in 44.
I never said it was a MBT...
How many Cromwells lasted more than 5 minutes in Tank vs tank engaments with german heavies anyway? Villers Bocage comes to mind...
If they just wanted infantary support tanks they could have just sent Chuchills

AdA said:

It would still be a useful tankdestroyer, with a 17pdr, of course, the 20pdr not being ready in 44.
I never said it was a MBT...
How many Cromwells lasted more than 5 minutes in Tank vs tank engaments with german heavies anyway? Villers Bocage comes to mind...
If they just wanted infantary support tanks they could have just sent Chuchills

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I was thinking of Villers Bocage when I posted the thread but my title was Comets instead of Shermans not instead of Cromwells.

If Michael Wittman ran into comets he would have been killed and the British would have secured Villers bocage and may have taken Caen the next day. Perhaps you would have seen a breakout fom Normandy by early July.

Comets

Agreed on the Comet having been useful had it been in Normandy. I just talked about normandy to make a case for the uselfulness of Tank destroyers, even when they are a bit compromised. Had the Brits designed a good tank in 1942, and built it in 43/44, they need't be dependent on Tank destroyers. There is no real technologicall limit that has to be bent severely to prevent the Centurion being built in that time frame, it's about as advanced as a Panther. The smart thing would be to drop the Centaur/Cromwell/Comet line all together, relly on Shermans for 43 and start a clean sheet of paper design(the Centurion) earlier.
The Charioteer was a compromise, but if you had to stand against a Tiger, would you rather be on a Cromwell with a useless (against a Tiger) gun? But that was a reply to another post and not to your original point.