Keynes' Cruisers

[RyderWest]

It didn't exactly die, I just ran out of stuff to sink...

Seriously, the last bit of a victorious war is a pain to write, and it was a story about navies.

What point did you get up to in that TL?

Last point I knew, it was when Kondo was killed...

 

[Ramp-Rat]

In my time in the green machine it was Button but different armies, different descriptors.
But am I right in saying you agree with my solution, forced on me by many a superior officer?

Absolutely old dear, but I do believe we are showing our decrepitude, don’t think vehicles are fitted with distributors or starting handles anymore, it’s all computer driven now. As for crash boxes, and doubling the clutch, long lost, and not missed skills. Nor is the lack of power assisted steering, you needed strong arms back in the day to punch a big rig. Well first day off, and off to meet up with another old bugger for a pie and a pint, pip pip.

RR.

 

[Zheng He]

Absolutely old dear, but I do believe we are showing our decrepitude, don’t think vehicles are fitted with distributors or starting handles anymore, it’s all computer driven now. As for crash boxes, and doubling the clutch, long lost, and not missed skills. Nor is the lack of power assisted steering, you needed strong arms back in the day to punch a big rig. Well first day off, and off to meet up with another old bugger for a pie and a pint, pip pip.

RR.

It's not even 0800 hours where I live and a pint sure sounds good. There is a brewery not far from me that is selling $1 drafts today. The only problem is that it is Black Friday and that shopping center is going to be a zoo.

 

[Zheng He]

Transport.


The Japanese are short of transport, they were IOTL even before the outbreak of war, and they are ITTL, only more so. The recent events at sea, has deprived the Japanese of a number of vitality needed transport ships, ships that can not be replaced quickly, as there are none to spare locally. The ships lost, were carrying much needed motor vehicles, vehicles that are going to be even harder than the shipping to replace.


They are at present in Northern Malaysia, which at this time is a very underdeveloped area, poor roads and little motor transport. Montgomery for all his faults isn’t going to allow large numbers of trucks to be left operational for the Japanese to use. Nor will he permit, local coastal shipping to be left for Japanese use. It’s no use some local government official bleating about this, private property, upsetting the locals, Monty says sink/burn it now, leave them a desert. There is one type of transport that initially the Japanese will get hold of, as they did IOTL, bicycles, the ubiquitous transport of the poor. That is until Monty realises what’s happening, then bang go the locals bicycles, which are very easy to put out of action.


For historical reasons the Japanese had problems with animal draft transport, and made very poor use of it. During the Samurai era, the peasants were not permitted to own horses, or operate wheeled vehicles. Japanese were notorious for their poor treatment of draft animals, and frequently overworked them, miss treated them. The Japanese for all the ingenuity, have very few troops with any experience with motor vehicles, and in most cases if presented with a stalled truck at the side of the road, couldn’t get it going again.


Unlike the British, even more so the Americans, they will not have the guy who can drive and follow through the logical steps to get a truck going again.


Step one, walk around and look for any obvious signs of why it’s been left here, and is not running. If there are no obvious signs, and it doesn’t look to be bobby trapped, get in the cab and try to start it. OK, where’s the key, and how do you start this type of truck, no key, can you hot wire a truck, if not bugged. OK, the key is in it, turn key, nothing happens, right does this vehicle have a separate starter button and where is it. Found it, but still nothing no lights nothing, check the battery, does it still have one. The list of basic checks is long, but most British platoons, all American, will have someone who can do this, and instinctively, the Japanese will be lucky to have one man in a company who can.


So you finally have a runner, it’s got enough oil, water and fuel, now you have to drive it, chances are that the bloke who gets it going, is the only one who can drive. And there is no way that he can quickly teach anyone else how to, driving a modern motor vehicle isn’t easy, but a 1940’s truck, dream on. You haven’t forgotten the major fly in the ointment have you, yes you did, I bet you did, it’s fitted with a crash box. What’s a crash box RR, it’s a gearbox with no synchromesh, you have to double the gears up and down. I was taught to drive such vehicles a long time ago, diesels though not petrol, and I would struggle to drive one now. None of this will be helped by having some incoherent with rage Japanese officer screaming in your ear, and slapping you to get it going, NOW.


How to disable a 1940’s truck, without resorting to explosives, and only the tools on the vehicle. First off all look to see what you have, five minutes spent looking, is really going to help you a lot. If you have the time, jack her up and remove the tyres from the wheels plus the spare and any inner-tubes, next start the engine, sticking a wedge on the throttle, remove oil drain plug and catch the oil if you can in a receptacle. Once the engine seises, stick the tyres underneath and drop the truck on them, punch holes into fuel tank to drain onto tyres, add saved oil and a match. Try getting that going again, all it’s good for is scrap.


RR.

This is one of those interesting little details of WW2 that I read about years ago. Because car culture was already taking over the US, most young men coming into the US military at that time came from families that owned a car and this was at a time when most people did at least the basic maintenance on their own so you had a lot of guys who had mechanical knowledge so they could help with basic maintenance and for the ones who were going to be actual maintainers, it was a lot easier to train them to fix things - trucks, tanks, jeeps, or airplanes whatever.

 

[Incognitia]

Can't believe it was *that* hard to learn to drive a 40s truck.
My grandmother learnt to drive by the simple expedient of her WRNS superior officer telling her she was assigned to drive a lorry. There were a lot of gear crashes and a learning curve, but she learned without any formal lessons (ever - she was handed a civvie driving licence when she demobbed).

 

[Astrodragon]

What point did you get up to in that TL?

Last point I knew, it was when Kondo was killed...

It got up to savaging the IJN and the Allies in Sicily.
While the IJN was still going, it was rapidly becoming a set of aircraft targets as OTL 1944.

 

[Cryhavoc101]

Transport.


The Japanese are short of transport, they were IOTL even before the outbreak of war, and they are ITTL, only more so. The recent events at sea, has deprived the Japanese of a number of vitality needed transport ships, ships that can not be replaced quickly, as there are none to spare locally. The ships lost, were carrying much needed motor vehicles, vehicles that are going to be even harder than the shipping to replace.


They are at present in Northern Malaysia, which at this time is a very underdeveloped area, poor roads and little motor transport. Montgomery for all his faults isn’t going to allow large numbers of trucks to be left operational for the Japanese to use. Nor will he permit, local coastal shipping to be left for Japanese use. It’s no use some local government official bleating about this, private property, upsetting the locals, Monty says sink/burn it now, leave them a desert. There is one type of transport that initially the Japanese will get hold of, as they did IOTL, bicycles, the ubiquitous transport of the poor. That is until Monty realises what’s happening, then bang go the locals bicycles, which are very easy to put out of action.


For historical reasons the Japanese had problems with animal draft transport, and made very poor use of it. During the Samurai era, the peasants were not permitted to own horses, or operate wheeled vehicles. Japanese were notorious for their poor treatment of draft animals, and frequently overworked them, miss treated them. The Japanese for all the ingenuity, have very few troops with any experience with motor vehicles, and in most cases if presented with a stalled truck at the side of the road, couldn’t get it going again.


Unlike the British, even more so the Americans, they will not have the guy who can drive and follow through the logical steps to get a truck going again.


Step one, walk around and look for any obvious signs of why it’s been left here, and is not running. If there are no obvious signs, and it doesn’t look to be bobby trapped, get in the cab and try to start it. OK, where’s the key, and how do you start this type of truck, no key, can you hot wire a truck, if not bugged. OK, the key is in it, turn key, nothing happens, right does this vehicle have a separate starter button and where is it. Found it, but still nothing no lights nothing, check the battery, does it still have one. The list of basic checks is long, but most British platoons, all American, will have someone who can do this, and instinctively, the Japanese will be lucky to have one man in a company who can.


So you finally have a runner, it’s got enough oil, water and fuel, now you have to drive it, chances are that the bloke who gets it going, is the only one who can drive. And there is no way that he can quickly teach anyone else how to, driving a modern motor vehicle isn’t easy, but a 1940’s truck, dream on. You haven’t forgotten the major fly in the ointment have you, yes you did, I bet you did, it’s fitted with a crash box. What’s a crash box RR, it’s a gearbox with no synchromesh, you have to double the gears up and down. I was taught to drive such vehicles a long time ago, diesels though not petrol, and I would struggle to drive one now. None of this will be helped by having some incoherent with rage Japanese officer screaming in your ear, and slapping you to get it going, NOW.


How to disable a 1940’s truck, without resorting to explosives, and only the tools on the vehicle. First off all look to see what you have, five minutes spent looking, is really going to help you a lot. If you have the time, jack her up and remove the tyres from the wheels plus the spare and any inner-tubes, next start the engine, sticking a wedge on the throttle, remove oil drain plug and catch the oil if you can in a receptacle. Once the engine seises, stick the tyres underneath and drop the truck on them, punch holes into fuel tank to drain onto tyres, add saved oil and a match. Try getting that going again, all it’s good for is scrap.


RR.

And lets face it - by Nov 1941 the British army would have become Subject Matter Experts at disabling trucks before evacuating via the RN

 

[diesal]

It got up to savaging the IJN and the Allies in Sicily.
While the IJN was still going, it was rapidly becoming a set of aircraft targets as OTL 1944.

Have you ever considered just posting a pdf of the last book onto your site? Just it would make it easier than having to wade through the forum. It's always a problem with series that sometimes they just stop, I am a fan of a couple of sci fi and naval fiction series when this has happened. Julian Stockwin's Kydd series is on book 19, and still going well, what amazes me is that I read the first book when it was first published back in the 90's and he has been publishing one every year since then.

 

[Unknown]

And, even if the Japanese take Malaya (which is looking more doubtful), it'll delay the invasion of Burma, which will have knock-on effects on the Bengal famine, which will, in turn, have effects on the postwar development of Burma and India...

 

[torten]

How to disable a 1940’s truck, without resorting to explosives, and only the tools on the vehicle. First off all look to see what you have, five minutes spent looking, is really going to help you a lot. If you have the time, jack her up and remove the tyres from the wheels plus the spare and any inner-tubes, next start the engine, sticking a wedge on the throttle, remove oil drain plug and catch the oil if you can in a receptacle. Once the engine seises, stick the tyres underneath and drop the truck on them, punch holes into fuel tank to drain onto tyres, add saved oil and a match. Try getting that going again, all it’s good for is scrap.

Nah. Bayonet the tires with nice long cuts so they are very hard to fix. Anything else is a bonus.

 

[RyderWest]

Nah. Bayonet the tires with nice long cuts so they are very hard to fix. Anything else is a bonus.

At least they are doing it a slow carve, other than an American blast.

 

[Oldbill]

I don't think so. The 37mm PAK 36 weighed 327 kg; quickly relocating one by hand in the middle of a blizzard under fire? Besides which, it was impotent against T-34s; the German troops called it "the Army door-knocker", because it made noise with no effect.

The 5 cm Pak 38 was more effective, but weighed 830 kg.

I disagree. This is not impossible at all, but dependent upon things not written, therefore unknown. Are they being shot at directly, or simply having shots fired in their general direction? What is the terrain, flat, going up or down hill? How much concealment is available? The weight of 327kg is a lot when you have to pick it up and move it, not a hell of a lot when you and your gun crew are rolling it. It's listed as having a two or three man crew, but nothing by the author says it cant or didn't have a few nearby infantry to help. The blizzard makes getting away easier, again, we don't know exactly how much snow is already on the ground, whether there is a cleared path rearward or not, etc etc. It's doable.

 

[Mr Carrot]

It didn't exactly die, I just ran out of stuff to sink...

Seriously, the last bit of a victorious war is a pain to write, and it was a story about navies.

excuses excuses, get on it and the next 50 years of alternate history in that time line

 

[Ramp-Rat]

Can't believe it was *that* hard to learn to drive a 40s truck.
My grandmother learnt to drive by the simple expedient of her WRNS superior officer telling her she was assigned to drive a lorry. There were a lot of gear crashes and a learning curve, but she learned without any formal lessons (ever - she was handed a civvie driving licence when she demobbed).

While I intended no disrespect to your grandmother, I think the story of how she learnt to drive a truck during the war, has over the years become slightly taller with the repeated telling. No one who hasn't already driven can get into a motor vehicle, and with just the odd crunching the gears drive off. Best case, granny already knew how to drive, car or tractor, and just needed someone to tell her what was what in the cab. Simple things like what to do to start it, which switches need to be where, is it a turn key or key plus button, does it have a primer pump for the fuel. If it does, how many strokes and where is the pump. Starter motor or handle, if handle, fixed or stored, if stored, where? and what type of swing, top down flick, or bottom up. Gears, how many and what's the lay out, back and forth towards you up the box, back and forth away from you, round the clock, down to top, or top to bottom, where is reverse, does it have a gate, manual or spring, and what gear to start in. Does it have a splinter box, two speed axel, if so where is the control for this. 4WD, is it fitted, and how do you engage/disengage it? Trucks are different to cars, and depending on how many gears you might not always star of in first, could be second, third or fourth, depending on load and whether you are on the flat, or a hill, loaded or empty. Can you block change going down the box, or do you have to catch every gear, makes a big difference when slowing down to stop corner. This is for someone who already knows the basics, and just has to get used to a much bigger vehicle. Now imagine trying to do this for someone who hasn't driven before, our eponymous Japanese soldier, under pressure, and in less than ten minutes, while being shouted at by some mad officer. Don't forget he needs to know to keep a close eye on the oil pressure gauge, water temperature gauge, fuel gauge. No warning lights on trucks in those days, it is down to drivers mk 1 eyeball. So yes driving a 1940's truck wasn't easy, especially as they had no power assist on anything. Again no disrespect to your granny, but to my mind, someone sat in the cab with her and ran through the basics of what was where, and how to start, change gears etc, then went around the parade ground a few times with her, before letting her lose on the roads, to learn on the job. As for crunching the gears, get it wrong on a crash box and you have just stripped the gearbox. You also need to know the basics of the rules of the road, or you are very soon going to have an accident, ie who gives way to who at a junction. Oh and this lot is just to get moving, there is so much more once you are on the move.

RR.

 

[duckie]

Can't believe it was *that* hard to learn to drive a 40s truck.
My grandmother learnt to drive by the simple expedient of her WRNS superior officer telling her she was assigned to drive a lorry. There were a lot of gear crashes and a learning curve, but she learned without any formal lessons (ever - she was handed a civvie driving licence when she demobbed).

Don't you know it. When I was inducted into the dutch army in the early 1980's I was trained as an driver of an YA328 truck (indeed gear crashes, no power steering, a most akward placed gear shift, a metal bucket as driver seat (it could double as an torture device, powered by 5,5 lt petrol engine (3km' per 2 liters petrol) in winter your right leg was roosted, and your left toes nearly froze off (you could see the road surface through hole for the gear petal. But in it was build as an brick and was an real all-terrain truck.

Take a look at this beast in this youtube movie:

 

[Draconis]

I think the easiest way to disable the trucks is to burn them. A bullet through the gas tank followed by tossing a match or other ignitor into the pool of gas forming. But if they're out of gas (possibly the reason the trucks must be abandoned) than simply use the bayonet to make multiple gashes on all tires and spares. Rip out and cut the spark plug wires. A rifle butt or bayonet through the radiator. That should only take 2 men 5 minutes or less per truck.

If all of the abandoned trucks are damaged in the same way that removes the option of cannibalizing parts to get some of them running. They will certainly be of no use during the campaign.

 

[Butchpfd]

I think the easiest way to disable the trucks is to burn them. A bullet through the gas tank followed by tossing a match or other ignitor into the pool of gas forming. But if they're out of gas (possibly the reason the trucks must be abandoned) than simply use the bayonet to make multiple gashes on all tires and spares. Rip out and cut the spark plug wires. A rifle butt or bayonet through the radiator. That should only take 2 men 5 minutes or less per truck.

If all of the abandoned trucks are damaged in the same way that removes the option of cannibalizing parts to get some of them running. They will certainly be of no use during the campaign.

There is the quickest expedient of a half dozen rounds in the fuel tank, then a grenade or flare into the resulting pool on gasoline. Or as earlier discussed, pull the distributor rotor.

 

[Driftless]

Removing the distributor rotor disables the vehicle - the other stuff renders cannibalizing it for parts less possible. If you've got time, make the vehicle worthless.

 

[Errolwi]

This is one of those interesting little details of WW2 that I read about years ago. Because car culture was already taking over the US, most young men coming into the US military at that time came from families that owned a car and this was at a time when most people did at least the basic maintenance on their own so you had a lot of guys who had mechanical knowledge so they could help with basic maintenance and for the ones who were going to be actual maintainers, it was a lot easier to train them to fix things - trucks, tanks, jeeps, or airplanes whatever.

Supposedly one reason colonials were requested for the LRDG was that they had more squaddies familiar with vehicles (breaking in farms etc) than Brits (satanic mills etc).

 

[mudhead]

I disagree. This is not impossible at all, but dependent upon things not written, therefore unknown. Are they being shot at directly, or simply having shots fired in their general direction? What is the terrain, flat, going up or down hill? How much concealment is available? The weight of 327kg is a lot when you have to pick it up and move it, not a hell of a lot when you and your gun crew are rolling it. It's listed as having a two or three man crew, but nothing by the author says it cant or didn't have a few nearby infantry to help. The blizzard makes getting away easier, again, we don't know exactly how much snow is already on the ground, whether there is a cleared path rearward or not, etc etc. It's doable.

There's lots of film, and stills, of Pak36s being manhandled around the FEBA.

Remember the fight in Carentan in Band of Brothers? The Fallschirmjaeger were pulling one around pretty quickly. As you say, it depends on terrain.