PC/WI: Centurion Tank in service by Normandy landings.

WILDGEESE

Gone Fishin'
What pod's would be needed to be made so as to get a minimum of a least a brigade's worth's of Centurion tanks in service and to be landed on the beeches at Normandy in June '44?

How effective would they be in the Battle of Normandy?

How would they perform against German Panther & Tiger tanks?

Regards filers
 
Probably not possible. Though the early prototye Centurions were built before the fall of Berlin, only in very low numbers. Actual production of what we would recognisably call a Centurion didn't happen till somewhat after.

If you managed to get all the stars of pre war and wartime British Industry aligned some kind of Comet is probably doable for D-Day Though in that time line it would probably a better designed and executed Cromwell armed with the 77mm HV.


Even if you did magically come up with a vehicle like Centuron for D-Day it wouldn't be used in the assault, it was too big for the landing craft, or at least would have been impractical compared to the number of smaller tanks that could have been landed isntead.
 
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I agree with 'Ato' great as the thought may seem, just don't see how a plausible sequence could get the Centurion ready for D-day. Agree too that it would be plausible - though not easy - to get the Comet, and perhaps the Black Prince, available (even if in limited numbers) for action during the Normandy campaign.
 
IIRC IOTL the Army sent 6 prototypes for service trials in Germany and they arrived the day after Germany surrendered. I was watching a walk around of the Centurion on Youtube recently. They said that construction of the prototypes began in 1944 even though the A41 specification was issued a year earlier. The presenter said this was because the British were concentrating their resources on building as many tanks to the existing designs as possible.

Based on that it might be possible to get some prototypes ashore on D-Day for combat testing and then put it into production instead of the Comet if the familiar problem Britain's limited industrial capacity can be solved.

It might also help if the number tank projects could be cut down and the resources put into the Centurion. E.g. A38 Valiant, A39 Tortoise and A43 Black Prince. However, AFAIK one of the reasons Centurion was so good was that the designers took their time and it wasn't rushed into service before the prototypes were properly tested and its bugs ironed out as happened with most of the other British tanks of World War II.
 
It all depends on when the request is issued. A year earlier? The 'dots' are around - Meteor engine, 17pdr, while Horstman suspension is a known thing, just engineer it for a 50+ tank, just connect the dots. Perhaps it would've been a good idea to forget the coax 20mm this time around.

On the battlefield - about as good as Panther or Tiger (bettering it in maneuverability, lower HE capacity vs. Tiger). But more important - it would've shrugged the plethora of 7.5 cm AT guns (disregarding whether in towed or self-propelled flavor).
 
At best, Brits could have fielded an up-dated Comet before Germany surrendered.
The up-dated Comet would included: sloped front hull, track skirts (to protect against AT rockets), turret baskets (to protect against AT rockets) and a narrower sloped gun mantlet.
 
On the battlefield - about as good as Panther or Tiger (bettering it in maneuverability, lower HE capacity vs. Tiger). But more important - it would've shrugged the plethora of 7.5 cm AT guns (disregarding whether in towed or self-propelled flavour).
That suggests the same kill rate as the OTL tanks, but a lower loss rate of tanks and crews.
 
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