ACIII kept the coax, as shown on drawings and the actual prototype, though it is harder to see (bulge and hole next to the gun, on the left from our POV):
Sir John Valentine Carden Survives. Part 2.
- Thread starter allanpcameron
- Start date
Well..... in tank vs tank combat against the Japanese
How well protected in 3" armour
How good will a 25pdr round be against the Japanese tanks
I think we all know the answer to these questions......
Wrong, the bits that made it up will still exist. Their arrangement will be severely altered mind.
Well , it does bring up the issue of do they bother even issuing AP shells, HE will , going on Sherman's , be overkill anyway.
FIELD REPORT - AUS. 5th INFDIV [excerpt]
Attached CAC1 engaged by 3 Jap Light Tanks, [later confirmed to be Type 97 'Chi-Ha' Mediums] ambushed from prepared positions. Two Jap tanks firing from left side next to each other [map position XXX,XXX], one from right [aprox. XXX,XXX]. All three firing from camouflaged position, effective non-visible until firing.
CAC fires one shot on right tank in left group, clean penetration just below turret ring center hull resulting in detonation within tank, total kill of vehicle. Shrapnel from detonation of first tank disables turret and suspension of left-most tank, abandoned by crew. Single tank on right fires on CAC twice, both shots bounce off turret sides or front. CAC fires one shot at right-most tank, penetrates upper hull, internal detonation and fire. With all three tanks neutralized column reforms and continues to [redacted].
Addendum to Incident - post-event investigation by engineer brigade reveal that first tank was penetrated by 25pdr HE round, which overmatched the Japanese hull armour entirely, only serving to arm the HE shell's contact fuse and leading to detonation in center of tank and total loss of vehicle. Second tank struck by shrapnel had facing track blown off, commander killed by suspension element from first tank penetrating turret side. Remaining crew killed by infantry fire as they abandon tank.
Third tank hit by 25pdr AP shell which penetrates hull without arming, only armed and detonated after striking the engine in rear of vehicle. Estimation of engineers is that AP shells prone to over-penetration against Japanese targets and recommend use reserved against concrete fortifications.
All joking aside, great post! The knock-on effects on Allied tank development is what I'm here to see and @allanpcameron delivers!
A collab between the Aussie and Hoser development teams with the Valiant as a starting point has resulted in a very nice Commonwealth design in the CAC1.
Looking forward to the next installment!
Line them up! Single file please, otherwise it is a waste of a shell.
I'm suddenly remembering those You Tube videos where they line a dozen milk jugs full of water to see how many a bullet will pass through.
Not really, no; the current generation (Valiant II) already has 6-pdrs, and Carden & Co have already investigated the American M2 75mm and found it was too big to put in a Valiant.
The next generation (Victor) is going to primarily have either the 75mm HV or an equivalent to the 77mm HV as it's main gun, which will be decent at both anti-tank and anti-personnel, and better than the American 75mm including its variants. Only advantage the M2, M3, or M5 has is American shells, which to be sure is useful, but not so useful that they'd handicap themselves to have it happen. Especially since the US isn't in the war yet, so there isn't enough advantage for standardization. Most I could see them doing is finding a way to easily modify US 75mm shells to allow them to be used in the Victor's gun, tbh.
For CS variants of the Victor, I definitely wouldn't be surprised if something like the OQF 95mm is developed and produced much earlier than IOTL. The 3.7in mountain howitzer that it's developed from has been in service for a long time, after all.
...I do sure hope that they'll decide to change the 75mm HV to 76mm before adoption; they'll be able to reuse ammunition lines for the obsolete 3in 20ctwt anti-aircraft gun there rather than just the one 75mm line.
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Also, very nice for the Valiant variant with the larger turret ring to be a thing; hopefully Carden can do something similar with the design of the Victor so it'll be able to take a 17pdr or something like a British equivalent to the 90mm or 85mm guns.
You can still bore out the 6-pounder to fit the shell.
I'll point you at the 75mm conversion for the 6-pounder. Also, at 1000m or more, the effective armour penetration of the 75mm ammunition (at least, the M60 round, fired from the L/40 barrel) approaches that of the standard AP round of the 6-pounder. Other than a well-armoured tank at close range, the 75mm is a more useful shell than the 6-pounder.
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Well of course, but Ice was talking about Britain having shortages of guns so would use US 75mms in their next generation of tanks; from my perspective that meant "put US M2/M3/M5s in the Victor" so I was saying that wasn't the best idea since there's going to be better options available.
I think it's highly likely that they won't put the OQF 75mm in the Victor though either (except for possibly in the early tanks while the 75/77mm HV or whichever gun is chosen is ramping up production) as they'll want the better gun for the better tank. Though the OQF 75mm will almost certainly still be used, just in the Valiant instead; it should definitely fit as it's a rebored 6pdr and the Valiant turret is designed to fit the 6pdr. That's definitely the ideal solution to getting lots of tanks with dual-purpose guns in service relatively soon, after all.
The shortage is partially alleviated by the fact that none of the Valiants bound for Russia even have guns.
Well Vickers is working on their own gun for the Victor, so the OQF-75mm isn't happening on that score.
For any Japanese out of the shrapnel range, but within sight range. Those within shrapnel range will be a bit more worried about counting their extremities afterwards to think about how they feel.
With the way the war in North Africa about to be over for the time being I have to wonder if the the shortages in this case will be lessened to a degree. I mean with active operation effectively stoped in Europe till the Invasion of Italy and the Med effectively turning into a British and Commonwealth lake thanks to the Victories at Crete, effective destruction of the Italian navy at cape Matter Pan as well as Taranto, not suffering the reverses in NA they did holding and still holding Benghazi which means they can fly extra air craft into Malta as well as provide extra cover to say nothing of taking the Libyan ports.
A lot of pressure will come off in Europe which means it gives them a lot more time to fix the supply issue and work on developing and improving what they have already since they won’t be having to supply a front that ate up material like NA did. Though the Far East will be starting soon most of the supplies will probably come from India and ANZAC.
Not to knock a great post, but the OTL AP round for the 25pdr (which "only" weighed 20 pounds) was solid. like most WWII AP rounds. So unless the CAC have been doing some warhead research on the side, the big risk with 25pdr AP is that it just adds extra firing ports/ventilation holes to a Japanese tank without necessarily contacting anything vital on the way through.
Also, where are the Aussies fighting that the Japanese are fielding their good tanks against them? OTL the Chi-Ha medium tanks appeared in small numbers in Malaya/Burma and the Marianas, but the go-to Japanese tank for the Southwest Pacific (when they had any at all) was the dinky little type 95 Ha-Go light tank. Though with a max armour thickness of 25mm (gun mantlet only), the Japanese definition of "medium tank" was somewhat diverged from everyone else's. (Wikipedia doesn't list armour thickness for the Ha-Go, presumably out of pity).
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