Were heavy tanks ever useful in WW2

On the subject of cost of a certain peice of equipment - for me more important is the man hours and the ability of that nation to mass produce them

An example would be the Lewis gun - it was for various reasons including a large liceance fee more expensive to make than a Vickers MMG however for the same man hours you could build 5 of them!

So comparing the Tiger to a Sherman in purely terms of cost does not really tell us that much as US workers were among the best paid in the world which increased the cost relative to other nations and the Shermans were being built in Kahn sytle modern factories using modern mass production methods including single use machine tools and relatively low skilled workers (the same is true to a much higher degree when considering the war time T-34 which where being made to the lowest possible standard ie only intended for 6 months of service or 1 day in combat) - while in Germany the Tiger tanks by comparison were being effectively hand made with limited machine tools having to be recalibrated for multiple jobs.

Had the USA decided to build the M6 heavy tank from late 42 it would very likely have spammed out many 1000s of them, the KV1s and IS2s where also produced in 1000s and the Churchill was likewise built in larger numbers than the Tiger - not because they were necesarily easier to build but because of the fashion in which they were built allowing them to be built in larger numbers.

So there
 
Never gamed the Tunisian battles with the US M6 present. Technically the US had 250 on hand & could have sent 50 easily. One can argue the small details of the M6 vs the Tiger I, but against anything else the Axis had...
 
Was there any reason apart from doctrine and possibly transport difficulty that stopped the M6 going into service.

My understanding is that they aside from the other reasons you quoted they believed the Sherman to be tank enough for the job - which arguably it was.

The only other issue was its weight at 55+ tons its in the same ball park as the Tiger I

The M6 had a number of faults but I am sure that they could have been overcome had the decision been made to persevere with the design

In a previous thread I suggested a POD that the M6s replace the Tank destroyer Battalion (and that doctrine) in each US Army Division allowing them to act as both TDs and Heavy tanks in support of the Infantry

A bit of back of ciggi packet math gives us 90 divisions x 50 odd tanks = 4500 - doable numbers I think if some of the Factories are retasked
 
A bit of back of ciggi packet math gives us 90 divisions x 50 odd tanks = 4500 - doable numbers I think if some of the Factories are retasked
Offhand, the original production order was to have been 4000 before the one thing that both Gen McNair and Devers agreed on, was they didn't like the M6.

Yes it was heavy. Yes it was less reliable than the M3 medium chassis.

But it was being tested at Aberdeen just after Pearl Harbor, when the Tiger prototypes didn't even have turrets yet, ready for production, 8 months ahead of the Tiger
 
That's right I think, whilst pushing back a Brigade when outnumbered two to one?

Tigers are over credited in that battle. there was also a grenadier platoon reinforced with a couple HMG and a 81mm mortar. Also a artillery battery of three howitzers fired a few times in preparation.
 

Deleted member 1487

Tigers are over credited in that battle. there was also a grenadier platoon reinforced with a couple HMG and a 81mm mortar. Also a artillery battery of three howitzers fired a few times in preparation.
Certainly Wittman himself was.
 
The pdf text is too big to attach here, Follow the name below & you should be able to read a long monograph on British plus for invading the Cotientin Peninsula in 1942.

(Warning: requires reading & comprehension skills above that necessary for wiki articles)

Nov 23, 2009 - 2009 Gary Michael Giumarra. D-Day 1942, D-Day 1944: A Comparative Analysis of. Operations SLEDGEHAMMER and OVERLORD.
 
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