IOTL tanks seemed to develop mostly out of a need to break through the trenches of WWI, however from a tech stand-point how much earlier could they have actually emerged?
The 1880s at the absolute earliest. Before that there are no engines (steam or combustion) that can pull their own weight, even less a lot of armour, tracks, weapons, ammunition and crew.
Fuck horses or engines, just have a bunch of guys inside a big steel shell with wheels dragging it fowards and backwards, and small holes for guns and a small cannon on top, like a steel siege ram.
In a pinch, the guys inside the Steel Ram(!) can get some knives and swords and shank the bad guys
A train runs on iron rails, which drastically reduce friction. I doubt it would be possible to construct a steam engine strong enough to overcome the friction of tracks and terrain and still small enough to be housed in a tank hull small enough to be armoured effectively. It would anyway be hell to be inside a tank hull alongside a steam engine.Ummm... trains existed in 1825, and they could certainly pull their weight.
- BNC
IOTL tanks seemed to develop mostly out of a need to break through the trenches of WWI, however from a tech stand-point how much earlier could they have actually emerged?
James Cowan came up with a concept in 1855 comprised of a cannon and scythes mounted on the side. It didn't go much further than a sketch due to it being seen as barbaric.Fuck horses or engines, just have a bunch of guys inside a big steel shell with wheels dragging it fowards and backwards, and small holes for guns and a small cannon on top, like a steel siege ram.
In a pinch, the guys inside the Steel Ram(!) can get some knives and swords and shank the bad guys
A train runs on iron rails, which drastically reduce friction. I doubt it would be possible to construct a steam engine strong enough to overcome the friction of tracks and terrain and still small enough to be housed in a tank hull small enough to be armoured effectively. It would anyway be hell to be inside a tank hull alongside a steam engine.
A combustion engine effective enough would I guess be plausible in the first years of 20th Century, but not much before.
I would tend to agree, but:
- You could potentially build a steam "tank" during the civil war. It would have to be pretty big , the armor probably wouldn't be too heavy (but big enough to be fairly safe from rifle fire, shrapnel, and small artillery), and it would be limited to fairly smooth terrain. It wouldn't really be practical, but it might be used on a road (as an armored train) of sorts, for storming across a bridge, or as a semi-mobile defensive point. As far as being miserable, the steam ironclads weren't too much different (steam engine in an enclosed space).
-- POD might be after the bloody Battle of Fredericksburg, the Union decides on a crash course to try to build one. It might make its debut in late 63 or early 64. After a few dubious attempts, it might not be further developed, but the examples might be used as road defenses
- A variant of Da Vinci's design could be built, made somewhat lighter and shorter. It, too, would be limited to smooth terrain, but could certainly be devastating at clearing a street/road.
- That horse drawn ideas are probably impractical since the thing would be 'dead' once the vulnerable horses are shot. The war wagon idea is close, but it's not really practical for offense.
no, pre-ww1 there were several attempts already at designing a tank, the austro-hungarian burnstyn comes to mindPeople needed to feel the need before thinking of inventing the tank. It is because the military realized, during WW1, the devastating effect of modern machine-guns and artillery over infantry that they were able to conceive modern tank.
I do think that the Trojan Horse was a distorted memory of a late Bronze Age siege tower of some sort.Until steam engines 'came of age' as 'prime movers', you're talking several millennia of human / ox-powered 'siege towers'. Perhaps the 'Trojan Horse' was such a beast ??
The Assyrians used that in the 3000s BC. Not steel, but wood counts doesn't it?
- BNC