Panther by Mike Green

Author:Mike Green
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Panther: Germany’s Quest for Combat Dominance
ISBN: 9781782000938
Publisher: Osprey Publishing

Partial penetration is when an AP projectile does not have enough energy to penetrate through an armor plate or cause spalling to break off from the rear of the armor plate. Tankers who have survived partial penetrations comment on the shock/pressure wave that reverberates through their vehicles when struck. American military personnel look over a destroyed Panther Ausf. A tank. (Patton Museum)

Erickson is not the only one who believes that Panther armor remained free of serious defects for the duration of the war in Europe. Jentz and Doyle stated in their book Germany’s Tiger Tanks VK45.02 to Tiger II: Design, Production and Modifications that “There is no proof that substandard German armor plate was used during the last years of the war. All original documents confirm compliance with standard specifications throughout the war.”

Evidence for the quality of late-war German armor plate can be found in a postwar U.S. Army Aberdeen Proving Ground firing test (Project number 5044: July 16, 1945), which consisted of American 90-mm M82 AP projectiles fired at an early production Panther Ausf. D tank and at a late-war produced Panther Ausf. G tank. (late-war being the time period of supposed inferior steel). The 90-mm M82 AP rounds punched two holes through the Panther Ausf. D tank’s glacis plate with significant break out due to FHA brittleness in the face of overmatching projectiles. The 90-mm M82 AP projectiles did not penetrate the glacis plate of the Panther Ausf. G tank but did achieve a penetration through the glacis plate machine gun mount. The end result being only “scoops” upon the late-war glacis plate, not an indicator of substandard late-war armored steel against an overmatching projectile.

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