Tanque

I did a quick search for the turret rotation speed for the King Tiger and according to a Wiki site:

"High speed turret traverse was provided by a hydraulic motor linked to the main engine; a full rotation could be achieved in nineteen seconds at engine idle, and inside ten seconds at the maximum allowable engine speed."

10 second? Sheese I never looked into that before, but that's petty quick for something that large.

I am researching as I'm building the turret drive for my 1/10 KT. My turret weighs 9.5 pounds and there's a bit more to add to it.
It turns on a custom made ball bearing using ~208 .125 stainless steel bearing balls in two races. I'll post some
photos of the work I've done. So far my first drive was way too fast, in fact dangerously fast; so fast that when I
swung the turret around in my test the barrel knocked a plastic bottle all the way across my kitchen. The second
drive was so slow that I had time to feed my dogs and birds in the time it took to make one rotation....

Jerry

pattoncommander

Jerry, I'd like to see the source for that data. George Forty's German Tanks of WW II gives the following data;
Gun could elevate +15 or depress -8, gunner having to turn the handwheel 13 times for every 10 degrees of el or depression.
Traverse was either hand or power using a similar power traverse system as Tiger 1. All around traverse was 19 seconds at high ratio= 2000 rpm, and 77 seconds in low ratio 1000 rpm. Gunner had to turn the handwheel 700 times for 360 degree traverse. There was a suplimentary handwheel for the loader which was marginally faster.

Wiki's data is mostly not verified and I doubt whether that high speed data is correct. I was working on M-47s in 1956 and with the new hydraulic traverse motor, it was reported to be the fastest turret in the world at the time. Never timed it, but it was very fast but certainly no where near 10 seconds.
Bill

yellowshaker

My Feedback: (1)

Where's Rivetcounter when you need him? LOL

RSEA

I also think 10 seconds is too fast for a full 360 KT traverse. With that big, long heavy turret being traversed by the same engine as the Tiger I, I'd have to see it in action to believe it.

sevoblast

Well, we have two publicly acknowledged runners, the KT at Samur and the T 1 at Bovington. Be interesting to time them if possible, assuming the system still works. Bovington's I would bet works. Samur, who knows.

rivetcounter

I would seriously doubt that the Tiger II could rotate it's turret in 10 seconds, The Tiger I with the engine revved rotated it's turret in 60 seconds, a recent test on the Bovington Tiger with the engine ticking over rotated it's turret in 70 seconds I would have thought that Tiger II had a similar Turret rotation speed to Tiger I, I have been in a Centurion which couldn't quite make that turret speed 10 seconds and that tank had a much more improved turret rotation system.

hatakashi

Well according to Thomas Jentz it would be 19 sec max.

uhu

According to Achtung Panzer #6 maximum traverse speed is 19 sec. for 360Âş at 2,000 rpm, at 1,500 rpm it is 25 sec and at 1,000 rpms it is 30 secs or more.

Regards
Uhu

pattoncommander

and manual, all day and a replacement gunner until the gunner's arms heal from cramps.

rivetcounter

Patton, Tigers, Panthers and PzIVG,H had motorized turret rotation hence the speed of the turret, they also had a hand crank to manually turn the turret if needed or when the engine wasn't running

pattoncommander

Riv, German tanks required the engine running for power traverse, since it came off a PTO on the drive shaft under the turret.,
Amercan tanks always had the power control on a seperate motor which could be used without the engine. It ate up the batteries, so an aux generator was provided to rejuve the accumulator or batteries. ALL tanks have manual traverse, but it's a very slow, tedious job on a long traverse.

uhu

Hi Bill

Yes, the manual system on Königstiger was slow indeed, one turn of the auxiliary handwheel gave a turret rotation of 0.5 degrees, so a full 360º should need 720 handwheel turns.......

Regards
Uhu

yellowshaker

My Feedback: (1)

While we're on the KT subject, does anyone here have a video of a real KT firing its main gun? If so, can you post a link for me?

rivetcounter

Bill, I know also the PzIV G and H had an auxiliary engine for turret rotation this was dropped on the J version and rotation was by hand again, the space was used for a fuel tank which increased the range of the tank

Gabriel could you give me the book and page you found your information on, UHU again could you give me the page number you found your information as I'm having trouble locating the relevant page.

Further research in to the Tiger II turret speed revealed in "VK45.02 to Tiger II" page 22 top left, where the discussion of the turret traverse was discussed by representatives of Wa Pruef 6/IId Krup and Henschel on 15 December 1942 this goes on to state that a turret traverse of 8 degree per second at 1750rpm, 12 degree per second at 3000rpm and 6 degree per second at 600rpm was achived.
This would give a full 360 degree rotation of the following
600rpm = 60 seconds
1750rpm = 45 seconds
3000rpm = 30 seconds
There may be more information that I have missed but I cant find anything else on this subject

In Tiger I there were 2 auxiliary hand wheels one for the gunner and one for the commander the commanders had a higher rate of turn to the gunner this may also have been true of the Tiger II

hatakashi

Finally I got a few minutes to dig into my books.
This time I use the simplied version of T. Jentz's Tiger II book, I use New Vanguard's King Tiger Heavy Tank, on page 24.
"...with the high range power traverse engaged and the engine turning over at 2000rpm, the turret could be traversed 360 degrees in 19 seconds. At the maximum allowable engine speeed of 3000rpm, the turret could be traversed 350 degrees in less than TEN seconds..."

So yes Rivet is right, the KT turret could do a full swing in less than 10 seconds.

pattoncommander

Hey Jose,,

Glad you chimed in on this...anyone knows Tigers, it's you. I have had to hand crank around turrets on many tanks, the M-41 and E-8 Sherman being the easy ones. The Russian T-55 and 62 are very smooth and easy. The M-48 and 60s were very slow and awkward to manually traverse, but US tanks were engineered for balance on less than level ground. I couldn't immagine manualy traversing a KT turret with all the weight of that long, heavy gun as well as the extremely heavy turret. Just the design alone tells that it is not balanced. Traversing to a target on a higher elevation must have been a strain on the ring gears and turret motor, but had to be pretty miserable manually. At speeds of 19 seconds, to suddenly stop on a target from full traverse speed must have been a real strain on the turret ring clutch, so I assume the mechanism was as much prone to breakdown as everything else on the KT.

Tanque

Where did Rivet say this?? I've been searching my own books off and on since I posted the original post. In the meantime I've
come up with a turret drive for my KT that will traverse the turret (top speed) at about 14 seconds. That's plenty close for me.
As I'm using a esc to control the motor I can set the top speed to be what ever I want; The drive has plenty of power, the only
detracting aspect is it makes a great deal of noise.



Jerry

karel47

Guy's just read it right this is what mark have staded here

karel47

This was a following info from mark, don't fantasize just read it as it is wrote down

heavyaslead

KT revolution 360 is more like 20 sec max. assisted. The 10 sec ref is probably for 180 deg.

The Leo 2A6 has a 9 sec 360 revolution as comparrision

karel47

no at 3000 rpm it takes 30 sec for the turret to get a 360° rotation on the King Tiger looks at mark's tabels

that's the fastest it can do

hatakashi

But as stated in T Jentz's simplified version of the book he categorically mentioned the turret traverse speed as I stated in my previous reply.
What Rivet quoted was a discussing prior to the production of the KT, but not the actual description of the final production model's actual traverse speed, that's how I see it.

rivetcounter

what I quoted was a discussion where the rotation speed was archived according to what I read and it's the only information on the subject I could find, if a Leopard IIA6 achieves a 360 rotation speed of 9 seconds then there is no way a Tiger II could achieve a speed of 10 seconds, if this turns out to be true then I will be shocked, there is archive film of a a Tiger I rotating it's Turret but I don't recall seeing a Tiger II doing the same

Incidentally I also found the same information in the Waldamore Trojca book "King Tiger Technical and Operational History" if anyone needs the page number I will post it latter

hatakashi

Well both info were taken off Jentz's books, Rivet's one is the thick big version, and my one is the simplified version for easy reading.
I have both books and read the relevant paragraphs, strangely the simplied version has a more precise description of the turret traverse speed.

Unless we could drag Jentz out and ask him to clarify this issue, without that we can only guess between his almost identical books.

rivetcounter

Gabriel,
Jentz and Doyle have reelected quite a few books over the years please give the correct title and page number this will save me having to read from cover to cover, saying "it's in the big book" really doesn't help I don't have the smaller "New Vanguard" edition so cant verify what you have read however I do have various other Jentz and Doyle books so please help