Still less ammo then the 105 and better protected.
Both the T29 and Tiger 105 has 6 crew members. Tiger 105 also has a semi-automatic smoke grenade launcher which is very helpful and a range finder.
The T29 gun mantlet is very similar in effective thickness and size compared to the Tiger ll 105 turret front plate.
Tiger ll 10,5cm:
Way better hull armor.
Higher foward speed, 42km vs 35km.
Better overall mobility.
Range finder.
Semi-automatic smoke grenade launcher.
A bit better turret turning speed.
Higher velocity APCBC.
T29:
Way better all around turret armor, while the mantlet is similar in effective thickness and size.
Better gun depression -10 vs -8.
A bit better survivability.
Better reverse speed 14 vs 12.
Has three 12.7 mm M2HB.
They’re very comparable now with the reload buff, while having different play styles.
Wish they remodelled the T29 as T29E3 which has a range finder.
I’d very much disagree here. That front left ammo rack (common to most American tanks around this tier) gives a very easy oneshot potential to most HEAT/APDS rounds it fights frontally. Angle it slightly to the right, and even AP and APHE will easily onetap it there. It’s my go-to shot against these tanks (The Super Pershing in particular).
Meanwhile, the Tiger IIs are so roomy that a shot through the turret front will rarely set off the ammo in the back except against extremely high pen APDS (Conqueror or similar, in my experience), and APHE through the front will sometimes wipe the turret crew, but rarely touch the hull crew.
Add on the conical mantlet the Tiger II has, which is a volumetric black hole, and compare that to the flat mantlet of the T29, which any gun with over 200mm of penetration can tear through and overpressure the tank, and I’d say the Tiger II has slightly better frontal protection.
I’ve heard somewhere there was an extra 3" rotor shield somewhere behind the mantlet of extra protection, which is how the 279mm thickness number was arrived at. Any truth to that?
In a way, yes.
But only in the gun collar (the armored area directly around the cannon).
The majority of the mantlet is 203 mm, as measured.
I also found memoirs book from and M26 stabilizer mentioned too. Death Traps: The Survival of an American Armored Division in World War II - Belton Y. Cooper - Google Books
WTF? Maybe they mounted it not for all vehicles? Or what? Several secondary sources are mentioned STAB, and one primary.
That book is a well known joke. Don’t take anything you read in there seriously.
Okay thanks, i don’t know much about foreign authors. We still have Hunnicutt and Technical Manual