M3 halftrack HS 404

CaID · May 4, 2024, 5:09am

[Would you like to see this in-game?]

Yes
No

0 voters

caid’s suggestion #28

I would like to suggest a low-rank fire-support vehicle for Israel, the M3 Halftrack with 20mm Hispano-Suiza 404

we could use this picture for the stats card

the M3 half-track with the Hispano Suiza was a modification made by Israel to the M3 Mk. A to provide fire support to the infantry. the gun is capable of heavy fire against the buildings, soft targets, and light armored vehicles making the half-tract important vehicles for the support. Israel used it notably during the 60s for direct fire support. while his state of service is rather mysterious, the vehicles remain an interesting addition to the game (either as SPG or SPAA). the many serial numbers of the vehicles allow us to believe a many M3 Half-tracts had those modifications (at least 5 different vehicles were modified)

firepower

the main armament is the 20mm HS 404 . the gun was originally designed by Hispano-Suiza as an aircraft cannon. but was also used on the ground vehicles. the gun had a rate of fire of 570 to 700 rounds per minute and had magazine with a capacity of 15, 30, or 60 rounds. the auto-cannon was capable of firing armor piercing round (with or without tracer) as well as high explosive (with or without tracer, and with or without self-destruction at 2500-3000m) and incendiary rounds .

the armour piercing round is 168 g heavy with a velocity of 880 m/sec which shall give a penetration of about 46mm @ 100m according to Gaijin’s calculation

the arc of fire is limited to the front. some 50° left and right appear to me to be realistic but the true horizontal transverse is unknown.

the elevation is also unknown. but some -10°/+40° seem to be possible.

ahull LMG was also installed for the assistant driver at the right side of the cockpit

Mobility

the vehicle is an M3 Halftract which is already well known from the game by the use in many versions on many vehicles. this one is probably the lightest of them all as it only has a single 20mm gun making the weight at 8 tonnes (the gun only weighs 50 kg without the magazine) this shall make the vehicle the most mobile of the M3 half-track by a bit. the speed reaching 72 km/h on the road would be a very nice asset but the vehicles suffering from being half track will lose a lot of their speed during turns. yet it would not lack mobility. with a power-weight ratio of 18 hp/ton, he will be one of the quickest in acceleration.

protection

the protection of this vehicles is not at all his best asset. the vehicles could easily be qualified as “glass cannon”. with 6mm of armor about EVERYWHERE ecept the driver port who is 15mm , the armour would barely protect from the LMG fire. literally any vehicles could be a treat to it. even the GAZ 4M who’s is renown to be the weakest vehicles against ground target. the vehicles also suffer of been open top which mean the aircraft would easily kill his crew. not that the 6mm would had protected it much, but it’s still could resist the LMG from above. the gunner is also without shielding of any sort which mean a tank could disable the gunner with is LMG. but the good side is there is at least 3 crew member (gunner, driver, hull-gunner) which mean you still have a chance to retreat if your gunner is down.

Source