To travel is a gift and a privilege. my first taste of a different country was France. France is incredible, It's a bastion of culture, something I realized upon embarking on my first strip outside of my home country of Canada. I realized by being in a different country that the country that you are born into could be a complete mismatch with your priorities. This may be obvious but I had no idea that a country could appeal specifically to everything one likes; art, social and history are the priority in France, very different from here in Canada where we prioritize work and healthcare ;)
In French countryside, amidst the kilometers of vineyards and medieval castles lies Saumur, a small town with a wonderful Tank museum, the Musée Des Blindés. It is in fact the largest military vehicle museum in the world (if you count the vehicles pending restoration) with around 200 vehicles on display and 400 in storage.!
These are just pics from the Musée Des Blindés, my passion, tanks...!
Please enjoy the pics, I endeavor to share with you what you may not be able to venture to see.
The stand outs:
Here is the Panzer IV a German medium tank with a potent 75mm gun, this gun could penetrate around 91mm or armor (off the top of my head) Beside it is the fearesome Tiger tank, this tank needs no introductions other than US tank crews would contract what you call "tigerfobia"
This is the panther, similar armor thickness (80mm to the Tiger's 100mm) because of it's slope and similar main guns 75mm long barrel vs 88mm shorter barrel, the length of the barrel indicates velocity. The slope in armor actually increases its effective thickness, it's true, tilt something width wise and you'll see!
This... is a Tiger II, the big brother of the Tiger, I could write about it all day, but i'll spare the bore. This tank combined the armor of the panther and the gun of the Tiger, it was the most fearesome tank on the battlefield in late 1944-1945 and was even stronger than french prototype tanks until 1950. The Germans however, couldn't appropriately field them as they neared the end of the war due to fuel shortages (this baby took 1 liter per 300meters...) I'm standing in front of it, just look at the scale... imposing! *I do not usually wear my pants sagging, one time thing folks!
The shell on the top is the 88mm shell that would have been fired, note the shell on the very en compared to the gunpowder in the brass shell housing, the velocity would have been incredible and the sound emitted... A side note: this Tiger II is fully functional; the only one in the world, in fact it is so heavy that they run it less and less frequently due to stress on the suspension!
This is the thickness of the armor... this tank weighed 69 tons
This is the Pershing, it was deployed in early 1945 and saw limited combat, it was the first effective American heavy tank in World War 2. Only 2 were destroyed, one by a Narshorn and the other by a king tiger (the latter was later repaired and returned to service)
Closeup of the same tank; mantlet and turret
The british cromwell with the 75mm gun, this tank was standard; similar to the sherman
Here is a Soviet, predecessor of the SU-85. The SU-100's enormous 100mm gun would sometimes tip the tank in early models!
classic T34-76, with the 76mm gun, a must have for any museum. Similar in performance to the Sherman and/or Cromwell
This is a Jagdpanther, it has the armor of the panther (80mm) and the main gun of the tiger II, it could cut through any of the above tanks without a doubt. Me again, for scale :S
This is the Flak88 anti aircraft gun, it's the base of the Tiger I's potent main gun
Honorable mentions:
150mm Brumbar
That's what it looks like inside a (rare) soviet 120mm mortar
The outside
This tank was destroyed and still has a non penetrating shell inside of the armor!
Full penetration in the Churchill tank, must have been a Tiger II or Jagdpanther!
Well I hope this wasn't too boring, it's something I would be interested in seeing, I hope others could find something to take out of it
Don't be too harsh XD
Thanks guys!