They even got the camouflage colours right. It seems to have the wafflepattern Zimmerit. It was applied to prevent enemy infantry to apply magnetic antitankmines on the tank. What the germans did not know then was that none of their allied enemies had magnetic mines so it was a wasted effort.
Wish my father was still alive. he would have love to have seen this this. he was 5th SSPZD Wiking and in the last 6 months of the war was a gunner in a panther after his PZ 4 H was disabled.
if they gave the tank to the right people this tank would be a real death sending machine i can't argue but to say that the Panther was one of the best tanks during WW2
Gracious Lord! A showroom-fresh Panther! I stood next to one of these down at the tank museum in Bovingdon this summer. They are intimidatingly large. The video doesn’t translate how massive these things are and how menacing.
Belle pièce, il tourne bien rond, c'est une sacrée machine de combat. Belle remise en état, tout y est présent. Le char Panther reste une prouesse du savoir faire de l'industrie allemande pendant la guerre . Le juste équilibre, en gros un superbe outil pour les combats de l'époque. Phil 🇨🇵.
He sinned against the (WW2) rule of using the handcrank when possible 😉 The roadwheels and rubber look pristine and are probably brandnew, an excellent restoration job.
It wasn't always considered wrongful to use the starter motor, if & when the engine is still warm from earlier usage and the batteries are reasonably charged. The whole point of hand cranking a cold motor was to both get some oil pumped around before ignition, freeing up any other internal frictional stictions, & mostly/actually to save wearing down(../burning out) of the carbon armmanture contacts within the starter motor itself, not just the often over used and over simplified excuse of '..save the batteries!' or '..don't drain them!' turning it over and over - as can be attested in this video, where she started practically immediately within a second or two.
@@razor1uk610 The saving of copper, electrical and other components was a major issue. That's why the last version of its little brother, the PzKpfw IV , wasn't fitted with an electric turret motor(aka hand crank the turret)
The Panther is, without doubt, the coolest looking tank of WWII. That it was rushed into production and had so many issues was... unfortunate (but maybe not, given that they were used by the bad guys!)
Agree re it's looks Harry. When form and function combine to create something... um, beautiful? Re its issues... the French had a quantity of Panthers post war that they began to overhaul to use in their new Armor Corps in the late 40s. They were shocked to find all sorts of factory sabotage present. Cigar and cigarette butts jammed into hydraulic lines, wires intentionally crossed, ungreased or just completely missing bearings, bolts left off, nuts loose, tools left in transmissions, dirt and pebbles stuffed into fuel lines... the list went on. One French mechanic remarked if not for their excellent engineering these Panthers never would have been able to drive out of the factory! Factory sabotage was a huge problem for the Germans. We're not talking s lave labor here btw. This sabotage was done by paid foreign and German civilian workers who were just war weary. Add in relentless day and night bombing and a severe shortage of needed chemicals and metals needed to forge and cast engine and transmission parts?? Amazing.
i think my grandad got to see one in person, it was a while back....... agree looks and sounds epic, imagine 20-30 of these approaching would sound like, you'd feel the ground shaking before you see them
Awesome. I wondered what a panzer would've actually sounded like; my previous hearing being totally based upon the screeching noise from 'Saving Private Ryan'. Bravo
I had the honour of looking after a geriatric, former Hitler Jugend Austrian. As his caregiver. He was a hunchback, so was deemed unsuitable to follow his elder brothers unto the osten front. He nevertheless was a South Tyrolean gamekeeper: a crack shot. I am not sure exactly what I am trying to say but Ernst is mein kameraden forever. (Now I am sober, I recall why I added this entry a few days ago. Herr Ernst told me that his HJ troop discovered an intact but abandoned Tiger I panzer. Unfortunately they were observed climbing all over it by a Soviet Artillery spotter. They were simply boys playing soldiers, like any other youngsters. He never finished his tale. As his Caregiver, he didn't need to fill me in. Every time I showered him, (he insisted on cold water), I saw myself the horrific shrapnel wounds ... Enough.
Just amazing that 3/4 of a century on these are still running. Can you honestly think of anything made today that will still be useful in the year 2097?!
@@dankwartdenkhardt5714 very true. That happens. I once met with engineers at the Duxford Imperial War Museum where they were restoring an ME109 and they could not believe how tight the tolerances were in the engine. They thought it incredible how the Germans could have mass produced it. Yet they did. One gentleman said that we could not have done this. Again unfortunately it was on the wrong side
@@dankwartdenkhardt5714 there are always a little bit of slack in the cylinders to the cylinder block and there is always slack in things like the rocker valves. Apparently these were made so precisely that there was hardly any slack which is really a difficult thing to do on every one. Okay on a one off unit but on thousands of units in those days very hard to produce
Aye, she's a lovely tank and will start right up and run just fine...so long as you be sure to clear off any pine straw which may be covering the air intake on top the engine deck after it's been in the forest, otherwise you may start running quite hot 🔥🥵
Funny that. The camera is from a IPhone 13 pro. It takes very clear photos, and has this auto tracking on the vehicles when they were running. I’m very impressed with it.
It was knocked out in Normandy and then brought back two the UK for evaluation. For main years it belonged to the Cadman Brothers, who ran the War and Peace military show in the UK - it was used as a static display for those shows and it never ran until eventually, the Cadman's sold it to the Australian Armour museum. They paid specialist military dealer Bruce Crompton to restore it to running order in the UK before shipping it out to Aus. There is a section of the Combat Dealers TV programme on here showing the Panther supposedly being run for the first time then shipped to Australia, but be warned - some of the back story told in the programme was bullshit. They made it look like Crompton bought the tank and then sold it on, but that isn't what happened. The story I tell above is the truth. Note that the museum have since repainted it in the scheme you see here.
Germany doesnt need Tigers.Panther was the best WW2 tank. Imagine 50000 Panther, what could be possibile if dont losing time, steel and manny for others tank. Today we all would speak germany language. BTW Russia make 56000 t34
I don't care what people say, what cheap documentaries say etc. The best tank of the war wasn't the T-34-85 or the Sherman etc. It was the Panther. At least the Panther protected it's crew
The best tank is the one that best suits the situation at the time. Running shoes aren’t better than Wellington boots, Brogues aren’t better than hiking boots. It depends on what you need from them.
@@numberstation in terms of killing tanks and protecting your crew from other tanks I’d say the Panther is up there lol. Once the early problems were ironed out it’s reliability was good, and it was mass produced. If your goal is to throw waves and waves of your men at the enemy until they run out of bullets, then yes the t-34 was excellent xD
The cranking noise, is the engine winding up. U need the tracks to be slightly slack for turning in the panther, the tank has too reserves slightly and the tracks have to slack up. Too allow it for turning, in the vehicle.
@@mulligan64 Thanks for your reply, I did say cracking and not cranking...when tracks are slack they crack as they bite the drive sprockets, the noise is them snapping onto the teeth.
Got to see the French Panther at TankFest 2019 at Bovington. In some ways they were junk because of materiel shortages and being rushed into production, but the engineering is impressive for their time period!
Wouldn't say they were junk in any way. Even the first production run of Panthers were effective at Kursk (given the circumstances) and mechanical issues were over exaggerated.
@@lyndoncmp5751 Panther drive trains would regularly fail before 40 miles of use. Scopes were known to fog up. There are plenty of aspects of the Panther that were terribly manufactured
Lucas Elder Exaggerated hyperbole. If that was true, regarding the final drive, most wouldn't have made it to the Ardennes battle front because it was at least that distance just to get to the start points. The Panthers of 2nd Panzer Division got the furthest of any German armour in the Ardennes, approaching the Meuse, before they were halted by American and British forces. Panthers reliability increase from 1943 to late 1944. At the end of October 1944, the Panther abteilungs in the west reported and overall operational average of 85%. Source. Tom Jentz.
@@lyndoncmp5751 The "exaggerated hyperbole" comes from official American, British, French, and German documents. The "increased reliability" never happened but rather it was extra training to keep crew members from pushing the tank so hard. Which, isn't a stellar review, you want a vehicle that you can push hard without fear of breaking. And the 2nd's push isn't really something that grand. They almost reached their objective nearly a week late and at that point were fighting for their lives against counterattack and encirclement. Still about 90 miles from their true objective of Antwerp as well.
It is a Maybach, and could be the original from this tank although I'm not certain about that. The Combat Dealers TV programme spun a yarn about finding an engine to buy for the tank but the truth is, both tank and engine came from the Cadman family.
Hope it aint the one authority's pinched out that garage from that elderly guy!!!!!! That sd kfz 11 next to it with the 38 is a rare old bird aswell, especially if the waffenampt numbers marry up...
No this wasn’t the panther found in that basement, this is the one that was built by Combat and dealers by Bruce Compton - and his team. Nick and Phil that built this tank. Came from England to run it, for this years armour fest.
Tank from this clip is Model A, while confiscated vehicle from Germany is Model G. On Surviving Panzers Web site is information that Panther from Germany ended up in Flying Heritage Museum in USA.
This is by far the most modern-looking tank in the war. Can't say it was the best though. The allies did win you know. This message was sponsored by the 76mm Sherman gang.
76mm Sherman was disappointing in armament. Actually it was mediocre in anti tank firepower without HVAP, by 1944/45 standards. The US 2nd and 6th Armored Division especially were disappointed in their firepower.
its quantity ov quality the panther was introduced too late into the war, if production volume was greater the outcome would had been vastly different...
