Once a legendary, known to be indestructible, Germany’s Tiger II was the worst nightmare of the allied soldiers. Heavy gun power, strong Armour, and possibly the best mobility among all the WWII tanks made the Tiger II truly a legend. Also known as King Tiger or Tiger B the official name of this masterpiece was Panzerkampfwagen Tiger Ausf. B. Tiger II was able to achieve many victories even under the harshest conditions in the Russian soil. Its ability to kill allied tanks in long-range with only getting the least damages from Allied anti-tank guns made this legend a nightmare to the allied tanks.
Panzer Tiger ii – An Introduction
Tiger ii is a heavy Nazi tank manufactured by the Henschel company of Germany. It was the successor to the Panzar Tiger I tank which served in Africa and Soviet Russian raids. Tiger ii was produced in years 1944-1945 and 489 units of this beast left factories to fear the allied armies.
Comparing to all other tanks in the world war II the tiger ii had a great mobility under all terrains. The massive V-12 Maybach engine was able of outputting 690 hp. This provide a magnificent top speed of 41.5 km/h on road. For a heavy tank with a weight exceeding 69 tons this was a mind blowing speed.
Tiger II was equipped with a 88 mm heavy canon as the main armament and two 7.9 mm heavy machine guns as the secondary armament. The main gun was designed to shoot Armour piercing rounds to fight against enemy tanks. Also, for other targets high explosive and hollow charge
Tiger I vs Tiger II
Tiger II was designed as the successor of Tiger I. Both tanks served together in the WWII. Tiger I first entered service in 1942 and served the German army till 1945. But, Tiger II was only in service for one year between 1944-1945. After Germany loosing the world war Tiger tanks were retired from service.
Main armament Tiger I vs Tiger II
Both Tiger tanks are equipped with 88 mm KwK canons. Tiger 1 is equipped with KwK 36 canon while tiger 2 is equipped with more advance KwK 43 canon. The kWK 36 model is a modified version of FlaK 36 anti-aircraft (AA) gun. The FlaK 36 is modified to fit in a small space to be fixed to the turret.
The breech block of the canon is designed as a vertical falling wedge. So, the main gun is basically operated as a semi-automatic gun. This mean right after firing the empty shell is automatically ejected and the canon is immediately ready for reloading.
FlaK 36 8.8 mm AA gun
The KwK 43 gun of Tiger 2 has a similar design as Pak 43 anti-tank gun. Pak 43 was used as the main gun of medium and heavy tank destroyers. It is also used as stand-alone artillery gun. The main ammunition used in such cases was APCBC-HE armour piercing ammunition to penetrate enemy tank amour.
Pak 43 Anti-tank gun in waffenträger light tank destroyer
Weight and engine power comparison Tiger A vs Tiger B
Tiger 1 tank has a total mass of 57 T while the combat weight of Tiger 2 is 70T. However, both the engines output a maximum power of 690Hp. Tiger 2 tank is equipped with V-12 Maybach HL 230 P30 engine. This engine is powered with gasoline. The total piston displacement is 21000CC. Maximum torque is 1850 Nm at 2,100 rpm.
Tiger 1 tank is powered with V-12 Maybach HL230 P45 gasoline engine.
Weight to power ratio
Tiger 1 has a weight/power ratio of 9.5 kW/hp while the tiger 2 has 7.5 kW/hp. The maximum speed of tiger B is 41.5 Km/h on road while tiger A has a top speed of 45.5 km/h. In later development Tiger II engine was upgraded with super charging technology and the maximum power upgraded to 1000hp.
Why tiger 2 is slower than tiger 1?
The main reason why tiger 1 is faster than tiger 2 is the B model is heavier. Tiger II has a 185 mm armour while tiger 1 only had a armour of 120 mm. The 120 mm armour is easily penetrable and tanks are more volatile to get destroyed by allied army artillery power.
Tiger II engine and power
As you already know, Tiger II is powered from a V-12 HL 230 P30 engine manufactured by Maybach company of Germany. HL 230 is the successor of HL 210 engine. HL 210 was an engine used in heavy tanks such as tiger I. Unlike the 210 engine the crankcase and block is built with aluminum alloy. Comparing to cast-iron cranks aluminum cranks generate less noise and the reliability is also high.
HL 230 Engine
Engine features HL-230 Tiger II
The engine of tiger II is water cooled petrol engine with a total displacement of 23,000 cubic centimeters. The engine is equipped with 12 cylinders with 1.9L displacement in each. The 12 cylinders are attached in a V shaped block (V-12).
Upgrade to HL-234
Later in development it is proposed to replace the HL-230 with more advance engine HL-234. HL-234 engine use fuel injection technology. This improved the maximum power output fro 690hp to 800-900 hp. With addition of supercharging technology this could be boosted up to 1100-1200hp.
Ammunition used with the Tiger ii main gun KwK 43
Mainly four types of ammunition is used with the KwK 43 gun.
1. Armour piercing capped ballistic cap – High explosive ammo
APCBC-HE ammunition is highly effective against tank armour especially in short range. In 100-500m range this ammunition has a 100% probability of penetrating armours present by the time of WWII. APCBC-HE ammo used with KwK 43 was weighted at 10.4Kg and its muzzle velocity was 1000 m/s.
PzGr. 39/43 (APCBC-HE)
2. Armour piercing composite rigid ammunition
PzGr 40/43 APCR ammunition is a light weight (7.3kg) high accuracy ammunition used with KwK 43 and Pak 43 guns. The main purpose of this ammo type is to penetrate armours in a long distance. With a high muzzle velocity of 1,130 m/s this ammo has a 89% precision at 2000 m range.
3. High explosive anti-tank ammunition
Gr. 39/43 HL is used with the KwK 43 gun for the purpose of penetrating heavy armour. Even though the penetration ability and accuracy is low at long range, this ammunition can penetrate up to 90mm armour in short distance. So, without a doubt this ammo is capable of destroying any medium or light tank in one hit.
4. High explosive ammo
Sprgr 43 high explosive ammo have two main abilities. It can damage a target with a very large explosion. Also, it has fire-causing effects. So, HE ammunition is mainly used to fire on infantry targets and buildings.
Sprgr 43 high explosive used in Tiger 2
Armour performance of Tiger II
Before 1945 (the last year of the war)Tiger II was proved to be indestructible by any tank destroyer or artillery. It was proven to have heavy resistance against all types of ammunition. Especially in the western front Tiger II was able to fear all Allied armies with its indestructible armour.
However, later in the war (in 1945) many new tank models were introduced to the war with the capability of destroying tiger ii tanks. M26 Pershing and M4A3E3 Sherman of US army and late Churchill models of British army was able to carry successful attacks against the mighty Tiger II.
M26 Pershing
Also, Russia conducted tests with their 122mm D-25T howitzer field gun and the tests proved that tiger ii could be destroyed completely with 3-4 successful hits from 500-600m range. The same gun was used in IS-2 series tanks.
D-25T field gun
Tiger II secondary armament
Tiger II was equipped with two type 34 7.92 mm machine guns. MG 34 is a recoil operated machine gun. It is cooled from air. MG 34 is considered as the word’s first GPMG (General purpose machine gun). At the time of deployment MG 34 was known to be the most advance and fearful machine gun in the world.
This gun had the ability to provide light and medium machine gun infantry power. Also, it is adoptable as a anti-aircraft machine gun. The gun is extremely light and weighted only 12 kg.
At the time it provided the highest fire rate which was 900 rounds per minute. This gun has a maximum firing range of 4,700m and the effective range is 200-2,000 meters.
MG 34 of Tiger 2
Combat history of Tiger II
Tiger II first entered the service in 1944. The 503rd Heavy Panzer battalion of 1st company was the first group to use this mighty tank in the battle field. In 18th July 1944 the Tiger II fought its very first battle in battle of Normandy. During its first battle two tanks were completely destroyed.
503 Panzar battalion
In 12th Augest at the Lvov offensive three tanks were destroyed by Soviet T-34 tanks. This battle is significant in the development of Tiger II. Turret hits caused ammunition explosions and caused many fatalities of the crew. Thereafter main gun rounds are prohibited to store in the turret storage.
In April 1945, on the Eastern front 45 Tiger IIs were destroyed. Most of them were not destroyed by the enemy fire. But, due to mechanical failures the crews had to abandon the tanks and to prevent tanks going to enemy hands the crews themselves placed explosives and destroyed those tanks.
Tiger II tank in popular gaming culture
Legendary tiger II tank appears in many games under many occasions. The most popular games are,
- Call of duty : World at war
- Steel division Nromandy 44
- Panzer Corps
- World of Tanks
- Company of Heroes
- Men of War
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Tiger 2 tank in popular gaming culture