Tanks on Safehold

I've been re-reading through Fiery Trials and I'm wondering given the amount of Automotive manufactories popping up in various nations,if it's possible to re-produce some of the better tanks of WW2? As I'd love to see the first Charisian Panzer Division in action. I chose WW2 tanks as I think anything else might be pushing the boundaries more than they'd like,and plenty of good Medium tanks in there to pick from,including my personal favorite medium,The German Panther tank..

A couple of thoughts:

We may see Charis playing around with an early tank design in the next book, but I don't think we will see Charis deploy a tank until and unless someone else does first. Even then, I think the development of tanks will follow along the same lines as that found in our history - albeit with Charis' tanks being finished products extremely well-built.

My prediction is that Dohlar will be the kingdom that "introduces" the tank. Upon returning to Dohlar, young Lywys Whytmyn will shortly thereafter have an "inspiration" about Charis' steam-automotives, and start asking around about whether Dohlar could build one that is armored and mounts a small piece of artillery. As Siddarmark will be descending into whatever hell its on the road to, and Desnair and South Harchong are not exactly friendly neighbors, Dohlar's introduction of a basic tank (perhaps in response to an invasion by a fascist Siddarmark), would make sense.

After that, we will see Charis shortly thereafter introduce its own light tank, one that is superior to Dohlar's but in a matter of degree, not kind. This tank will also be exported to the United Provinces, allowing them to further cement their territory.

Charis, of course, will also be introducing a cross-country infantry vehicle at the same time as they introduce their tank. And, perhaps this infantry vehicle will have mounting brackets for the "tripod bazooka". Who knows, there may even be a rotating cupola with an early (and slower-firing) 20mm gun. If each of these is capable of carrying a squad (13 people, perhaps 14 if a dedicated driver is added), and travelling across decent terrain at 20-30 MPH with a 200+ mile range, you could see mechanized formations.

And, of course, it is likely that Charis will be hard at work on creating the first medium tank. Perhaps taking the best of the Panzer III, Sherman, and T-34. And it shouldn't have to be pointed out, but Charis will also be ahead of the curve when it comes to design counter-measures for tanks. Whether they be tripod (or shoulder) mounted rockets, special mines, or something else the fertile imagination of RFC cooks up it will be fascinating.

The thing that limited the size of Tanks on earth was the with of the standard size of railroad track/cars. With the standard size of rail being set by the standard size of horse drawn carriages... Earth set the size to be the width of two horses side by side. But what about the distance between two Draft Lizards pulling a cart being set as the width of the Safehold rails? tanks are going to be MASIVE!

mhicks wrote:The thing that limited the size of Tanks on earth was the with of the standard size of railroad track/cars. With the standard size of rail being set by the standard size of horse drawn carriages... Earth set the size to be the width of two horses side by side. But what about the distance between two Draft Lizards pulling a cart being set as the width of the Safehold rails? tanks are going to be MASIVE!

Do we know what gauge Charis has gone with for their railroads? I would assume that Siddarmark and the United Provinces, at least, followed suit - although maybe Siddarmark went narrower due to concerns about their mountain passes? And did Dohlar follow Charis' lead or go with their own gauge?

I don't remember if he ever mentioned the gage of the track. I had always imagined the standard Terran gages and how we got them and then started to think about how wide a draft dragon (sorry about calling it a lizard) was and how wide two would be and how wide those carts were.

Rocket engines for the space shuttle are the size they are because of the size of train tunnels between the production site in Utah and the launch site in Florida. Military equipment is also limited to railroad restrictions for fast transport.

If the tanks can be wider because the gage of track is wider... some super wide tanks are possible. Wide enough for driver, loader, gunner, commander, 2nd gunner, flagger (radio man). Extra thick armor, wider tracks to distribute the weight.

Bolos?

Daryl wrote:Bolos?

What's running the AI? Can't use electronics after all.

Actually, what would be an obvious development would be armored trains (armored steam locomotive, etc.) and railroad guns. Won't see anything as excessive as "Dora" or "Heavy Gustuv" (with a 32" barrel).

Robert_A_Woodward wrote:

Daryl wrote:Bolos?

What's running the AI? Can't use electronics after all.

Actually, what would be an obvious development would be armored trains (armored steam locomotive, etc.) and railroad guns. Won't see anything as excessive as "Dora" or "Heavy Gustuv" (with a 32" barrel).

Which isn't all that useful because how do you protect the tracks?

Robert_A_Woodward wrote:

Daryl wrote:Bolos?

What's running the AI? Can't use electronics after all.

The original Bolos (named after the Bolo division of GM - that produced tanks during WWII) didn't have any AI - so I could see Merlin suggesting the name as a kind of homage to old Terra)

Loren Pechtel wrote:

Robert_A_Woodward wrote:
Actually, what would be an obvious development would be armored trains (armored steam locomotive, etc.) and railroad guns. Won't see anything as excessive as "Dora" or "Heavy Gustuv" (with a 32" barrel).

Which isn't all that useful because how do you protect the tracks?

Armored trains were used a lot in Eastern Europe (WWI, Russian Civil War, and WWII), see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Armoured_ ... rld_War_II