Talk:3.7 cm Pak 36

message: What was the PaK 35? Drutt (talk) 01:08, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: No such gun Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 04:57, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

text: I haven't a reference handy—I'm working on French weapon at the moment—so I do not want to state this authoritatively right now—in a way, yes. The original design for a 3,7cm A/T Gun went back to the early 1920s (1924, I think?), resulting in the Pak.36, which was built for horse transport. The weapon was updated for motorised transport beginning in 1933 (I believe), resulting in the Pak.35/36 (or Pak 35/36, or Panzerabwehrkanone Modell 35/36, &c). That's my "general understanding". It oughtn't to be too difficult to run down a reliable source, or even find the Waffenamt specifications. I should think.
Ranya (talk) 08:01, 20 May 2020 (UTC)
thread_title: PaK 35

message: How many were built in total? Drutt (talk) 01:18, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Production

message: When did production begin, and when did it enter service with the German Army? Drutt (talk) 01:09, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Dates

message: The way the armour penetration data is explained here is fairly ambiguous. 
"PaK 36 can penetrate 35mm sloped armor at 30 degrees"
I do not believe the author meant to say "35mm sloped armor" because there is no other reference to the slope. For instance if he had said "it could penetrate 35mm of armour sloped at 30 degrees" then it would make sense because there is actually a way to calculate the effective armour thickness of that.
Typically (and I have read Ian Hogg's book in his reference section) armour penetration is reported thusly:
100 meters: 35mm at 30 degrees.
It doesn't mean that the armour is sloped 30 degrees, it means that it assumes the round strikes the target at a thirty degree angle. If it was an absolutely perfectly flat shot and the armour just happened to be a 30 degree slope then yes this would be a correct reference. The reason it is reported typically in degrees is because of vertical differences, range, trajectory and other considerations.
Long winded and technical but I would suggest changing this to "the Pak36 could penetrate 35mm of armour at a 30 degree angle."  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Drakhl (talk • contribs) 12:04, 6 April 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Armour Penetration 

message: Yes, in fact, the Pak 36 was just as good as nothing vs. the T-34, which the Germans had already discovered, which is why they had completely phased out the Pak 36 and replaced it with the 5 cm PaK 38 and pawned off all their old PaK 36s on the Romanians, who already had poor morale and training. So to answer your question, even WWI era obsolete divisional artillery pieces (similar to what the Soviets were doing with the 102mm and 152mm guns) would have been a massive improvement. Hell, even giving them a bunch of Tellermines, Molotov cocktails and Stielhandgranate bundles would have been a major improvement. It probably would not have saved them, since their morale was already terrible, but it would have been a major improvement. The panicked rout that ensued when they met the T-34s of the Russians during Operation Uranus was widely attributed to their inability to even destroy a single tank. Court Appointed Shrub (talk) 04:25, 29 August 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Clarification re: question about the Romanians at Stalingrad 

message: I seriously doubt the T-34 or KV-1 (or any tank of the era) was in fact "invulnerable" to the Pak 36. Its frontal armor was theoretically unpiercable (but even that entirely depends on the actual quality of the armor and many other factors that combine to make reality sometimes differ from the expected result), but there were weak spots even in the front glacis plate, and the side and rear armor were another matter entirely, not to mention the damage that could be done to the suspension and roadwheels and track. "Invulnerable" means that the tank is able to totally defeat any possible projectile from that weapon under any circumstances, and I seriously doubt that is the case. A 75mm M3 gun cannot penetrate the glacis of a Tiger, yet there are cases of them being killed, even from the front, definitely from the side or rear. Even true of the Tiger II. I would say "the frontal armor of tanks like the T-34 and KV-1 was largely invulnerable to the fire of the Pak 36". That is actually factual, whereas saying the tankitself is "invulnerable" to the gun is almost certainly an untrue statement. There are plenty of places on a tank that can be penetrated or damaged by a projectile that would have no effect on its main armor. Hell, the Panther was being knocked out by 14.5mm anti-tank rifles, even though its frontal armor was able to (theoretically_ shrug off 76mm and 17 pounder rounds.
I have also yet to see any concrete evidence that the nickname "door knocker" (etc) was actually coined to be derogatory towards the Pak 36 and to reflect its inability to penetrate enemy tanks, aside from some author interpreting that as being the troops intent. It may well have been the meaning after the Pak 36 began to show its obsolescence, but it could have just as easily been a darkly humorous name for it coined when it was still considered a perfectly effective anti-armor weapon. "Door knocker" can just as easily suggest a device expected to rudely awaken the enemy crew when a shell comes crashing into their tank as a device that is so weak it won't do any more than knock on the door. I have seen people refer to door breachers and breaching guns as "door knockers" as well, and not because they are incapable of opening doors.
64.223.159.241 (talk) 13:33, 21 May 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Invulnerable"?