Pz.Kpfw. VIII "Maus" The Maus super heavy tank was the largest fully realised armoured vehicle made by the Germans during WWII. With a weight of 188 t., it was a giant which was never to be exceeded, and most likely never will be. The specification set for the vehicle in 1942 was a Panzer, which should weigh at least 100 t., and mount a 15 cm L/40 gun. The gun was later changed to a 12,8 cm L/50, and the length changed until it was set at the 12,8 cm Pak 80 L/55 - the same cannon as the Jagdtiger. 100 grenades were originally to be stored. The vehicle was also to mount a co-axial 7,5 cm gun. The Maus was intended to take over the role of the Panther and Tiger I 1944, together with the Tiger II.

Technical history In 1942/3, the contract for the vehicle was given to the Porsche factories. Hitler and Ferdinand Porsche had some discussions about the vehicle, and Hitler became convinced that the vehicle could not function as a tank. Therefore, the Maus was changed to be a mobile fortification. This was because of Hitlers priorities for a Panzer: heavy armament, then high speed and then armour. Mobility was not mentioned at all! The co-axial weapon was to be the 7,5 cm Kw.K. L/36,5. The number of grenades was changed to 55 for the Pak 80, whereas the 7,5 cm should have 200 grenades. Why the high number of small-calibre grenades was chosen as a priority instead of 12,8 cm grenades is anybody's guess. As it is highly unlikely that 200 grenades would be needed before the vehicle could reload, some of the space should have been given to 12,8 cm grenades. The 7,5 cm canon was placed on the right side of the main canon, with an M.G.42 on the left side. The production was very slow, especially that of the hulls. The planned hull production was very low, with only 2 in November 1943, 4 in December, 6 in January 1944, 8 in February, and after that 10 each month. The turret production was 1 month ahead. The total number of Maus ordered was 120. Already then it was realised that the Maus would not be able to fill any major holes in the Panzer divisions. This would have meant that 22.000 tons of steel was needed - 0.15% of the entire German iron ore production during 1944, including conquered countries! Considering the high fuel consumption, so many Maus Panzers would have meant the waste of a lot of oil. The Maus was to have 24 roadwheels, with 1,100 mm. wide tracks. The road contact surface was to be 5,880 mm. This gave a very high ground pressure - over 50% more than any German tank. The lightest armoured place was the roof and bottom, each with 50 mm. Every other place, the armour was a minimum of 100 mm., with 200+ mm. to the most exposed areas. The Topfblende, which housed the gun, had 250 mm. armour. This meant, that none of the most common western Allied anti-weapons could penetrate ANY of the Maus' armour, and only a few Russian anti-tank guns could have penetrated the armour.   The Maus could destroy most Allied tanks from all angles at over 3,500 metres. The Maus didn't feature any anti-aircraft weapons, but Flakpanzers would have protected the vehicle (in Hitlers imagination), so this was no problem. The Maus featured a 1,540 hp. re-build aircraft engine, which was the limit of what was possible at the time. Despite this, the Maus had a rediculously low maximum speed, and only because of the large fuel capacity (of which some was stored externally in a large cylinder on the back), was the operational radius acceptable. The driving system was electric, which was one of Porsches favorite abilities. The total amount of Maus produced amounted to 1½; one prototype, without a turret, and another prototype with. This was because of the halt of the production to give way for more realistic tanks. The crew consisted of one commander, one gunner, 2 loaders, one driver and one radio operator. Many hulls were under construction when the project was cancelled, and were not re-used for other purposes. Operational history No Maus were ever in combat. Many reports state so, but evidence shows that the Maus with a turret was blown up, destroying the hull. The testing hull was then equipped with the turret, and exhibited in the Kubinka tank museum. It is stripped of all equipment, and is nothing but an empty shell. It was for a while used as a target, but was not destroyed (which would probably have taken too long a time). An even larger tank, the 1000-ton Krupp P 1000 "Ratte", started construction but was cancelled before completion. It would have carried two 280mm guns (mounted in the same type of gun turret used in Scharnhorst and Gneisenau warships) a single 128mm gun, eight 20mm Flak 38 anti-aircraft guns and two 15mm Mauser MG 151/15 guns. The Ratte made the Maus look like its namesake. The Ratte was to be a nightmare machine and its scale still boggles the mind. It would have been 35 meters long, almost four times as wide as the Maus, and 11 meters high. Armor would have been similar or possibly slightly thicker than that seen on the Maus, but of course covering much more surface area. The tank would have been propelled along on a total of six 1.2 meter wide tread assemblies, three on each side of the tank. This means that the treads on one side would have been only slightly narrower than the entirety of a Maus. No less than eight Daimler E-boat engines would have provided the tank's requisite 16,000 horsepower.   The number of crew members is unknown but would have likely topped fifty men, with adequate machineguns studding the hull to engage infantry from all directions.   The Ratte would have been able to drive over trucks, houses, and even the mighty Maus tank with ease. Its guns would have leveled buildings, blasted craters ten meters across in the earth, or sunk an unfortunate naval cruiser loitering a little too close to shore. The term P.1000 was a reference to the estimated thousand ton weight of the Ratte, but odds are it would have been much closer to 2000 tons.   The tank would have been extremely slow - probably less than the paltry 20 kph the Maus could manage - and difficult to command effectively in combat. While its relative invulnerability would have made up for some of these shortcomings but something that big and that slow would have been destroyed one way or another.

The Panzerkampfwagen VIII Maus (Sd.Kfz 205) was a German super-heavy tank design, and the heaviest tank to reach complete working prototype in World War II. The basic design known as the VK7001/Porsche Type 205 was suggested by Ferdinand Porsche to Adolf Hitler in June of 1942, who subsequently approved it. The design up to then had been the culmination of work done by Porsche who had won the contract for the heavy tank that March. Work on the design began in earnest; the first prototype, to be ready in 1943 was initially to receive the name Mammut (Ger. "Mammoth"). This was reportedly changed to Mäuschen (Little Mouse) in December of 1942 and finally Maus (Mouse) in February of 1943.   Overview The tank's hull was 10.1 metres long, 3.67 metres wide and 3.66 metres tall. Weighing about 188 tonnes (or about 207 short tons), the Maus' main armament was a 128 mm cannon with a coaxial 75 mm gun and steel armour ranging from 60-240 mm. A total of nine were in various stages of completion when the war ended with two completed. The Maus would have had a crew of either 5 or 6 and a total production of between 150 and 200 was planned for one version of it.   The principal problem in development of the Maus was finding a powerful enough engine for its weight that could be carried in the tank. Though the design called for a maximum speed of 20 km/h, no engine was found that could power the prototype to more than 13 km/h under ideal conditions. The weight also made it impossible to cross most bridges. It could ford due to its size or submerge and use a snorkel. Ferdinand, Sd. Kfz. 184 'Elefant' 'Jagdmaus' Projekt The Maus was designed from the start to use the "electric transmission" idea Ferdinand Porsche had used in his attempt to win the production contract for the Tiger I tank that Henschel & Sohn of Kassel won, which ended up with 90 "Porsche Tiger" hulls remaining unused, and were used instead to serve as the hull of the Elefant tank destroyer. The gasoline engine (the later prototypes were to use a diesel engine instead) in the Maus prototypes, that drove the massive electrical generator, together occupied the entire rear two-thirds of the Maus' hull, cutting off the forward driver's compartment in the hull from any sort of direct access to the turret from within the tank. Each metre-wide track had its own electric motor mounted in the rear of the hull; the tracks had no direct "mechanical" connection to the internal combustion engine that powered the Maus.   German Jagdtiger VI B (Sd Kfz 186) of Henschel was the biggest tank destroyer of WW2 The amount of armour was substantial, the front lower hull (glacis plate) was about 200 mm (8 in) thick, sloped at 35 degrees to the vertical. The sides of the hull were 180 mm (7 in) and the rear 160 mm (6.3 in). The turret was 240 mm (9.5 in) to the front and 200 mm to the sides with a roof of 60 mm (2.3 in) As a result of its low power and huge bulk the Maus was relatively slow moving and logistically demanding, but could potentially have been a formidable weapon in certain defensive positions where extensive movement was not required, and where its massive weight would serve to its advantage by making it a stable gun platform. In an assault, it would have been less useful but it had the benefit of a turret where a vehicle like the 128 mm armed Jagdtiger did not. It could be considered similar to British infantry tanks which sacrificed speed (but not necessarily cross-country ability) for armor protection. This was not a major hinderance because by the time it was built, the German army had almost entirely abandoned Blitzkrieg tactics. Development history The initial plan for the Maus was for the prototype to have been completed by the summer of 1943, with monthly production scheduled to run at five vehicles per month after delivery of the prototype. The work on the Maus would be divided between Krupp, responsible for the chassis, armament and turret and Alkett, who would be responsible for final assembly.   The Maus tank was originally designed to weigh approximately 100 tons and be armed with a 128 mm main gun and a 75 mm co-axial secondary gun. Additional armament solutions were studied including various versions of 150 mm and 128 mm guns. Hitler himself in January of 1943 insisted that the armament be a 128 mm main gun with a coaxial 75 mm gun.   By May 1943, a wooden mockup of the final Maus configuration was ready and presented to Hitler, who approved it for mass production, ordering a first series of 150. At this point, the estimated weight of the Maus was 188 tons. However, there is a story that concerns the main armament of the Maus being changed by Hitler who said that the 128 mm gun looked like a ´toy gun´ when compared to the tank, causing the 128 mm to be replaced by a 150 mm gun.   Development work on the Maus continued, but in October 1943 Hitler cancelled the order, which was followed in November by the order to stop development of the Maus altogether but to continue the construction of the prototypes.   The first, turretless prototype (V1) was assembled by Alkett in December 1943. Tests started the same month, with a mock turret fitted of the same weight as the real turret.   The principal problem with the Maus that emerged from this test was its power-to-weight ratio. There was no engine powerful enough to give it anything like the 20 km/h demanded by the design specifications. The modified gasoline-fuelled Daimler-Benz MB 509 engine used in the prototype was only able to move at 13 km/h and only under ideal conditions. The suspension system used by the Maus also had to be adjusted to enable it to take the tank's weight.   Another issue found was that the Maus was simply too heavy to cross bridges. As a result an alternative system was developed, where the Maus would instead ford the rivers it needed to cross. Due to its size it could ford relatively deep streams, but for deeper ones it was to submerge and drive across the river bottom. The solution required tanks to be paired up. One Maus would supply electrical power to the crossing vehicle via a cable until it reached the other side. The crew would receive air through a large snorkel, which was sufficiently long for the tank to go 45 feet (13 m) underwater. In March 1944 the second prototype, the V2, was delivered. It differed in many details from the V1 prototype. In mid-1944, the V2 prototype was fitted with a powerplant and the first produced Maus turret. This turret was fitted with a 128 mm KwK 44 L/55 gun, with coaxial 75 mm KwK 44 L/36.5 gun and a 7.92 mm MG34 for anti-aircraft armament. The V1 prototype was supposed to be fitted with the second produced turret, but this never happened.   By July 1944, Krupp was in the process of producing four more Maus hulls, but they were ordered to halt production and scrap these. Krupp stopped all work on it in August 1944. Meanwhile, the V2 prototype started tests in September 1944, fitted with a Daimler-Benz MB 517 diesel engine, new electric steering system and a Skoda Works designed running gear and tracks. There was as also a special railroad car made for transporting the Maus prototypes.   Operational use The working Maus prototypes remained at Kummersdorf and at the proving grounds in Böblingen. In the last weeks of the war the V1 with the dummy turret was captured by the advancing Soviet forces in the vicinity of the western batteries of the Kummersdorf artillery firing grounds. It had been mechanically sabotaged by the Germans before abandoning it. The V2 prototype with the armed turret was dispatched to Berlin for its defence but broke down at Stamplager, near Zossen. It was blown up by its crew to prevent it from falling into enemy hands. It did not see any combat. What might have been..... The Russian Commander of Armored and Mechanized troops ordered hull V1 to be mated with the turret of V2. The Russians used six 18t half-tracks to pull the 55 ton turret off the burnt out hull. The combined V1 hull/V2 turret vehicle was completed in Germany and sent back to the USSR for further testing. It arrived there on May 4, 1946. When further testing was completed the vehicle was taken over by the Kubinka Tank Museum for storage where it is now on display.   It appears that the capture of this prototype had little impact on post-war Soviet tank development. Soviet tank design continued to concentrate on strictly limiting size and weight. The next-generation Soviet tanks had similar levels of protection and armament. The IS-3 heavy tank was armed with a 122mm gun, but weighed under 50 tonnes. The T-54 main battle tank, which started production in 1947, provided 200 mm of frontal turret armor, 120 mm of frontal hull armor and a 100mm main gun, while weighing in at less than 40 tons.

Panzerkampfwagen "Maus"   Type: Ridiculously Gigantic Tank     Specific Features: Weighing in at a scale-breaking 188 tons and measuring over 10 meters in length, the Maus is the largest tank built to this day. The M1A1 Abrams, by comparison, weighs in at a mere 67 tons. Of course the Abrams can actually move. With a top speed of only 20 kilometers per hour on roads the Maus also has the dubious distinction of being one of the slowest tanks built during the Second World War. Not to mention that if it actually drove on any road it would leave behind it a terrain of buckled asphalt. The armor on the turret's front, the thickest armor on most tanks, was almost a quarter of a meter thick and was completely impervious to any anti-tank weapons of the day. Unfortunately, it was vulnerable to direct strikes from heavy bombs, which just happened to be falling like raindrops thanks to the epic bombing campaigns of the United States and Great Britain. More importantly the Maus was vulnerable to engineering charges, throwing a tread, or being immobilized by mines, all very real risks for even much faster and more maneuverable tanks. Even the armament of the Maus was ridiculous by any standard. The Maus mounted a 128mm main gun that would punch through enemy armor like a thrown rock punches through a wall made out of gelatin. To augment this offensive capacity the Maus also mounted a 75mm cannon designed to fire explosive rounds at infantry.   History: Development on the Maus began in 1942 with Porsche of Stuttgart - THE Porsche, using slave labor and dirty money to design a tank for the Nazis. Two prototypes were built and tested in 1943 and 1944. One of the tanks was believed to be completed but was either destroyed to avoid capture or destroyed while attempting to flee from the testing facility. Some amateur historians like to believe that it actually did fight in combat, but chances are it broke down or got stuck in a ditch and was destroyed by the fleeing personnel. Thus ended the brief career of evil of one of the most brutal engines of war ever made.   The story of the super heavy tank 'Maus' is only now beginning to become clear. With the fall of the Soviet Union, more and more information about the "Soviet side" of World War II has come to light. With that information, the history books must be re-written to reflect new information.   The official line in the West regarding the fate of both Maus prototypes was that "they were blown up at Kummersdorf" to prevent their capture by the Soviets. Though from one source or another there are a myriad of stories, including that one was destroyed by a rampaging British Typhoon. Though, in a war where every Panzer IV became a Tiger in the minds of the Western Allies, perhaps every Tiger II became a "Maus" upon further reflection. With the fall of the Iron Curtain, however, it was revealed that the Soviet tank museum at Kubinka had a Maus on display. Further examination of the vehicle suggested that it combined the hull of one prototype with the turret of the second. According to a new reference about the Kummersdorf proving ground, in the latter half of 1944 both Maus prototypes arrived at Kummersdorf for testing after final assembly of the turret and chassis at F. Krupp. As the front approached nearer and nearer to the testing facility, both Maus tanks were sent out to engage the approaching Soviets. The vehicles were approaching Wünsdorf (crossing what is now highway 96) when the first Maus was disabled because of damage to the drive mechanism. This vehicle was later captured by the Red Army. The second Maus managed to proceed a few kilometers further before the crew destroyed it. The Mouse was designed to ford up to 45 feet of water. To do so, the tank was made watertight. A trunk was fitted over the hull escape hatch, and trunk extensions bolted over the engine vents. The trunk contained an escape ladder, and was divided into three sections; the number used varying with water depth. A second Mouse supplied electricity to the fording Mouse motors through a cable attached to the rear, as shown.   The Maus was a huge and impractical vehicle. The Waffenamt was leery of it because the producer, Dr. Porsche. Ferdinand Porsche was notorious for placing a higher value on technical brilliance than serviceability. The petrol-electric drive used in every Tiger prototype designed by Porsche was carried over into the Maus design. There does seem to be one important difference between previous petrol-electric designs and the one in the Maus, the Maus design actually seems to have performed well in tests. Dr. Porsche was also very demanding of his engineers. He had promised that the vehicle would "turn in place" just like any other tracked vehicle. Given the size and weight of Maus, the army was understandably skeptical. Just prior to a demonstration, some of the engineers became a bit overzealous and took the vehicle out to test it. They excitedly called Dr. Porsche indicating that Maus had indeed almost turned in place. Dr. Porsche was furious, and rousted the engineer in charge of the sysem out of his sick-bed and demanded an answer to this "problem." After a bit of looking, one spur gear was corrected and, true to Dr. Porsche's word, Maus could turn in place.   Maus was far too heavy to use most bridges, so provision was made for river and stream crossing underwater. As the drive was electric, one Maus could sit on the bank with power cut to the electric drive and power the fording Maus via electrical cable using its petrol engine.   Armored protection on the Maus was amazing. Every surface which would be targeted by other tanks was protected by no less than 180mm or armor, which maximum protection reaching 240mm. The top was, however, relatively vulnerable as protection was typically 40mm. As with most tanks, anti-aircraft protection would have been an absolute must. The ever-increasing weight of Maus prohibited the use of the trademark external torsion-bar suspension developed by Porsche. The bogie system used instead was developed by Skoda. As with the Panzerkampfwagen E100, Maus was to be ultimately fitted with a 15cm KwK44 or a 17cm KwK44. Flakzwilling 8.8cm auf E-100/Maus In the latter stages of World War II, Allied air superiority on all fronts severely hampered German forces, especially armor. Aircraft like the Sturmovik, Typhoon, and P-47 wreaked havoc among the Panzer Divisions. With the late-war interest in super heavy Panzers like the Maus and E-100 (and one could also include the Tiger II and Jagdtiger in this category), the need for complimentary air defense was clear. Towards the end of the war, Soviet forces discovered blueprints for a turret mounting twin 8.8cm flak guns which was to be mounted on either the Panzerkampfwagen Maus or the E-100. Later in 1945 a mild steel mock up of the turret was reportedly discovered. Because the flak vehicle would utilize the same chassis as the tanks it was protecting, maintenance and spare part inventories could be rationalized considerably.   It was envisioned that each Maus or E-100 battalion would include at least three of these vehicles. The Flakzwilling itself would be operated by a crew of eight: a driver, commander, gunner, mechanic, and four loaders for the rapid-firing flak cannons. For anti-aircraft operations, the three flak vehicles would be directed by a fourth vehicle. This command vehicle would have been equipped with a mobile range and altitude finder as well as a target tracking system. Unfortunately, no records as to the nature of this vehicle's systems, nor what chassis it would have been constructed upon, have surfaced.

PzKpfw “Maus” super heavy tank (1943) The last German tank of WW2 Tiger and Maus T34 and Maus A7V. The first German tank, 1917       The first German battle tank used in WW1