The M103 heavy tank (officially designated 120mm gun combat tank M103, initially T43) [3] was a heavy tank that served in the United States Army and the United States Marine Corps during the Cold War. Introduced in 1957, it served until 1974, by which time evolution of the concept of a main battle tank considered heavy tanks obsolete.

2021年2月5日 · The elliptical hull shape gave the T43 better armor than the T34 while weighing 10 US tons less. Combined with a 48,000 psi gun, the T43 seemed to be the way to go to counter the Soviet IS-3 tank menace.

2020年5月30日 · The hull was the first major change compared to the 1941 tank. The hull had the same front slope and connecting beam, but the design was different. The sides of the hull weren't sloped, which made it simpler to produce and reduced the size of the tank, helping to make up for the thicker armour.

The main armament was to be a 120-mm gun with quick-change tube mounted in a sloped turret on an elliptical hull; the designs of both turret and hull were to be worked out so as to present a minimum area of flat surface to enemy fire.

2019年6月4日 · The T-34's front, despite its having very good quality hull armor (a multiplier of 1.25, it appears, from back-calculating WaPruf1 stats, which represented the German (!!) opinion) was the frontal weak point, because of overmatching.

The T43 design represented the pinnacle of U.S. Army tank engineering of the late 1940s. The heavy tank proved fairly popular with its crews, who above all respected the powerful armament it...

The M103 Heavy Tank (officially designated 120mm Gun Combat Tank M103, initially T43) was a heavy tank that served in the United States Army and the United States Marine Corps during the Cold War. Introduced in 1957, it served through 1974, by which time evolution of the concept of a main battle tank had rendered heavy tanks obsolete.

2019年1月6日 · The design would be heavily influenced by the in-service T-34 and carried over its stout, angled hull facings while mating this to an all-new, more spacious three-man turret containing the main armament.

The T-43 turret was adapted to mount a more effective 85mm gun, and to fit on the T-34 tank hull. The T-43 project was cancelled, and the new T-34-85 was put into production instead.

This time the T43 was to have a elliptically shaped cast hull and turret, which was believed to give the same levels of protection at lower weight. This was examined in October and December 1949, and the new specifications were then laid out in OCM 33333 on 24 April 1950.