The only thing I know about this is that it was German and was used a few times on the Western front in WW2.
No Idea mate. I wonder if it's something to do with mine clearing? Perhaps the German version of the 'garden roller'. Pretty vague I know. Hopefully someone can shed light on it. cheers
That would be the (possibly) 1945 Krupp 'Kugelpanzer' preserved at Kubinka. Probably a one man observation post. Good explanation here: Krupp Kugelpanzer With the honest admission that nobody's really sure what it is or what it's history may be, presumably something the USSR 'picked up' as they rolled across proving grounds like Kummersdorf etc. Cheers, Adam
There was a very similar device to this developed in WW1 by the French; for the life of me I cannot seem to find a photo of it. It was small and shielded one man, and the idea was to roll it across No Man's Land.
Paul, do you know if these were ever actually used in battle? I'd have loved to have seen the faces on the Germans when they saw that rolling across no mans land towards them.
The British experimented with similar devices (I think interwar, but could even be ww2... can't remember) suggested by Martel or one of those other 'free thinkers'. There's a quite funny/alarming picture in one of the Fletcher books showing a rear view of Tommies pushing a little fleet of them up a hill, sort of like the one above but with a little more armour down the side of the crawling men... can't find the picture now.
I don't think they were ever used beyond training grounds; I doubt if there were many volunteers to get inside them in a 'live' situation... !!
Been trying to work out how Paul's one-manner worked... Like this apparently, I was 180 degrees off the mark .
