"Accuracy & penetration of PFs, PIATs, et al?" Topic

Can someone kindly point me to online statistics on the accuracy, ranges, and penetration capabilities of the various infantry AT weapons, such as panzerfausts, panzerschrecks, PIATS, bazookas, etc.?

They all hit on a 6…

They all hit on a 6

HA!

The Panzerfaust 60 had a range limit of approximately 60 meters, but it could penetrate 200mm of RHA. As for the PIAT, it was not effective beyond 100 yards and could only penetrate about 102mm of RHA. I think one had to be rather close to hit anything.

Slope and angle of attack could influence the penetration of these HEAT projectiles. The T34 was notorious for surviving panzerfaust hits. The warhead would glance off the sloped armor and detonate harmlessly.

A lot of folks felt you were incredibly lucky to hit anything beyond 40 yards with a PIAT.

mjc

I was hoping for some test data, neatly arranged in a pretty chart.

"official test data" does not correlate to actual performance -- especially where these things were concerned.

You needed to get awfully close to hit with any reliability. Even then it didn't hurt to be lucky.

mjc

"official test data" does not correlate to actual performance

neither does an uncredited "A lot of folks felt…" provide evidence either.

Use the Message Boards search facility for posts on each of the weapons – you'll find hoary old chestnuts but also the links you are looking for.

PIAT link here:

link

Cheers
Mark

"Evidence!!"

The PIAT is a freekin Spigot Mortar!

In general use, the PIAT had a rated range of about 100 m, but that was considered extreme, and it was typically fired at much shorter ranges. According to some wartime British documents, the 3 lb (1.4 kg) HEAT warhead could penetrate 102 mm of armour at a 30 degree angle, although this was considered overly optimistic, and 4 inches (102 mm) at a 90 degree angle was considered to be a more realistic penetration figure. Indeed, there seems to be some disagreement between wartime sources on the PIAT's actual performance – earlier British documents often state a figure of 75 mm, whereas later, most often post-war documents state the figures of 100 mm or more. This was only just sufficient to defeat the frontal armour of the older German tanks, remaining more effective against their side and rear armor. The PIAT could also function in a mortar-like role, where the shell was fired in a parabolic arc up to 350 m. The PIAT was also widely used in the "house-breaking" role, being used to blast openings through walls to permit the entry of an assault team.

Early use in Sicily proved that a "perfect" hit was required or the round would not detonate! The bombs it fired were quite sensitive, due to the special firing mechanism, and if dropped could explode. Hence some bombs were given special caps over the ignition device to prevent this. Also, the bomb had to be positioned correctly or it would not fire and would have to be removed whilst the PIAT was re-cocked, taking time before it could be fired again.

Although the PIAT was theoretically able to penetrate approximately 100mm (4 inches) of armor, field experience during the Allied invasion of Sicily proved otherwise. These shortcomings were substantiated by trials conducted during 1944. During these trials, a skilled user was unable to hit a target more than 60% of the time at 100 yards, and faulty fuses meant that only 75% of the bombs fired detonated on-target.

Hmmmm… that means a skilled user under ideal circumstances has a 15% chance of firing a round at 100 yards that is going to detonate on a stationary target! Wonder what kind of numbers the average Tommy in the field was putting up?

YouTube link

Just look at how this thing jerks when you fire it. I have nothing but admiration for the men that had to use this weapon. It was as much a menace to the men using it as the enemy!

Oh yeah! Sources!!

Bishop, Chris (2002). The Encyclopedia of Weapons of World War II: The Comprehensive Guide to Over 1,500 Weapons Systems, Including Tanks, Small Arms, Warplanes, Artillery, Ships and Submarines. Sterling Publishing Company, Inc. ISBN 1586637622.

Bull, Stephen; Dennis, Peter; Delf, Brian; Chappell, Mike; Windrow, Martin (2004). World War II Infantry Tactics. Osprey Publishing. ISBN 1841766631.

Copp, Terry (2004). Fields of Fire: The Canadians in Normandy. University of Toronto Press. ISBN 0802037801.

Hogg, Ian (1995). Tank Killers: Anti-Tank Warfare by Men and Machines. Pan Macmillan. ISBN 0330353160.

Weeks, John (1975). Men Against Tanks: A History of Anti-Tank Warfare. David & Charles. ISBN 0715369091.

And . . .

Jeremy Clarkson made the remark on the PIAT in a documentary that "it was a botched piece of design" and "virtually useless against all known sorts of German armor".

Yeah, I know, what does Jeremy know about PIATs?

His father-in-law is VC holder Major Robert Cain who, while standing in the open, held his position until [the first German tank] was 100 yards away, whereupon he fired at it. The tank immediately returned fire with its machine gun and wounded Cain, who took refuge in a nearby shed from where he fired another round, which exploded beneath the tank and disabled it. The crew abandoned the vehicle but all were gunned down as they bailed out. Cain fired at the second tank, but the bomb was faulty and exploded directly in front of him. It blew him off his feet and left him blind with metal fragments in his blackened face.

Here's a bit more on Cain:

Cain and his men flew out to Arnhem as part of the Second Lift on the following day. Upon landing he immediately set out to find B Company, who were presently moving forward to help the 1st Para Brigade, but he wasn't able to resume command until late on the following morning, when they were involved in vicious fighting in a dell around the area of the St. Elizabeth Hospital. The South Staffords were being heavily attacked by tank and self-propelled guns, but they weren't able to bring up any anti-tank guns to repel them. Mortars were effectively being fired at point blank range upon German infantry, but the Staffords had to rely on PIAT's to deal with the armor. Lieutenant Georges Dupenois kept several tanks at bay with his PIAT, while Major Jock Buchanan and Cain drew a lot of enemy fire by running around searching for ammunition for him. Cain did not believe that any tanks were actually disabled during the action, but the hits did encourage them to withdraw; even firing at the turrets with Bren guns forced them to move.

Now I could be wrong here but Cain's outfit was considered a bit better than the average British infantryman, so I'll go out on a limb here and posit that perhaps Cain's outfit might be better trained and more experienced than the average Tommy?

link

You can fantasize about getting a "perfect hit" with this thing at 100 yards all you want. I've seen them shoot this thing and I'm amazed they hit anything -- consistently -- beyond 25 yards!

Sorry Mark. You can stick with your testing numbers. It is information created for a purpose.

Me? The actual performance of this weapon can only be described as dismal. I'll stick with the statements of the men that used it and actual performance on the battlefield when I do my evaluation of the weapon.

Just seems more relevant to me.

mjc

Good stuff quid, thanks for posting that.

How come no one mentioned the "Super" PIAT, the one used in FOW. It was apparently rocket assisted as it can be seen on the cover of their "Bridge to Far" source book with flames coming out of the muzzle. Probably much more accurate.

"PIAT link here:"

They certainly make a few curious statements in that clip like stating that "The PIAT and the Bazooka still had one big problem – neither could really fire a projectile fast enough to penetrate the ever-thicker armor of tanks because three-quarters of the firing charge was lost in neutralizing the recoil." He then goes on and says something about the solution being the hollow charge…

If I'm not mistaken, the Bazooka was designed around the hollow charge from the beginning and was rocket-propelled – not recoilless (as he also indicates the PIAT was!). Just another fact-filled Discovery Channel production.

I almost bought a PIAT at a gun show once. It was much heavier than it looked and I really would have been unhappy to have been tasked with carrying it.

60% x 75% = 45%.

One definition I've seen mentioned in the past states that "effective range" means that 50% of the shots made will be on target.

Not sure all nationalities use the same definition, but it is at least something to consider if more detailed info is unavailable.

From John D. Salt's compendium of War Office reports -

WO 291/153 The effectiveness of PIAT shooting

"User performance with the PIAT is dependent on the accuracy of shooting, the proportion of fuzes
detonating on hitting the tank, and the effect of the bomb on various parts of a tank. Trials have been
carried out which give information on the first two of these points."
3 serials were fired, one by "average" trained soldiers and 2 by above-average users, one of staff from AORS 6. The results should therefore be regarded as an upper bound on possible performance. The serials were fired using an inert bomb with identical ballistics to the HE/AT round. The target was a Covenanter tank moving at about 10 mph, either crossing at 70 to 110 yards, approaching at 110 to 65
yards, or receding at 35 to 110 yards.

Overall percentages of hits were:

Target Rounds fired Hits % hits
Crossing 172 103 60
Approaching 57 20 35
Receding 54 39 72
All 283 162 57

The percentage of hits "…is noticeably greater with crossing and receding targets, and firers put this down to the 'sense of hurry' that seems to exist when a tank is fast approaching. This appears to be a genuine effect, and not due to chance errors."

Percentages of hits on 1st, 2nd and 3rd shots were:
Target 1st 2nd 3rd
Crossing 59 67 55
Approaching 28 42 39
Receding 80 79 53
All 56 64 51

"There is no great difference between the percentage of hits with first, second and third shots, although the proportion is slightly greater with the second."

Percentages of hits at different ranges were:

Target Less than 85 yards More than 85 yards
Crossing 70 48
Approaching 42 24
Receding 80 68

In the case of receding targets, the range bands are less than and more than 65 yards.

"The effect of range on the percentage of hits is not very great; about two thirds as many shots hit above 85 yards as below. It is certainly not possible to obtain a hit with certainty by waiting until the tank is within say 70 yards. The reason for the unexpectedly poor performance at short ranges is presumably the increase in angular movement of the target, combined, perhaps, with the 'sense of hurry'
already mentioned."

Percentage of hits detonating were:
Crossing Receding All
Number % Number % Number %
Total hits 43 100 13 100 56 100
Detonations 32 74 9 69 41 73
Hits on
turret or hull
29 67 9 69 38 68
of which
detonations
22 51 7 54 29 52

"From these figures it can be seen that about 75% of hits detonate with the DA Fuze 425. No DA Fuzes 426 were available for trial, but it is assumed that a greater proportion of them, perhaps as much as 90%, would detonate."

"The average number of rounds in an engagement was 3". It is pointed out that the current ammunition allotment for PIAT is 6 bombs per gun.

"It is held by some that the PIAT may not be able to fire as many as three rounds before it is spotted by
the tank. This is not proved."

Mr. Salt didn't provide the date of the testing, but one presumes it was relatively early due to the mention of the newer fuse not being tested (note the presumption that the new fuse would be about 90 per cent effective).

While it appears to have been an awkward weapon to use it does appear to have been effective in the hands of users.

It would be interesting to see the bad press for the other AT weapons – I can't believe that they were without laws of their own. Can't remember specific occasions, but dead batteries and defective fuses come to mind as having occurred with the bazookas.

P.S> Sorry for the format errors, spent about 15 minutes trying to get the columns right – didn't work I see. Next time I'll have to check the formatting FAQ.

Don Lowry. Thought you were dead? Mike Reese
There are several books on both the PIAT and the bazooka. Several were referenced above. The PIAT was a spigot mortar with a spring slamming the rod into the propellant charge in the bomb. The charge propelled the bomb down range while pushing the spigot back to lock, ready for another bomb to be placed in the weapon. Recoil was bad – enough to knock a standing man down if he wasn't ready for it. Worse, the spigot might not lock back. The spring was so strong you needed both hands and your feet to cock the weapon. Early versions didn't have the bomb secured so if firing down at a target the bomb sometimes slipped out. Although it had about the same penetration as the bazooka most of the 1st hand accounts I have read make the PIAT slightly more effective. My personal viewpoint is better results may have been because the bomb was lobbed at the target whereas the bazooka had a flatter trajectory so armor slope was offset and the PIAT bomb hit the top armor more often. The panzerfaust (Pzfst) was a recoilless smoothbore gun. The panzershreck fired a rocket. Bazooka round was 57mm. PIAT bomb was about 50-60mm (look that up). Panzerschreck was 88mm, Pzfst projectile was considerably larger. Both would have more explosive than the Allied weapons. Thus both German weapons could penetrate thicker armor and would have greater behind the armor effects. Pzfst 100 and panzerschreck both had flatter trajectories than the 3 earlier Pzfst versions. All of these infantry anti-tank weapons had a greater effective range against buildings and infantry than a tank. All took a lot of courage to use against tanks. However all were effective enough to make tanks have an infantry escort or take heavy losses if unescorted.

It's also worth bearing in mind that the most produced panzeraust was the Klein or 30 which had an effective range of just 30 metres……

Goragrad

Excellent stuff, especially the fact that hitting an approaching target is harder!

I think in truth the answer is, they were all better than nothing. After that, well who knows?

Post battle analysis from Normandy showed that the PIAT was credited with the same proportion of tank kills as air attack

Actually 4th Curaissier, credit John Salt for taking the time to go through tose War Office studies and putting together the synopsis'. A friend sent me a copy of the pdf several years ago and I go back to it regualrly for information like this. Martin Rapier has an earlier copy of John's file on his website over at University of Sheffield (unfortuantely this PIAT info came from the latter version). It contains a goodly amount of analysis of British weapons effectiveness as well as information on German and American.

Martin Rapier's wargame info page -

link

Don Lowry. Thought you were dead? Mike Reese

Not as far as I can tell, Mike. How about you?

Thanks to goragrad for saving me the bother of posting the PIAT stuff. The PROCAT catalogue at the National Archives gives the covering date for piece number WO 291/153 as 1944, which puts a late bound on the date of the trials. Normally if there is an indication of a specific date in a file, I record it; I might have missed it this time, or it might not have said.

There's also this snippet on Panzerfaust accuracy, which
I have put inside the "pre" HTML tag to keep that table from going all squinty:

WO 291/1060	The A45 flame gun versus the Panzerfaust
This is a post-war report, as it quotes one reference dated
1947.  It deals with the possibility of fitting a flamethrower
to the A45 tank for the purpose of suppressing Panzerfaust-type
weapons.
"As the campaign in NW Europe progressed the proportion of tank
casualties due to hollow-charge weapons (mainly of the 
Panzerfaust type) increased from 10% to 35%."
[Snips]
An indication of Panzerfaust hit probability from operational
experience is given as follows:
Range (yards)	0–20	21–40	41–100
Hits	        17	13	10
Misses	        15	14	22
% hits	        53%	48%	31%
"…it has been impossible to trace all misses so that the
figures are only comparative."
"The disproportionally large number of misses at close range is
thought to be due either to the fact that short-range firing is
nerve-racking to the firer, or to the large angular velocities
of the target as it reaches crossing point."
Comments and corrections
The hit probability at 21 to 40 yards is given as 43% in the
original, which suggests a copy typing error.

Finally, one might note the rule of thumb that says the maximum effective range of a hand-held anti-tank weapon, in metres, is about the same as its projectile's initial velocity in metres per second.

All the best,

John.

That rule of thumb sounds useful, if it's reasonably accurate! In that regard, how would you define "effective range"? As the charge is theoretically the same regardless of range, only the accuracy and angle of strike would change.

Interesting on the PIAT results that they don't include firing at a stationary target!

This is excellent stuff John, many many thanks.

What it all says to me is that if your infantry have hand-held AT weapons they are best grouped together in such a way that someone has a reasonable shot.

Mr. Salt -

I had forgotten that piece, But then you compiled it, I only shamelessly spread it about.

Yes my copy of your compendium gives the 43% probability.

Thanks for making your research available.

James

P.S. Donlowry, my presumption would be that the War Office felt that hitting a stationary tank at 100 yds or less would have a high enough probability so as to not require testing.

for the gentleman who almost bought a piat and didnt, well I did buy one for $4 USD in 1966 and played with it from time to time.you are correct the damn thing is very heavy and to cock it I had to sit down and put my feet on the trigger guard and pull with all my mite to get it to cock. when you fire it ,it has a tremendious kick with out a round in it.I always wanted to fire it at least one time but when I found some one who had rounds ,whew they would cost $3,500 USD for a legaly regestered round and i just didnt want to spend that much.I finally sold it to reinactment (british) group in austin texas,they had been looking for one and had about giving up.I wasd visting my kids and was in a hobby shop they were talking about finding one ,I interrupeted them an said I had one for sale if they were interested.they acted as if I was just BSing them.went back to oklahoma city got it and came back.the guy in the about stroked out when I came back with my piat.I hope thier group got some good use of it.some times I wish I still had it just to say I've got one of those .LOL

Anyone have any data on the bazooka?

Here's a couple for ya Don.
inert-ord.net/atrkts/bazoo
link

Cheers

Ever tried cocking a PIAT? One should get a VC for that alone!

The percentage of hits "…is noticeably greater with crossing and receding targets, and firers put this down to the 'sense of hurry' that seems to exist when a tank is fast approaching. This appears to be a genuine effect, and not due to chance errors."

Fascinating stuff. Never seen any rules reflecting this. But then I mostly play SF.