Logo from Scott Cunningham.
Logo from Scott Cunningham.
o complicate things even further, some armour plates and castings were flawed which significantly affected their ballistic resistance. The only way to determine the presence or absence of flaws is to sample the steel in question and run metallurgical tests. By deduction, premature ballistic failure as recorded in field tests indicate the presence of flaws, such as the several tests of captured Panthers which had poor quality glacis plates (which includes the report of tests of Soviet 100mm and 122mm guns against a captured Panther at the Kubinka Proving Ground found in the library at the Russian Military Zone).1
British and USA armour before 1944 was badly flawed.
It was determined reliably that a large proportion of USA armour, both cast and rolled, produced prior to November 1943 was flawed to such an extent that it resisted about 5% to 50% less than it should have (mean resistance around 85% of 1944–45 armour plate). Also British armour of greater than 57mm to 63mm was flawed until about 1944.1
The BHN of steel is not directly related to flaws. Some Soviet T–34 BHN 450 armour was relatively flaw free, while other plates of the same thickness in the same tank were quite flawed, as shown by tests conducted by Watertown Arsenal in the USA.1
For the technically minded: flaws are things like stringers, laminations, inclusions, and transformation by-products which are in dirty or improperly heat treated steel. Flaws also include crystalline microstructure, as opposed to the ductile microstructure of correctly made, sufficiently alloyed steel.1
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