World War 2 Tech is back after quite a long break! We blitz back onto the scene with a look at one of the largest and arguably most successful tank destroyers ever produced! The Panzer Jager "porsche" Tiger (Heavy tank destroyer Porsche Tiger) or commonly known as the Ferdinand (Without Hull machine gun) or Elephant (With Hull Machine gun) was a heavy tank destroyer employed by the German military in 1943. 91 of these monsters were built and most in time for the largest tank battle in the history of the world, the battle of Kursk. It weighed in at 70 tons in its ferdinand model to 65 in its elefant model. Its top speed came out at about 19Mph (30 KMH). Elefants served on the battle fields of Kursk, Italy (Anzio) and of course on the eastern front as a whole from spring 1943-1945. The Elefant and Ferdinand are basically the same vehicle only the Ferdinand lacked a machine gun, this model debuted at Kursk and recieved modifications due to lessons learned during the battle. It was found that while the Ferdinand was impervious to all forms of Soviet anti tank weaponry, it was exposed to infantry attacks due to its lack of a machine gun, to supplant this all Ferdinands were recalled back to their factorys for refit. Thus the "Elefant" was born, with its new hull mg it was able to adequately protect itself from most ground threats, infantry, armor and anti tank guns. It also recieved a commanders cupola for increased sight from the top of the vehicle, Zimmerit anti magnetic charge paint (The Germans fear of magnetic allied anti tank weapons was ironically unfounded, they never employed anything like them unless captured), in addition its tracks were also widened and its weight down from a whopping 70 TONS to 65 tons. The Elefant (I will now be using this as its default name as i previously explained the Ferdinand business above) was equipped with a PaK 43 High velocity 88mm cannon that was improved from the infamous anti tank/anti air/artillery 88 field gun and of course the one famously fit on the Tiger 1. The PaK 43 cannon was able to destroy a T-34 from a distance of 3 miles making it one of the greatest anti tank weapons ever deployed on the World War 2 battle field capable of defeating any allied armor, this cannon would also be fitted in many versions on the King Tiger and Nashorn. The Elefant also enjoyed invulnerability from its front due to its 200mm thick armor plating, which rendered it literally invincible from any allied weapon in the war facing it directly. Its greatest achievement was during Kursk where the 653rd Heavy tank destroyer battalion was said to have destroyed around 320 tanks to 13 Elefants lost. However with all of the advantages in armament and armor, the Elefant was plagued by horrible mechanical failures. It was simply to heavy for its own chassis and many times its transmission broke or it threw tracks constantly from this problem. Infact the majority of the elefants lost were due to crews abandoning them because of mechanical problems and not enemy fire. Many times they were forced to destroy them and abandon the vehicle. At the end of it all the elefant proved to be the most cost effective tank destroyer of the war, coming in with a ratio of 10:1 in destroying allied armor, its armor and main armament was the best of its time and it was truly feared on the battle fields of World war 2. However with all of its positives it was simply to over engineered, complicated and plagued with to many mechanical problems to make much of a difference. Today 2 Elefants have survived and have been restored, one which was captured during the battle of Kursk resides in the Kublinka tank museum in Russia, the other at the United States Army Ordnance Museum's collection at Fort Lee, VA which was captured by U.S. troops at Anzio. Restored Elefant at Fort Lee- http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/07/Elefant_USAOM-01.jpg As always if you like this stuff feel free to follow me and I always appreciate people who read these all the way through! It is quite a mouth full!