Craig Moore reports on a German World War Two railway security vehicle
Herbert Ackermans is a Dutch historian who researches the huge German military archives. This is something I find difficult to do as I do not read German, unlike Herbert who is fluent in the language. He recently discovered two drawings for a multipurpose armoured tracked vehicle that could also run on railway lines with drop-down railway wheels (German Archiv Signatur RH8/3933K).
The first drawing, W1490, was dated October 12, 1943, and the second drawing, W1491, was dated October 14, 1943. This vehicle’s name in German was typically long and hard to pronounce. It was called the Mehrzweckfahrzeug (Schienenlaufwerk): Mehrzweckfahrzeug
translates to multipurpose vehicle and Schienenlaufwerk translates approximately to rail running.
It had sloping front armour but the engine was at the rear so it could not be used as a rear-entry armoured personnel carrier. No armament was shown on the drawings and although there was space in the centre of the vehicle for a turret basket, a turret was not shown on the drawing.
It was fully tracked but used the overlapping road wheel design seen on the Tiger and Panther tanks. The drive wheel was a…
