Tracks vs. Wheels?

[Aristle]

Since Traction Wars seems to be going to introduce tanks into the game, I thought that it would be a good idea to bring up the idea of tank tracks vs. wheels, and why tracks were originally used on tanks since their beginning. Personally, I don't see much of a difference other than that there is a larger surface area to the ground for tracks. What are you opinions on tracks vs. wheels?

 

[LuckyOne]

Tracks generally have much better off road performance, and they are also quite resistant to small arms fire, while wheels might not always be (not talking about the specially designed ones). And tracks generally enable increased maneuverability - the tank can turn in place, basically. In contrast, wheels are much better on the roads, providing better top speed and less friction (the original Christie suspension design was made with track removing and driving on rubber bogeys in mind but later they just made rubber covers/tracks for paved surfaces).

I'd guess since the first tanks were meant to be used on the highly devastated terrain filled with trenches the design just stuck around, since nobody really expected the Blitzkrieg style warfare the Germans pioneered at the start of WWII.

 

[VonMudra]

Tracks provide far superior off-road capabilities. It's not that the design just 'stuck around', there were even attempts to make tanks that had wheels which would fold down for road useage and fold back up to go off road, just those were very clunky and hard to keep operable. The main thing is, tanks spent the majority of combat time off road, so they need the much, much higher grip, and much lower footprint weight, than wheels can ever give. Indeed, that was the whole point of the halftrack design- to create something in-between which would be better for off-road and could take some of the weight of armour, without losing too much speed. Armoured cars meanwhile stuck with tires as they were meant to be traveling extremely fast up and down roads, and didn't need much off-road performance due to low weight.

 

[Aristle]

Also, what are you thoughts on logs attached to some tanks? Could/would it be implemented to represent its purposes that it had? I wasn't able to find a lot of information on logs attached to tanks, but it seemed like it assisted with getting out of mud and holes. It might have even added some armour.

 

[VonMudra]

Far as I am aware, only the Finns did that, to Stugs in the ETO, so no. Beyond that, in the PTO some American sherman tanks used logs or planks to keep japanese magnetic mines from sticking.

 

[Aristle]

The Russians seemed to have added logs to their tanks as well, but thanks for answering.