“They Don’t Burn Anymore” – German Tank Crews vs the New Wet‑Rack Shermans

Описание: German gunners were used to a simple formula: hit a Sherman through the side and wait for the fireball.

Then, one day, they punched an armor‑piercing round clean through an M4 — and it didn’t blow.

For years, U.S. and British crews watched their Shermans go up like Ronson lighters when a German 75 mm or 88 mm round found the hull side. The reason wasn’t just “thin armor.” It was the way the ammunition was stored: dozens of 75 mm rounds stacked in thin‑walled racks along the hull sponsons, right where penetrations and hot fragments would find them.

In mid‑war, U.S. Ordnance quietly rewired the Sherman’s insides. They moved the ammo into armored bins on the hull floor and surrounded those bins with water jackets. The result—“wet stowage”—didn’t change the Sherman’s silhouette, armor thickness, or gun power. But it changed the odds for the men inside the tank in a way that shocked German panzer crews used to seeing M4s turn into torches.

This video walks you through that change from both sides of the sights.

What you’ll see in this episode:

Why early‑war and Normandy‑era Shermans had such a terrible reputation for burning when hit
How sponson racks worked: 30+ rounds of 75 mm stacked above the tracks, thin metal, and no real barrier to a chain cook‑off
A Normandy bocage engagement from inside a Sherman that brews up after a single AP hit — and what that meant for the crew
How British nicknames like “Ronson” and “Tommycooker” weren’t just jokes, they were battlefield reality
The Ordnance Department’s post‑Africa and Sicily studies: cutting open burned hulls, tracing fragment patterns, and deciding armor alone wasn’t the answer
The design and introduction of wet stowage: floor‑mounted ammo bins, armored lids, and water/glycol jackets around the racks
Test data from Aberdeen and field reports showing catastrophic ammo fires dropping from 60–80% down into the teens
The first time German panzer crews saw Shermans take a side hit, not erupt, and stay in the fight long enough to fire back
How wet stowage changed crew behavior, salvage practices, and even German gunners’ assumptions about “one and done” hits
What this upgrade did not do — Shermans still died to Panthers, Tigers, and Pak — and why it still mattered massively for crew survival
⏱️ Approximate Timestamps
0:00 – Cold open: Panther shell punches through a Sherman… and it doesn’t explode
2:10 – “Ronson” and “Tommycooker”: why Shermans burned so easily in ’42–’44
6:00 – Inside an early Sherman: sponson racks, ready racks, and a fire waiting to happen
9:30 – Normandy, June ’44: Staff Sergeant Kowalski learns what a hit in the sponson really means
14:00 – Casualty lists and anger: crews and medics living with brewed‑up M4s
17:00 – Ordnance wakes up: cutting open wrecks, tracking fragment paths, looking for answers
20:30 – Aberdeen and the engineers: moving ammo from sponsons to floor, inventing “wet racks”
24:00 – Wet stowage in detail: armored bins, water jackets, new internal layouts
28:00 – The numbers: dry vs wet burn‑rates and crew survival stats
31:00 – Back to the front: first wet‑rack Shermans arrive in Normandy and the West Wall
34:00 – German side: panzer and Pak crews noticing “Shermans aren’t all burning anymore”
38:00 – Tactical and psychological impact: needing extra rounds per kill, fewer fireballs
42:00 – Late‑war battlefields: knocked‑out but intact M4s, more salvage, more crews walking away
46:00 – Postwar analysis, museum cutaways, and what this teaches about design that saves lives

If you’re into WWII armor, crew survivability, and what actually made tanks better (beyond bigger guns and thicker plate), this is your rabbit hole.

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