Tracks for Fighting Vehicles

This facsimile edition of the original wartime report on “Tracks for Fighting Vehicles” is complete and unedited, as produced in July 1944 by the School of Tank Technology for tank designers, manufacturers, and technicians.

Starting with the history of tank design, this rare report gives a snapshot into wartime knowledge and intelligence, including German, Italian, British, American, French, and Soviet technologies.

Across 25 chapters, 140 unique technical drawings, another 100 explanatory diagrams and graphs, 11 photographs, and 20 tables, this report was intended as an introduction, a reference, and a textbook. It served the uninitiated with a glossary of terms at the start, offered an education to inexperienced designers, helped manufacturers to improve, and concluded with theory for applied scientists.

Historical, practical, and theoretical, from designs to materials, from manufacturing to performance, from reliability to mobility, from tank design to soil mechanics, this report takes you to where the tracks hit the ground - in the midst of the Second World War.