Joined German tank forces in 1984. Although we had optical range finders (Turmentfernungsmessgerät-TEM) half of our training was estimating range with the TZF (the Leopard 1 gunner had two optics, TZF and TEM). And even in the 90s, when the Leopard 1A5 got a laser range finder estimating range with the TZF was trained intensively.

Another important point was radio communication! At least every group leading tank had a radio set built in which gave enormous tactical advantage.

Awesome video & great information. It’s covers deeper topics that aren’t covered in most videos. The tank crew also had to be great at estimating ranges & calculating firing solutions using various techniques. They had stadiametric range finders but also had to good at estimating ranges. The gun sights had various reticles for shooting at ranges & they also had special marks for lead, etc So besides knowing how to id enemy vehicles they had to know general sizes of enemy tanks for calculations. I was a tanker in the US Army & the Abrams has a laser range finder, multiple sensors for things like crosswind & vehicle cant, & a ballistic computer that gives us a firing solution. The gunner’s secondary or auxiliary sight (GAS) which is used if the primary sight (GPS) fails or is damaged is close to WW2 tank gunning as it lacks all the technology. Of course good optics helped & Germany had the best ones. Many of the finer details a out German tanks are covered in most WW2 armor videos which are the factors that made German tanks better overall. The German tanks had superbly trained crews, but also had better optics, radios, ammunition, etc Considering how crude the first tanks in WW I were it’s pretty amazing how advanced they became in some 20 odd years. They share the same overall build, layout & characteristics as modern tanks in many regards. Thanks for the greta video🙂👍

Good presentation! A few notes: Additives to optical glass such as Lanthanum do nothing of any note as regards improved transmission efficiency. Indeed, some additives can reduce transmission. The base level transmission of decent glass is so good that it requires a thickness of order 1 meter (!) to begin to become of any concern. The purpose of additives like rare earth elements is solely to obtain specific values of refractive index and dispersion. The aim is the suppression or at least diminution of chromatic (color) aberrations. There are two principal chromatic aberrations: Longitudinal, mostly introduced by the objective lens. This causes halos of unfocused light in certain parts of the spectrum. Most commonly exhibits as a blue halo, due to the shorter wavelengths becoming more rapidly differentially refracted. Affects the entire field of view essentially equally. Lateral, mostly introduced by the eyepiece. The central portion of the image is fine, but at increasing angular distance from the optical axis the light is radially elongated into a miniature spectrum. At such low magnifications of these sights, standard, inexpensive optical crown/flint glass objectives are quite good enough. For the eyepiece, lateral color aberration will not impact the working central part of the image, where the aiming reticle is located. It's only an issue in the more outer parts of the field. And so eyepieces made using non-exotic glass are still serviceable. Field of view at given magnification is controlled by the eyepiece design. The eyepiece FoV as it appears on the observer's retina is called the apparent FoV (AFoV). For older designs this was typically 40-50 degrees. After WW1 designers were starting to create oculars possessing AFoVs of 60-70 degrees. (In the 60s a designer cooked up a monster eyepiece having a whopping 120 degree AFoV!) The Germans during WW2 used eyepieces commonly having wider AFoVs than did the Allies, which presents an advantage in detection by virtue of presenting a physically wider field of coverage. In multi-element optical systems like tank sights and binoculars, coatings are important more for the improvement in contrast via reduction of internal reflection intensity from all those air-glass surfaces. The increase in total transmission is more of an additional benefit; it is decidedly secondary to contrast transfer. Let me put it this way; a 10% reduction in contrast is worse than a 50% reduction in image brightness. The human visual system has a HUGE dynamic range in its ability to detect light. What might seem to be a debilitating diminution is not nearly so injurious as might be feared. Contrast transfer, however, is most crucial because it presents as an immediate degradation no matter the image brightness. Even a subtle internal ghost reflection superimposed upon a shadowed part of the scenery can hide from view that tank lurking there in the gloom. The 'cleanest' image possible, aided by efficient reflection-reducing coatings, is a highly prized characteristic. Finally, I might note the differences in sight design that result from the image erecting elements employed. If a sight uses lenses to invert the image as opposed to prisms, the additional refraction imposed by these intermediary elements can introduce additional optical aberrations which prisms do not (by virtue of their acting optically as simple plane parallel optical windows). Now, I don't know if any tank sights used lens-based image erection schemes. But I would not be surprised if one or more nations did so early on. Parenthetical, my interest in gun sights leans far more toward those for aircraft. And I might add that I have worked in optics fabrication professionally. ;) Cheers! Glenn

Italian Admiral Trizzino wrote several books, and one of those deals with the Italian submarines which operated in the Atlantic, from their Bordeaux base. I remember his mention of the Italian crews receiving German binoculars on their arrival in Bordeaux, which were superior to the Italian ones: they allowed to inspect the sea during hours without feeling eye fatigue.

Zeiss Optics have always been and still are the benchmark other companies strive to attain hands down.....

The mirrors used to focus the lasers to cut the substrate on the newest 5nm CPU chips are made by Zeiss. The mirrors are absolutely flat, so flat that if the mirrors were the size of the earth the highst point on the surface would be only 3mm, can you imagine that kind of precision and accuracy.

Japanese Company, later called Nikon, hired a German Lens maker, in the 1920s. And they managed to improve their optics, to the point, that Imperial Japanese Navy had the best Night sight optics, when WW2 started.

The Germans are just amazing engineers. They were/are blessed with innovative, creative, inventive, genius across a wide range of technology. Love the Germans for that.

Zeiss rifle scopes for hunting still are outstanding and second to none. I use a Zeiss HT 3-12x56 as my general rifle scope and using it in the dusk is like turning on the lights.

A very informative piece with excellent footage of an aspect of WWII that's not well covered. Thanks a whole bunch. 👍

It's crazy , this "small" part was so important and had such advantage. But without steel ,tanks and/or ammo, this part was useless. Thank you for the video and information .

I had aways wondered how tanks could be accurate at 2000 meters and now I know. I had no idea the tankers used tables to calculate their targets and they must have done a lot of training to be able to identify and accurately range an enemy tank quickly. Amazing.

Wow, this video certainly contains a lot of "padding". Empty words of praise that convey no information. The actual knowledge posted in here is limited. We are told the German tanks had "TzF" scopes, but the individual models are not listed. The periscopic sights of SPGs and Stugs are not covered at all - but we see them on film several times. Shouldn't we be told that they exist, at least? We're shown the range markings on a later-model tank scope and how to use them, but what about the procedure for bracketing to determine range? I can guess which manuals the author has read and which ones they didn't read. And these paper "ranging tables" - how were they used? Did the gunner keep them in the tank and refer to them, or memorise them? Why don't we see a real one? The telescope of the hull MG is not mentioned, though we see it on film. What was THAT one capable of? The biggest defect of this video (in my opinion) is that the video doesn't mention the "open sight" system of early-war Panzers - a lensless "sighting bar" with a dedicated window. Why skip over that? Another manual that wasn't looked at, methinks.

This was known in WW1 as well-in the naval battele of Jutland, British gunners missed hits because the British rangefinders were poorly shock insulated-one gunner wrote that the prisms moved out of alignment after a german shell hit. The RN ordered improvements as a result

The American Stuart, Grant and Sherman tanks were the first to feature a gun stabilization system in the vertical plane, able to keep the gun barrel from dipping or climbing while crossing uneven ground giving them a limited shoot on the move capability.

As the adge goes, "You got to see them before you kill them", the Germans could see very well.

This was/is an extremely well done presentation on an important subject matter usually overlooked by most WW2 armor channels.... -German gunners, depending on how much TIME they spent, or how long theyd survived/seriously uninjured in that seat, gotten extremely intuitive @ acting extremely >> rapidly >>... -In absorbing tons of microdata from the optic, weather, other crewmen, ammo types needed, or on hand, T.C, unique machine, cannon, optical characteristics & scores of variable other factors @ play (As they werent always in the same Panzer everyday due to their own ride being under repairs, they maybe the same model/Ausf tank, but ALL had their very own idiosyncrasies due to previous/current wear or usage, maintenance schedules (Or lack of), prior repairs, un-repaired damage(s) or major parts/component re-fits, etc) As was often the case, most non-comm grade gunners who'd achieved a fair amount of time spent in that seat often got promoted to C.O of their very own Panzer, either due to rank, skill &/or T.C attrition rates. In spite of the gunner usually being the C.O's 'Nummer 2 man' I still believe the most important man, or position, held in any tank, even moreso with the WW2 German heavies was the DRIVER.... -Odd thing too, that most competent C.O's of any Schweres, or even Panthers to a degree, if they had the choice to make, would often draft, or have transferred over, drivers from Assault Guns/StuG' III's IF available. Which seems ODD @ 1st glance considering the difference between tactics via an assault gun & turreted panzer, but considering they HAD to keep thickest armor & cannon to the >> front due to overall design, that together with the ultra -S-L-O-W- turret traverse rotational speed of the T1, even if sitting stationary & engine was @ max RPM's to assist rotational speed, only then does grabbing a former assault gun driver make perfect sense if replacement personnel are needed...(Even if not the usual 'Status-Quo' rules regarding 'proper' personnel transfer within tank battalions, just like wild looking, but completely effective improvised armor adaptations, the Germans got away with a literal shit-ton of non standard practices on the battlefield, as long as the practices WORKED & achieved objectives, or desired results) -As depending on ground type/terrain the tank is on, sloughing the entire chassis w/cannon & frontal armor @ 11-1 o clock position to the nearest threat, or target, w/gunner doing the finer gun laying/traverse adjustments, turns out to be MUCH faster, safer for the entire crew, the complicated traverse motor & the continued employment of the expen$ive machine in general (Of which, with the new Tiger 1's, crewmen were oft reminded of several times DAILY in an ad-nauseum manner;). The T1's final drives being planetary arrangement so they could sustain stout twisting/lateral loads, only its tracks & subsequent ground types poss being a track popping/wrenching affair (The reason why some PzAbt's removed the Tiger 1s 1st outer road wheel) -Its tranny being incredibly well designed for its day, if a bit fussy @ times, but only as good as the man operating it & his own knowledge base of the overall integrated system(s), its features, faults, limitations, uses & limits. This had only gotten worse with shortened training schedules, emergency transfer, or drafting of fresh, non-specialist crewmen later in the war. The looks on the faces of all those former Luftwaffe & Kriegsmarine personnel when they'd gotten transfer orders to other ground units was probably ALL the SAME?..."!WTF?!"....Ha! -The total gleaned wisdom came w/experience, both good & bad, as to properly employing all those varying factors towards continued successful outcomes. Which only worsened as the wars fuel, personnel, material shortages & ever looming closure date was within sight... VERY well done vid FB...;)

Good video , and just mirrored the fact you need good equipment, like a Tiger or Panther with ZEISS Optics and a well trained crew. The crew make the tank to a killing machine, or failure. My Dad was confronted alone with his Panther by 11 T34/85 . They came with high speed head on in February 1945 at Hungary. They opened fire from1,100m and destroyed in less than 15minutes all 11 Soviet Tanks. They did not get hit at all from the wild shooting but bad aiming T34 crew. Every of the 11rounds fired from the Panther was a hit. The following but much slower two IS2 far behind the fast T34 were a different story . The Panther took them out , each IS absorbed one hit and need two rounds to get light up. The Panther got hit twice from the slow moving and two rounds a minute only capacity of the IS. They shoot five rounds at all and hit the Panther twice at the front which bounded off. But the heavy gun made a big dent and noise when his Panther was hit . On the end the class of the crew won over quantity . And yes, back in time the Russian T Tanks burned back in time on the first hit like they do today on the same fields , again….

cant beat ZEISS

Haven't watched yet, but I'm super excited. I've heard for years how German optics really made a difference, it will be great to get into the nitty-gritty. And since you brought up subsystems, how about a similar video on who had the best comm systems.

Even today the Carl Zeiss lenses are among the Best in the world,and the excellence of their Luxury Lenses are second to none.

Informative and covers a topic rarely touched in general discussion.

My father was 101st airborne, fought in Bastogne, his advice to me as a young man, " if you go into the military, whatever you do, stay out of those gd tanks".

The Germans did use high quality sights in their tanks and AT guns that had to be sent back to the factory for internal cleanings, adjustments and repairs. That caused problems when they started to run short on spare sights to install and the bombing of factories delayed having them serviced and made. American sights were adequate and could be service or rebuilt then adjusted by a tank mechanic out in the field in 30 minutes.

Super 👌 wonderful mathematical explanation video of accurate aiming by German tank crews

Been looking for this video for many years finally by chance this was sitting on my YT home Page. saving and making a copy fr personal video libaray Thank you for sharing don't know how much i Appreciate this video here.

Q. What did the Panther crews say to the Zeiss optics engineers? A. Tank you. Tank you very much.

Bravo, on oublie souvent les excellentes optiques Allemandes qui étaient un plus énorme pour leurs équipages..

With 4.2 percent light loss per lens, the sight only retain 65.1-50.3 percent of the light going from ten lenses to sixteen. The high-quality sights with 0.6 percent loss per lens is between 94.2 - 90.8 in the same range of ten to sixteen lenses.

At last, been waiting for this topic. Thank you. This video deserves more view etc.

Tank gunners needed extensive education and experience when using their optics. During my time as a gunner later as tank commander one of the most important gunnery training is using the GAS sight once properly bore sighted with the main gun using the SABOT and HEAT type ammunition. In the modern world tank crews have used computer generated simulators to train bother commander and gunner combination to train on the GAS for non-tankers is the Gunner Auxiliary Sight which has no magnification but relying on the Mil radiant markings to estimate range and aiming points. Basically almost like using and aiming the emergency optic on the tank if the GPS or Gunners Primary Sight is knocked out during combat.

Excellent. Thank you for this video

An interesting video. There's endless anecdotal evidence of the superiority of German optics. German binoculars were highly valued by Allied sailors and soldiers. Those men obviously had the opportunity to compare the captured equipment with what they were issued.

Thank you for making a no nonsense documentary and telling the truth about German technological superiority.

That was an amazing video! Thank you for the work you put into it!

Finally a video worth watching and learning from. Thank you.

If you watch the movie Kingdom of Heaven, you can see how range-finding was accomplished by placing distance markers on the battlefield. It's Old School but still effective. While in the Army, I was taught how to measure distance using the pace method. A pace is the distance of one footstep. Depending on a person's leg length, 100 yards might be X paces. As Porky Pig says, "Th-th-th-thats all folks!"

During WW2 most used periscopic optic on tanks was develop by Polish offcer Gundlah. I was patented in 1936.

Awesome video! Important topic!

awesome video, thanks!

This channel is a jewel. Thanks!

Thanks for this explanation of the tank optics.

A good officer wasn't interested in collecting a Luger, but rather the Germans Zeiss binoculars. I've read accounts of British tank commanders in North Africa envying their fellow crew commanders who had Zeiss optics, and the search for a pair of their own after a battle.

One thing that might be less depressing than war: Karl Zeiss still makes top notch lenses for microscopes and anything in a lab that needs a lense. I was working as a lab technician in an university and I always tried to get their stuff, if possible. More expensive? Yes. Worth it? Definitley!

A family member literally wrote the book on lens grinding in Germany and published in 1938. I suspect he was employed by Zeis or was a wheel with the company

such an excellently scripted , illustrated and researched video, well done!

Thank you for the interesting vid from Germany!

Great video

Zeiss Optik in Jena. After WW2, it ended up in East Germany territory. So there is another Zeiss Optik in West Germany. The one in the East is known as Zeiss Jena. I believe their vapour deposition technique was leading edge at that time. It was crucial to produce low light lenses, one with very high light transmission factor.

Excelent video. Thanks.

In reality german crew awareness was abysmal. Panther needed 3-5 times more time to notice an enemy and open fire than a sherman

Great analysis!

Germany set the bar for a lot of things before the war during the war and continue setting bar. They are excellent in technology 😮

Always wondered on each counteies tank and anti tank optics, this just answered a lot of My qestions....thank you!!

This is a very informative video, it is this sort of information that I am interested in.

The technical cooperation between Berlin and Moscow lasted until June 21, 1941. The CCCP was constantly acquiring military equipment from Germany and Italy. The Soviets paid immediately and quickly. This is how the Blue Cruiser "Taskent" arrived in the Black Sea in 1940, from Italy. Some weapons were bought by the Soviets even though they were under development and untested. You should know that the Red Army already had night vision systems for tanks available since 1939. I am surprised this is not mentioned . Suggesting the optics of KV 1 - 1941 was inferior to a Tiger 2 - 1944 are jokes ! Soviet tanks had very good optics by inception. But not all the tanks were used to hunt other tanks !

German cameras were so good, that the British government had to put out an appeal, for private owners of Leica cameras to turn them in, so they could be used for aerial photography.

I knew a fellow that worked for Marnell Correo and he did Custom finish carpentry job on the house on Correo island.and in the house was a World War II German submarine periscope That went from the main room in the center of the house and one could see every part of the island from that periscope. Big beautiful brass devic. he showed me pictures of him hanging his wrists upon it hat backwards.

The grandfather of a friend was a gunner in a Panther Ausf. F at the end of the war and told how it was like being a sniper in a tank because of the superior optics. I know, I know. The Ausf. F never made it into production and at the time I learned that, he had already passed away and I couldn't ask him about it.

Rally very detailed, congratulazioni.

Zeiss / Jena (East Germany) NVA Binos are the best Binos i ever had in my Hands during Service. Never wanted "Steiner" Binos again...

What a Great Upload , no Recycling.

All my Hasselblad lenses are made by Zeiss they are simply amazing..!!

Very very high quality video like always !! If someone could tell me what is the "klink" noise after each tank fired , i assume it is in relation with the barrel or culass or the empty shell , but i'm curious for what is precisely make that noise .

Amazing optics technology 👍

Loved seeing these optics. Not sure I've seen anything like this before.

finally truth about sights and optics

badly needed article ,as battle accounts over and over make clear that the fewer and weaker germany tanks and anti tank guns, still regularly destroyed opponents tanks from long range before they got into range to fire back - this had to be due to better sights and better layout in the tank for rapid fire

Great job thanks

I read somewhere (Military History (not) Visualized?) that Dubno & Prokhorovka notwithstanding, tank on tank battles were relatively rare. Most combat losses were from AT guns at ranges under 1,000 m. As for the Soviet T-34, the early models in 1940-41 were actually of better quality overall, including the optics. At one point decision was made to prioritize mass production of T-34s, and by 1943 its per unit cost was reduced in half. I'm guessing that expensive Zeiss optics were swapped for a cheaper local or American model.

Fascinating! Someone should send this to the Chieftain. He keeps knocking German tanks while praising the superior sight arrangements on the Sherman. It seems he doesn't realize that his analysis doesn't take into account the German optic's wider view.

Very interesting.

Regarding the range calculation: it is still used and not based on specific tank models and it is used in binoculars as well. there it is called "Strichplatte".

Ziess really took care of their workers too which contributed to a superior product.

the triangle aiming deal is a lot like stadia which I imagine is the same for WWII subs in calculating distances (along with a recognition chart) remember Ziess being the gold standard in surveying optics then Nikon came along later and was just as good and a whole lot less dollar wise.

The pronouncination of Zeiss is about "Tzeis" and the Panzer is "Pantzer"

The Narrator keeps calling them "TZF" when videomaterial says "TFZ"

I read about bubbles in allied glasses.

Superior glass quality perhaps. I'd say that for utility during combat the Sherman's setup was superior. The combination of 1x periscope and a magnified gunner sight made for faster target acquisition.

Just like Imperial Japanese Navy before the advent off Radar..IJN has very good Gun range optics also their secret early version off NVG range optics for their Gun ranging system.. But,by 1943 after Allied has perfected the used off radar,IJn starts to loose every Naval battle..

The problem is when the enemy has more tanks than you have shells...

If Germany hadn't been highly advanced, it would have fallen quickly like Italy

Interesting fact: ZEISS JENA was in the GDR after the war, Warsaw pact tanks got sights from there. With the collapse of the Warsaw pact and the soviet union that advantage was lost.

My Zeiss Conquests sure have a noteworthy bloodline even if i just use them for birdwatching..😅

15:22 now i do not now how true this is but i heared that the t-34 originaly had the best sights of any tank but the production facility for those was relativly close to the frontlines and as such no longer in soviet control shortly after the production of the t-34 began.

I live in the city where Zeiss originated.

That and the intense training that a German crew went through.

Excellent video, but please use variety for the gunfire sounds. The same one again and again is rather grating.

Al fin, un estudio de la optica alemana en la segunda guerra

Is this AI generated content? It’s over long and repetitive and the voiceover pronunciation sounds a bit robotic at times. Just saying. I could be wrong.

Russian optics were particularly bad during WWII - to a substantial degree due to the fact that they had to relocate the respective optics producing factory to the East - where the quality of everything - starting from the sand and ending up with the additional labor force - was inferior. One Russian tanker recollected his experience in looking through the optics of a German Tiger knocked out by him a couple of days before: “I was shocked with the quality of a slightly bluish picture allowing to see the details at the distances which would be far beyond the capabilities of the T-34 gunsights”. The more respect I have to the Soviet tankers, who, undertrained and otherwise disadvantaged in too many ways against their German counterparts had the outmost courage to fight and eventually to win.

Well any advantages in these tanks did not work out too well for them overall, did it ?

So...how did you manage to contradict yourself despite starting with a simple subject like gunnery? Do you kick yourself often or did this require extreme effort on your part?

American tanks were mostly fitted with gun stabilizer and could fire more accurately then the german tanks IF and only if the crews were trained to use it. Sadly most crews were not

I'm not a tanker, but now a days, typically the other task would also have a comparable sight. So i don't think you can actually say that it isn't as gritty. Both crews need to have laser focus and really quick reactions. Now if there was an Abrams vs a T34, that's something different.

Germans good AT optics,waw,who knew?

As the granddad of my best friend said: we had the better tanks, the Russian tanks were more like tractors but they had a lot.

German engineering in the house!

The flip side of the coin though, is that post war, every nation (including West Germany) copied the US concept for optical systems for tanks, as the US system (roof mounted maginifying sight, roof mounted non-magnifying sight and a gun mounted magnifying sight as back-up) had shown to be superior to the german system (with only a a gun mounted magnifying sight) in getting the first shot of.