@@RaferJeffersonIII It would have been magnificent for Imperial British Army. You know that which was just a travel agency for oversexed males and whose prerequisite for campaign was that enemy would under no circumstance carry guns.
I couldn't hold it that far "I was going to say it may have been known as Black Prince to its friend but in never had any friends so I don't see how they could do that. But anyway..." already got me XD
So, what we've learned: 5. You can't have a tank with hopelessly deficient armor. 4. You can't have a tank with hopelessly deficient speed. 3. You can't turn it into a boat. 2. You can't scatter major engine components in all directions. 1. You can't permanently trap your driver inside the tank.
You can do all those things, but no-one has managed to combine them into one vehicle. There also must be hopelessly deficient weaponry as well. I think .45 ACP is biggest caliber tank needs.
@@vksasdgaming9472 Poppycock! I think you need to look up that gun. The Kolibri. Who needs a gun actually mounted on the tank when you have that! Save that weight!
@@mulrich If crew lugs that hand-held artillery it does not save any weight. Besides tank is not a tank without mounted weaponry on it. A compromise: belt-fed dual Kolibri mounted on front so the gunner can shoot with it.
Just like the Robin valiant is not the Worst car in the world.... and just cus i not will put shot in my top 5 list of worst way to get killed, dont apply i woud like to get shot.
"It's not bulletproof in any sense of the word, apart from with a revolver, maybe, for a while, from a distance..." Mr. Fletcher is 100% savage and a national treasure.
He should get himself a side job doing consumer affairs reviewing auto n other products for consumer research. He would probably be a very Frank and honest person doing this job.🎉
All these months later now is my chance! The valiant has dumb good camo rating and binos view range it can actually work late game like a stupid advanced duck tank that can actually hide it is still terrible but funny
Probably the biggest flaw with the Charioteer was the clock installed on the turret. This often inadvertently informed the enemy what time it was and gave them the opportunity to attack at the worst times such as the middle of breakfast
"The sole Valiant was retained by the School of Tank Technology, where students were treated to an inspection of it at the end of their course and invited to find fault. David Fletcher wrote of this: "One hopes they started early in the morning." " Imagine your mechanical project being such a staggering failure, that they start using it as a teaching aid in how NOT to design something.
Bit late to the comment but this is actually standard practice at my university. They rarely show us successful projects, just horrifically failed ones and tell us "you see this, don't do this".
In engineering school, that makes great sense actually. As a project manager of 30 years, if you ask me to describe episodes that taught me the most, they were (at leat initially and maybe permanently) disasters.
Though some of his reasoning is a bit broad or generic. Such as his definition of a tank which covers a large number of "tank destroyers" out there, British or not. Also his point on armour when he was talking about the amphibious tank as there are several tanks out there comparable to it for it's time period like the Panzer I which can't handle AT fire either. As far as I know nearly no tank from that period can handle AT fire which is why 37mm AT guns and .50" AT rifles were common.
Ale Rojas ummm I was quoting him directly. Those aren’t my words, they are a paraphrase at worst. Read the comment before you comment like that. Besides, what is nitpicking grammar like that doing for anyone, what good does it do for anyone?
Ale Rojas it was a paraphrasing him, meaning i wasn’t doing the quote to the last word, it was a general description from memory. Besides, it was two words, how could that be worthy of insulting me by saying I am uneducated. Besides, answer my question please, why Did you insult me in the first place, it’s just mean.
The British should have designed more tanks with armor like Mr. Fletcher's moustache. Look at that angling. I bet that thing would bounce a direct hit from an 88
@Deus Vult ergo Mr. Fletcher's moustache can bounce a Schwerer Gustav
5 ปีที่แล้ว +12
It is a fleet of microdrone needles. They charge themselves using the heat differential of his upper lip and the local weather. He's great in the desert or ice but useless in mud.
In 1967-68 I was driver and everyone else too (manpower shortage) for an American M60A1 that had an engine so clapped out it could not go up a hill. "We only replace them when they reach X miles on the odometer," I was told. Oh, it also leaked pressure in the track tension adjustment pistons so that it often threw a track. On one fine day it threw BOTH tracks. Back in the base, I swapped the cable from the engine hours gauge to the odimeter so that each day, as the tank sat in the motor pool idling while I did routine maintenance, it ran up miles instead of hours. In a few months I had run the tank up to the required mileage without moving it from where it sat. I got a new tank. My company commander - who must have known what I was doing - called me aside and, laughing, said that my average speed (miles driven versus engine hours) was over 50 MPH on a tank with a design speed of 30.
“you're not supposed to do things like that with a tank, it's silly” This man is comedy Gold. I don't know if I'm listening to a lecture on tanks or Monty Python😁
He comes from a generation that debated views and idea in public discourse rather than silencing opposing views and criticism. It seems to be a lost art at times to be quick in wit, charm and pithy animadversions. Subtle cheekiness for the win :)
I had several teachers at school like him and you developed a thick skin very quickly as well as fast reflexes as they tended to throw chalk and blackboard erasers at you if you weren't paying attention/mucking around. If you were paying attention they treated you more like adults and you learned a lot, a great generation.
In love this gentleman, British humour at its best, talking sbout the L1E3, "it's armed with a single vickers machine gun, which is probably better than spitting at people but only just... " Hahahahaha... You sir ...a legend, hats off
@LocalToast because the majority of white countries are prosperous and free, so it's no wonder people from less prosperous and free countries are flooding to get in.
LocalToast Wow are you okay? You do realize the United States of America was made by immigrants? ITS A NATION OF IMMIGRANTS!!! So please, stop leaving propaganda leaflets in every comment and go be on your way...
Literally the only criticism of that comment is that British people don't say "Um, sure". They do in films, but most films seem to be written by or for Americans. Today you learned something special
Of course I'm sure you could saw the pedal off. I haven't seen it myself, but I'm having a hard time imagining a pedal with dimensions that would allow you to get your foot stuck, but not have any way to saw.
One of many great lines in this video. I liked the comment at 15:29 about the Vickers machine gun "...which is probably better than spitting at people, but only just."
*The Top Five list we've been waiting for!* Very interesting to see this focus on why some tanks failed from a design and/or production standpoint. Also remembering Operation Think Tank, I've been wondering whether the Valiant would make it up there ;)
Military Aviation History, yes I had expected TOG to be in the list, then he explained the amphibian, god its bad. I knew about Valiant it does beg the question with these examples, how in gods names did they design the Centurion?
Hopefully, the next time The Chieftain is there he'll do an inside the hatch on some of these. It would be interesting to learn a little more about them and see what they were like on the inside as well.
When they designed the Centurion, they had used all their bad ideas on the Valiant, Only thing they had left was to make the fuel tanks a bit too small.
Remember that completely different teams worked on these vehicles. The Centurion was deigned by the Directorate of Tank Design, part of the Ministry of Supply. One of the benefits they had was that they had had a view of the detail and operational experience of every tank deign the British had produced or used and had quite an open design brief. The Valiant design was begun by Vickers, who at the start focused on reusing everything they could from the Valentine. In the end nothing from that survived in the final design. Design work then passed to the Birmingham Railway Carriage and Waggon Company (who also did locomotives) who had done good work in producing the Cromwell. They then passed it to Ruston & Hornsby who up to that point had been producing Matilda IIs and whose design experience was with Heavy Oil Engines, Industrial Locomotives, Steam Shovels and Steam Traction Engines. A skewed design with compromises relating to the Valentine was then passed to less and less experienced design teams, with, no doubt, disruption and loss of knowledge at each stage. The design was all the time skewed by the design brief, which was for maximum armour at minimum weight for use in the Far East where the infrastructure could not support vehicles as heavy as those used in Europe. In effect it was 'Excelsior, but lighter'. Valiant weighed only 27 tons compared to Excelsior at 40. This required all sorts of compromises which would have been a tough nut to crack for most design teams, let alone a disrupted and, in the later stages inexperienced, one saddled with the legacy of an unnecessary additional design restriction added by Vickers management (the Valentine reuse requirement).
Rick Ansell - Thank you Rick for interesting backstory on the design development of the A35. I knew there was some sort of story to tell concerning it’s development but never could find anything about it. One would have to assume individuals of basically average and literate intelligence designed the Valiant, so there must have been something else at play for this mess to be the final product.
Boss: Boys! We are going to make an all welded tank! (Clearing throat) um sir... we don’t have any one that knows how to weld. Boss: Boys! We are going to make an all riveted tank!
He sees you when you're sleeping He knows when you're awake He knows if you've been bad or good So be good because his Rheinmetall 120mm smoothbore cannon can engage targets at up to [classified] meters range.
Ah but the Citroen 2CV did meet it's design brief of being able to travel quickly across a plowed field with a basket of eggs in the front seat and not break any. Just WHY you would want to travel quickly across a plowed field with a basket of eggs in the front seat is the part that eludes me.
@@ShiroFuun Black tea doesn't have that much less caffiene than coffee though 🤷♂️ To be honest, me using 2 tea bags (usually Yorkshire or PG Tips) in one mug gives me a bigger buzz than a normal cup of coffee and arguably tastes better
@moonbeam the tommy cooker was actually the Sherman tank. Also at least we never nuked anyone, yet America nuked 2 civilian-filled cities just because they felt like it. Pretty sure that violates multiple war crimes. Although, you dont seem like an american, so I'm going to assume you're Finnish because you brought up Finland for no reason.
"If you don't agree with me, then just keep it to yourself" Not only was that the best way to start a video....it's now how I start every conversation. :-D
So does that mean you want only to have conversations with those whom agree with you? How sad, blinkered and ultimately boring. Glad you're not my friend. I really enjoy a good argument/debate.
Would you believe that I'm watching a lot of these videos in preparation for designing tanks for a sci-fi game? It's like he knew I was watching. I'm going to have to maintain a better sitting posture when I view these in future.
I have one problem with this video being 30 minutes long, it's not long enough as I could listen to David Fletcher talk about tanks for hours on end and never get bored!
Charioteer designer: 'I want the gun on the really good centurion tank but on the outdated Cromwell chassis' Everyone else : 'why don't we just use the centurion?' Cromwell designer: 'you think too small!'
I love how after every time fletcher describes a way in which the valiant could cause death or severe injury to its crew he finishes with "which doesnt sound that healthy" I love this man
Saw the thumbnail preview and I was so happy to see that someone as legendary as David Fletcher shared my love of the Black Prince.... ... *sigh* looks like I'm still on my own then, just like the Prince.
Dude I got you. While I agree the engine wasn't powerful enough, it's got nothing really wrong with it otherwise. Armour? Check Firepower? Yep Looks threatening? Hell yes. British? You'd better believe it.
Halinspark Even if it would've had to have been the last of the infantry tanks anyway, I reckon it would've been useful to us (and to whoever we sold then to after their service to us. I guarantee someone would've bought them.
If Tank Santa was right, and its probably safe to assume that he is, an RR Meteor would have gotten it to 22 mph, which was not bad for the time, not the best sure, but it was not bad. Faster would have have been better but 22 mph was a serviceable speed. But yes, replace the engine especially, and probabloy the transmission and BP would have been a useful vehicle.
The Tortoise weighs 30T more, carries a crew of 7 and goes at 12mph. Think of that... You've got a tank that is slower with far less firepower than the Tortoise, and it gets called the 'Black Prince'. I guess it sounds better than 'The Sloth' though.
@Tyler TV The underlying problem with the Black Prince is that it was started too late. A Churchill derived 17-pdr armed tank would have been ideal for the breakout from Normandy in summer 1944, but they only started work on the Black Prince at the end of 1943 so it had no chance at all of being ready in time... even being ready by summer 1945 would have been ambitious IMO.
The Black Prince is basically a tier 5 tank facing tier 9 tanks. The tier 5 churchill 1 is devastating, a monster, but you effectively have to play it again twice against increasingly fast, well armoured and heavily armed tanks which outclass it in every single aspect.
It's name is "Nidhogg- Master of Dread and Devourer of Souls." A name that only the most brave have the courage to speak, and only in hushed tones. Weep, for the age of Ragnarok is nigh, and the great silver dragon will rise from its slumber. They say that all you hear before your inevitable demise is the sound of wind blowing through bushy whiskers. Something like that...
Greetings from Rhineland! My grandfather worked for the British Army of the Rhine as a craftsman. He left me some old tools with the imprint "war finish".
I'm using my right to agree with the list. I like how they are put in order ranging from "only slightly useful in combat" through "completely useless in combat" and finally "only useful for showing how to NOT".
Nick Pallatt Even if you know which tanks are on the list, it shouldn’t matter. What matters is the information and reasoning behind why it is on this list. That, and the amazing stories and humor from David Fletcher.
I thought the Tortoise - an unwieldy behemoth and a mechanic's nightmare with regard to maintenance - would make it on David Fletcher's list; I wonder why he spared it…
I'm a Brit (English, to be tribally correct), and what makes me so proud about this excellent presentation is the honesty and total lack of nationalistic bullspit (whoops, typo). There's no attempt to put a positive spin on anything. There's no pathetic flag waving, no excuses, no pulling of punches, no jingoism, no justification of incompetence in the name of patriotism. Some countries wouldn't even MAKE a video like this, let alone broadcast it - uncensored - to the world in case certain long-term rivals were watching and might find cause to laugh at them. Yes, you know who I'm talking about. Brits don't give a damn what other people think about them culturally, physically, mentally or militarily. I see that as a strength, not a weakness. ;-)
@@jerrygolding1056 Oddball was my hero after kelly himself. You can't not be a clint eastwood fan, but the actor who played oddball was excellent. Because you had to be a little bit crazy to crew a sherman. The thing was a deathtrap. Not the worst tank, by far, but not the best. The only reason it did as well as it did was numbers. If you can't out tech 'em, or out fight 'em, out produce them. I call it the rabbit strategy.
David Fletcher, where have you been all my life? Your British humor is flawless and I love tanks. How didn't I know of you sooner? I'm sure I remember seeing you on some TV shows when I was younger but I'm so happy to have found the Bovington Tank Museum's TH-cam channel. Makes me always think of Company of Heroes 2! Every time I order the Sherman Firefly around he says "just like driving around Bovington, eh?"
Each one of these I look at it and think, 'oh, that don't look so bad. It looks like it could be used as a river scout or a...' and then I hear him describe its internals and my heart sinks again.
We could never have that, David Fletcher is far too concise and knowledgeable to be in politics. He also has a terrible knack of common sense, not a prayer of making PM.
Brexit negotiations would be a treat to watch. "Now listen here, these are the terms, you will agree to them, or Berlin will look like it in 1945, understand?"
Great presentation! Regarding the Charioteer's history abroad , thou; the Finns didn't consider this thing a tank - but dedicated it into Tank Destroyer Battalions. Later the Finns even looked into the prospect of fitting thenew QF L7 105mm into the Charioteer, but there were no export availability for the gun. The leftover 20 pounders, instead, would have then been retrofitted into our Comet fleet - actually one such tank was buildt for trials.
Why is the 'The Old Gang II' not in the Top 5, I hear you cry. 1) it is a superb tank in every way 2) It would take Mr. Fletcher too long to cover it all.
"This thing could only do 11 miles per hour on a good day, with a following wind". So many great quotes. This guy is a national treasure (hence his MBE I suppose). :)
"It's not really bullet-proof. Except from a revolver. For a while. From a distance." Sums it all up, really.
S&W 500 has entered the chat
What about pointed sticks?
@@RaferJeffersonIII It would have been magnificent for Imperial British Army. You know that which was just a travel agency for oversexed males and whose prerequisite for campaign was that enemy would under no circumstance carry guns.
@@vksasdgaming9472 Eh, maybe in some parts of Africa. Plenty of guns among the various enemies of the Raj.
but that mustache of his bullet-proof is
"It's armed with a vickers machine gun, which is better than spitting at people but only just" i bursted out laughing at that point 🤣
I'm still laughing!!!
Too true
'It's not bulletproof... except for maybe a revolver, for a while, from a distance' killed me, that understated savagery is why I love this guy!
I did laught hard too when he said that
I couldn't hold it that far "I was going to say it may have been known as Black Prince to its friend but in never had any friends so I don't see how they could do that. But anyway..." already got me XD
So, what we've learned:
5. You can't have a tank with hopelessly deficient armor.
4. You can't have a tank with hopelessly deficient speed.
3. You can't turn it into a boat.
2. You can't scatter major engine components in all directions.
1. You can't permanently trap your driver inside the tank.
You can do all those things, but no-one has managed to combine them into one vehicle. There also must be hopelessly deficient weaponry as well. I think .45 ACP is biggest caliber tank needs.
@@vksasdgaming9472 Don't be silly, arm the crew with a single 2.7mm Kolibri. That will be more than sufficient.
@@mulrich For PDWs that certainly is enough. For tank-mounted weaponry .45 ACP is certainly enough.
@@vksasdgaming9472 Poppycock! I think you need to look up that gun. The Kolibri. Who needs a gun actually mounted on the tank when you have that! Save that weight!
@@mulrich If crew lugs that hand-held artillery it does not save any weight. Besides tank is not a tank without mounted weaponry on it. A compromise: belt-fed dual Kolibri mounted on front so the gunner can shoot with it.
Newsflash! David Fletcher confirms TOG II not worst tank in the world!
Go home Jingles, you're drunk.
Rigged! Insider Tanking! Russian Bias!
+The Mighty Jingles To be fair Jingles, it was ONLY a top five list. Now if it had been a top SIX list... :P
It was about tanks and tank destroyers and not about boats or caravans.
Just like the Robin valiant is not the Worst car in the world.... and just cus i not will put shot in my top 5 list of worst way to get killed, dont apply i woud like to get shot.
“It’s known as black prince to its friends, but it never had any friends.” David Fletcher is on fire
"It's not bulletproof in any sense of the word, apart from with a revolver, maybe, for a while, from a distance..."
Mr. Fletcher is 100% savage and a national treasure.
I know right? Just discovered this and it's hilarious
He should get himself a side job doing consumer affairs reviewing auto n other products for consumer research. He would probably be a very Frank and honest person doing this job.🎉
"If you don't agree with me, then just keep it to yourself" David Fletcher 2018.
I don't agree that i shall keep this to myself.
Yeah, like _that_ was ever going to work!
He's like the opinionated British Grandpa everybody wishes they had. I could listen to him go on about tanks for hours.
I don't think he understands how the internet works.
@@philipbossy4834 I don't think he cares how the internet works.
David Fletcher has spoken. All other tank ranking lists are henceforth invalid.
No, they are not. This is a list of the worst tanks in the museum.
Produced by British
They might be but apparently we have to keep it to ourselves (what?)
@LocalToast what?
Good point but how does that related to Einsteins Tache (nose brush).
David Fletcher: Valiant, worst tank in the world!
Wargaming: What tank can we give to people for free for 10 years of world of tanks..
You mean the free garage slot they gave with some free credits?
I can't lie,I have had an absolute blast with my Valiant. It's a little bit like a mini-TOG at heart.
In fairness the Valiant seems quite popular. And I didn't bloody get one.
All these months later now is my chance! The valiant has dumb good camo rating and binos view range it can actually work late game like a stupid advanced duck tank that can actually hide it is still terrible but funny
@@SpecialJess2 if you are top tier ofc X)
Probably the biggest flaw with the Charioteer was the clock installed on the turret. This often inadvertently informed the enemy what time it was and gave them the opportunity to attack at the worst times such as the middle of breakfast
Or tea time operation Market Garden
Or tea time
An utter shower. The enemy didn't play cricket or bowls. Shameful display.
Oh my god, that's hilarious....
It's ironic that this td actually performed well in world of tanks
That moustache is enough to know this is man who know what he's talking about
QUITE RIGHT
Anyone with the fore thought to have a soup strainer is a smart chap.
Lol nice, 😊
His mustache knows more about tanks than I do.
Is it me or is it slightly asymmetrical? Been annoying me for ages😂
"The sole Valiant was retained by the School of Tank Technology, where students were treated to an inspection of it at the end of their course and invited to find fault. David Fletcher wrote of this: "One hopes they started early in the morning." "
Imagine your mechanical project being such a staggering failure, that they start using it as a teaching aid in how NOT to design something.
thats like, being such a failure that you go down in history, on things that you shouldnt be
It's like those terrible movies like The Room, and terrible games Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde on Nintendo, abject lessons in exactly what _not_ to do.
@@reedman0780
That is what happened with Pyrrhus of Eripus
The guy that Pyrrhic victory is named after
Bit late to the comment but this is actually standard practice at my university.
They rarely show us successful projects, just horrifically failed ones and tell us "you see this, don't do this".
In engineering school, that makes great sense actually. As a project manager of 30 years, if you ask me to describe episodes that taught me the most, they were (at leat initially and maybe permanently) disasters.
A38 "...Only nine inches off the ground..."
Is this the only tank in the world in danger of being stopped by those concrete blocks for parking lots?
That's the saddest thing I've ever heard.
Well, the Italian cv33 probably couldn’t either.
Then again the cv33 is a thousand times smaller than the A38
@@mistertree553 italian tanks don't count as tanks
@TomasPabon what about the M13 and M14 series? They were decent designs! Horribly outdated, but still decent!
A7V
I'd be foolish to disagree with him.
Never expected to see you here.
Though some of his reasoning is a bit broad or generic. Such as his definition of a tank which covers a large number of "tank destroyers" out there, British or not.
Also his point on armour when he was talking about the amphibious tank as there are several tanks out there comparable to it for it's time period like the Panzer I which can't handle AT fire either. As far as I know nearly no tank from that period can handle AT fire which is why 37mm AT guns and .50" AT rifles were common.
Omg i love you Taofledermaus....
Jeff is everywhere
**'Jesus wept'! You again?**
"May of been called black prince by its friends but never had any friends so I don't know how that happened." How to roast a tank with David Fletcher.
May of doesn't exist. Would you care to try to learn proper grammar and come back once you get it right?
Ale Rojas ummm I was quoting him directly. Those aren’t my words, they are a paraphrase at worst. Read the comment before you comment like that. Besides, what is nitpicking grammar like that doing for anyone, what good does it do for anyone?
@@wesleywoodhouse2831 You misquoted him. Finish school before coming here, please.
Ale Rojas it was a paraphrasing him, meaning i wasn’t doing the quote to the last word, it was a general description from memory. Besides, it was two words, how could that be worthy of insulting me by saying I am uneducated. Besides, answer my question please, why Did you insult me in the first place, it’s just mean.
@@wesleywoodhouse2831 maybe he "never had any friends"? Haha
The British should have designed more tanks with armor like Mr. Fletcher's moustache. Look at that angling. I bet that thing would bounce a direct hit from an 88
that thing will tear you to shreds. Jamie, pull that up!
Wonder what caliber his mustache is, a KV2 suddenly appears.
@Deus Vult ergo Mr. Fletcher's moustache can bounce a Schwerer Gustav
It is a fleet of microdrone needles. They charge themselves using the heat differential of his upper lip and the local weather. He's great in the desert or ice but useless in mud.
His moustache looks it's trying to escape from his face.
In 1967-68 I was driver and everyone else too (manpower shortage) for an American M60A1 that had an engine so clapped out it could not go up a hill. "We only replace them when they reach X miles on the odometer," I was told. Oh, it also leaked pressure in the track tension adjustment pistons so that it often threw a track. On one fine day it threw BOTH tracks. Back in the base, I swapped the cable from the engine hours gauge to the odimeter so that each day, as the tank sat in the motor pool idling while I did routine maintenance, it ran up miles instead of hours. In a few months I had run the tank up to the required mileage without moving it from where it sat. I got a new tank. My company commander - who must have known what I was doing - called me aside and, laughing, said that my average speed (miles driven versus engine hours) was over 50 MPH on a tank with a design speed of 30.
And how fast were you REALLY going!?😜
Awesome! Lol
Lovely story. Thanks for sharing!
You gotta do what you gotta do 😂
Brilliant solution to bureaucracy
Going 50 mph on a tank that goes 30 mph
Gearbox: my time has come
"Except from a revolver..."
ouch.
"maybe..."
ouch.
"for a while..."
ouch.
"from a distance"
oooooouch.
Regarding the tank's armament; "It's probably better than spitting at people, but only just". Savage.
That’s also the crew’s reaction to the tank being shot by a revolver.
“you're not supposed to do things like that with a tank, it's silly”
This man is comedy Gold.
I don't know if I'm listening to a lecture on tanks or Monty Python😁
_Monty Panzer_
A Monty Python lecture on tanks.
@@CallanElliott and now for something completely different...
Goddamn best show there ever was.
A candidate for the Ministry of Silly Tanks . . .
The amount of casual savagery this man can dish out is astounding :D
He comes from a generation that debated views and idea in public discourse rather than silencing opposing views and criticism. It seems to be a lost art at times to be quick in wit, charm and pithy animadversions. Subtle cheekiness for the win :)
I had several teachers at school like him and you developed a thick skin very quickly as well as fast reflexes as they tended to throw chalk and blackboard erasers at you if you weren't paying attention/mucking around. If you were paying attention they treated you more like adults and you learned a lot, a great generation.
My secondary school history teacher was british and that fits him to a T (not counting the physical stuff).
Would have to have been a British staff officer
@@jelkel25 I never threw chalk, only blackboard erasers and it wasn't a " Chalk board" it was a board that was black, so it was a blackboard! Lol
In love this gentleman, British humour at its best, talking sbout the L1E3, "it's armed with a single vickers machine gun, which is probably better than spitting at people but only just... " Hahahahaha... You sir ...a legend, hats off
Cheerio
We have a down vote? Nice to know the designer of the A38 Valiant is still alive.
There are also 18 drivers who lost their feet
A38 for world of tanks!
@@livinglitchfield6917 I can already hear:
TC: «Our Driver is dead We can barely move!»
Player: «F*ck me, I just braked!»
A down vote? Shoot him at dawn!!
As of today, there are 81 down votes, so the family, relatives and friends of the designer don't like it either.........:)
This seems to fit with a very British tradition, self deprecation.
Saves everyone else slagging us off dude.
@LocalToast because the majority of white countries are prosperous and free, so it's no wonder people from less prosperous and free countries are flooding to get in.
LocalToast Wow are you okay? You do realize the United States of America was made by immigrants? ITS A NATION OF IMMIGRANTS!!! So please, stop leaving propaganda leaflets in every comment and go be on your way...
LocalToast
Couldn't you find a more appropriate venue for your blithering?
Well, Fletcher has shat on the A7V elsewhere ;-)
You get your foot stuck in the Valiant. "I'll just get a hacksaw then we'll be able to free you". "So you can cut the pedal?" "Um, sure, the pedal."
Literally the only criticism of that comment is that British people don't say "Um, sure". They do in films, but most films seem to be written by or for Americans. Today you learned something special
Adam McLaughlin are you implying British people don’t say um or that they don’t say sure. Both of those are false
Absolutely sick! Reminds me of the time a bear got my food on a backpacking trip and I had to survive on my own boogers for a week.
@@intermenater i wasn't expecting that lol
Of course I'm sure you could saw the pedal off. I haven't seen it myself, but I'm having a hard time imagining a pedal with dimensions that would allow you to get your foot stuck, but not have any way to saw.
13:35 "Its not bullet proof in any sense of the word, apart from a revolver maybe, for a while, at a distance"
One of many great lines in this video. I liked the comment at 15:29 about the Vickers machine gun "...which is probably better than spitting at people, but only just."
... shooting up hill into a stiff breeze.... with your eyes closed
Number 4. Black Prince was designed by Vauxhall Motors. Number 3... 😁
Gotta love that *dry British Humor* and YES as a Yank I have spelled *HUMOR correctly....*
David's amazing! Makes me laugh so hard with those lines, I could watch /listen to him for hours! Lol
*The Top Five list we've been waiting for!* Very interesting to see this focus on why some tanks failed from a design and/or production standpoint. Also remembering Operation Think Tank, I've been wondering whether the Valiant would make it up there ;)
Military Aviation History, yes I had expected TOG to be in the list, then he explained the amphibian, god its bad. I knew about Valiant it does beg the question with these examples, how in gods names did they design the Centurion?
Hopefully, the next time The Chieftain is there he'll do an inside the hatch on some of these. It would be interesting to learn a little more about them and see what they were like on the inside as well.
When they designed the Centurion, they had used all their bad ideas on the Valiant, Only thing they had left was to make the fuel tanks a bit too small.
Remember that completely different teams worked on these vehicles. The Centurion was deigned by the Directorate of Tank Design, part of the Ministry of Supply. One of the benefits they had was that they had had a view of the detail and operational experience of every tank deign the British had produced or used and had quite an open design brief.
The Valiant design was begun by Vickers, who at the start focused on reusing everything they could from the Valentine. In the end nothing from that survived in the final design. Design work then passed to the Birmingham Railway Carriage and Waggon Company (who also did locomotives) who had done good work in producing the Cromwell. They then passed it to Ruston & Hornsby who up to that point had been producing Matilda IIs and whose design experience was with Heavy Oil Engines, Industrial Locomotives, Steam Shovels and Steam Traction Engines. A skewed design with compromises relating to the Valentine was then passed to less and less experienced design teams, with, no doubt, disruption and loss of knowledge at each stage.
The design was all the time skewed by the design brief, which was for maximum armour at minimum weight for use in the Far East where the infrastructure could not support vehicles as heavy as those used in Europe. In effect it was 'Excelsior, but lighter'. Valiant weighed only 27 tons compared to Excelsior at 40. This required all sorts of compromises which would have been a tough nut to crack for most design teams, let alone a disrupted and, in the later stages inexperienced, one saddled with the legacy of an unnecessary additional design restriction added by Vickers management (the Valentine reuse requirement).
Rick Ansell - Thank you Rick for interesting backstory on the design development of the A35. I knew there was some sort of story to tell concerning it’s development but never could find anything about it. One would have to assume individuals of basically average and literate intelligence designed the Valiant, so there must have been something else at play for this mess to be the final product.
Boss: Boys! We are going to make an all welded tank!
(Clearing throat) um sir... we don’t have any one that knows how to weld.
Boss: Boys! We are going to make an all riveted tank!
Tank Santa has spoken....let no other speak on this subject!
Tank Santa! thats awesome. He must be related to Gun Jesus!
Tank Walrus more like !
Always thought he was more like tank Eisenstein. XD
He sees you when you're sleeping
He knows when you're awake
He knows if you've been bad or good
So be good because his Rheinmetall 120mm smoothbore cannon can engage targets at up to [classified] meters range.
"So be good because his Royal Ordnance L7 rifled cannon can (effectively) engage targets at up to 2,000 yards range."
David Fletcher is the David Attenborough of tanks.
No. David Attenborough is the David Fletcher of anything else.
If I may say so.
Lol i was just about to day the same thing.
6:38 "You're not suppossed to do things like that with a tank. It's silly!"
God, I love this man.
David Fletcher, you are THE man! So entertaining, so informative. Loved this one. Cheers! wot?
You could have made an effort with your clothes ye scruffy bugger
GG
RD Mountford , That would be Lindy beige , not sure what to make of him ...
David Fletcher the experts experts expert has spoken. Kneel.
No man makes the word ‘silly’ sound so cutting. Never seen that Amphibian - it just looks appalling, like a tracked Citroen 2CV.
Not bulletproof from anything except perhaps a revolver.
For a while from a distance.
a tracked citroen 2cv had me pissing my self. i agree.
2CV at least has personality.
And personality goes a long way.
Ah but the Citroen 2CV did meet it's design brief of being able to travel quickly across a plowed field with a basket of eggs in the front seat and not break any.
Just WHY you would want to travel quickly across a plowed field with a basket of eggs in the front seat is the part that eludes me.
Fill this man with high caffeined tea and stick a microphone on him. Letting him ramble on about everything.
Tea.
Caffeinated Tea
@@ShiroFuun Black tea doesn't have that much less caffiene than coffee though 🤷♂️
To be honest, me using 2 tea bags (usually Yorkshire or PG Tips) in one mug gives me a bigger buzz than a normal cup of coffee and arguably tastes better
@@Phantom_Aspekt Well put. That's exactly what David Fletcher's response would be.
If he grew his hair a little longer and mussed it up, he would be the Einstein of armour. The should be his title anyway, "The Einstein of Armour".
He's already been given the moniker "Tank Santa". So now we can be blessed by both Gun Jesus and Tank Santa.
I think he got a haircut recently.
He's a dead ringer for Count von Zeppelin as is! (Tanks & airships - same dog, more gas : )
Or is he the Fletcher of Physics?
Watch the new video on worst foreign tanks, with David Fletcher. He looks exactly as you described him, I think he must have read your comment.
Fantastic mustache explanation yet again.
Every time David Fletcher is on camera. My brain goes silent and builds itself up to something interesant.
Covenanter: A tank so bad that one company designed Crusader as a replacement just so they wouldn't have to build it.
And Crusader wasn't all that good either....
...it never had any friends.
#blackprince4everalone
😔😔😔
BOI. What in the fck does this have to do anything with the video
7:44 "It never had any friends" BRUTAL
Beat me to it. Brutal
Poor, friendless Black Prince!
No, the British know that the Germans lost the war.
@moonbeam the tommy cooker was actually the Sherman tank. Also at least we never nuked anyone, yet America nuked 2 civilian-filled cities just because they felt like it. Pretty sure that violates multiple war crimes.
Although, you dont seem like an american, so I'm going to assume you're Finnish because you brought up Finland for no reason.
@moonbeam *cough*the only world power between June 1940 and June 1941 fighting Nazis*cough*
"You're not supposed to do that with a tank - it's silly" lol
Ministry of Silly Tanks
@@gastonbell108
I'd like to see a skit like this somewhere within my lifetime.
Oh, REALLY!?😄😜😳😎
David Fletcher.... legend. Nuff said 👍👍
This man is an national treasure.
amen to that :)
A national not an national.
"if you're designing a tank at home" 😳😂😂😂😂
"If you don't agree with me, then just keep it to yourself" Not only was that the best way to start a video....it's now how I start every conversation. :-D
So does that mean you want only to have conversations with those whom agree with you?
How sad, blinkered and ultimately boring.
Glad you're not my friend.
I really enjoy a good argument/debate.
@@Bodragon comsoderimg that you took an obvious joke seriously, I'm glad we aren't friends either. XD
I don't agree with you! 😃
@@mrazik9365 But he's not joking.
If he was joking, it might be funny.
Why do you think he is joking?
Go on. Throw me a bone here...
.
@@Bodragon lol you spastic
Note the crumpled front of the amphibian following a small shunt with a Reliant Robin.
It likely did that when it hit some water.
The Robin, on the other hand, didn't have a scratch.
Caution: Unarmored
*Parked Reliant Robin covered in memory foam.
"Its not bullet proof in any sense of the word...apart maybe for a revolver.....from a distance...for a while" Classic!
“If you are designing a tank at home...”. Classic words...
*hastily stuffs tank plans behind back*
Would you believe that I'm watching a lot of these videos in preparation for designing tanks for a sci-fi game? It's like he knew I was watching. I'm going to have to maintain a better sitting posture when I view these in future.
Damn, silly I know but I was surprised to see how flipping large the Black Prince is.
Mark Grehan and he’s 7’ 2”
Out of the 5, I think the Black Prince could've been good. With another engine of course.
Perhaps Wakanda would want it?
I have one problem with this video being 30 minutes long, it's not long enough as I could listen to David Fletcher talk about tanks for hours on end and never get bored!
The Valiant looks like a little kid's go-cart version of an IS-7
1944 Valiant A38 Infantry Tank henlo stinky tank, get a better design stinky
@@justinpatterson7700 get better name dumbass
@@comradef1916 helli my british friend
Charioteer designer: 'I want the gun on the really good centurion tank but on the outdated Cromwell chassis'
Everyone else : 'why don't we just use the centurion?'
Cromwell designer: 'you think too small!'
David Fletcher is always a win.
Clicked LIKE the moment he said: "If you don't agree with me, just keep it to yourself". National treasure this man.
I love how after every time fletcher describes a way in which the valiant could cause death or severe injury to its crew he finishes with "which doesnt sound that healthy"
I love this man
Saw the thumbnail preview and I was so happy to see that someone as legendary as David Fletcher shared my love of the Black Prince....
... *sigh* looks like I'm still on my own then, just like the Prince.
Dude I got you. While I agree the engine wasn't powerful enough, it's got nothing really wrong with it otherwise.
Armour? Check
Firepower? Yep
Looks threatening? Hell yes.
British? You'd better believe it.
@@joecal97 A good engine and better transmission, and it would be perfectly serviceable.
Halinspark Even if it would've had to have been the last of the infantry tanks anyway, I reckon it would've been useful to us (and to whoever we sold then to after their service to us. I guarantee someone would've bought them.
If Tank Santa was right, and its probably safe to assume that he is, an RR Meteor would have gotten it to 22 mph, which was not bad for the time, not the best sure, but it was not bad. Faster would have have been better but 22 mph was a serviceable speed.
But yes, replace the engine especially, and probabloy the transmission and BP would have been a useful vehicle.
The Tortoise weighs 30T more, carries a crew of 7 and goes at 12mph. Think of that... You've got a tank that is slower with far less firepower than the Tortoise, and it gets called the 'Black Prince'. I guess it sounds better than 'The Sloth' though.
This man is a genius.
"if you don't agree with me, then just keep it to yourself"
David, you just got yourself a new subscriber.
So you like thin skinned people who cannot handle anything remotely resembling a different view?
The world of entertainment would need to have this as a motto when people start complaining.
Actually the voice we hear, it comes from his mustache
The Black Prince . . . a tank with no friends! 11 mile an hour with a tail wind, poor old number 4.
@Tyler TV The underlying problem with the Black Prince is that it was started too late. A Churchill derived 17-pdr armed tank would have been ideal for the breakout from Normandy in summer 1944, but they only started work on the Black Prince at the end of 1943 so it had no chance at all of being ready in time... even being ready by summer 1945 would have been ambitious IMO.
The Black Prince is basically a tier 5 tank facing tier 9 tanks. The tier 5 churchill 1 is devastating, a monster, but you effectively have to play it again twice against increasingly fast, well armoured and heavily armed tanks which outclass it in every single aspect.
"It's armed with a single Vickers machine gun, which, is probably better than spitting at people...but only just." Mr. Fletcher pulls no punches.
I nicknamed his moustache
“Alfred the destroyer of worlds”
I call it Fletcher's fanny brush, the inflexible.
the more i look at it, the more i see Boris Johnson...
It's name is "Nidhogg- Master of Dread and Devourer of Souls." A name that only the most brave have the courage to speak, and only in hushed tones.
Weep, for the age of Ragnarok is nigh, and the great silver dragon will rise from its slumber.
They say that all you hear before your inevitable demise is the sound of wind blowing through bushy whiskers.
Something like that...
please, we must have names for his eye brows!!!!
And that's something, coming from Stalin!
Greetings from Rhineland! My grandfather worked for the British Army of the Rhine as a craftsman. He left me some old tools with the imprint "war finish".
"It's not really bullet-proof. Except from a revolver. For a while. From a distance." That comment made my day. Thank you!
I'm using my right to agree with the list. I like how they are put in order ranging from "only slightly useful in combat" through "completely useless in combat" and finally "only useful for showing how to NOT".
"They've done away wth the front hull machine gunner, although they sometimes sat a man in there, in supreme discomfort."
0:00 OMG He's adorable! Mom! Can we keep him! I promise I'll feed him, walk him, and everything!
A sincere thank you to Mr. Fletcher. Your knowledge and opinion is greatly valued!
When David Fletcher says they're the worst
*They are the worst*
5: Charioteer 00:52
4: Black Prince 07:06
3: L1E3 Amphibian 12:24
2: Covenanter 16:40
1: A38 Valiant 23:43
SPOILERS
Nick Pallatt Even if you know which tanks are on the list, it shouldn’t matter. What matters is the information and reasoning behind why it is on this list. That, and the amazing stories and humor from David Fletcher.
riskinhos Thank you for the time stamps.
I thought the Tortoise - an unwieldy behemoth and a mechanic's nightmare with regard to maintenance - would make it on David Fletcher's list; I wonder why he spared it…
The only surprise on this list was the amphibious tank.
I imagine St. Peter looks and sounds exactly like this man as he looks over and judges your life at the pearly gates.
I love his descriptors of catastrophic flaws: "that's no all that convenient.". Lol
I swear David Fletcher is my favourite i love him.
потрясающая работа, мой друг! Так держать!
The hardest part of British tank building was to come up with new names starting with C..
Yes, like Matilda, Valantine, Archer, Firefly
That's exactly why everyone expects our next tank to be Challenger 3.
Chihuahua
I don't know if anyone would get this reference but how about Crawmerax Invincible for a new tank name starting with 'C'?
You're border(lands)ing on the silly, there. ;)
OMG!! David Fletcher must be my favorite ever tank presenter!!! OMG! I love the way he does it!!! 😃👌👌👌👌👌👍👍👍👍👍👍
Most capable, not most funny 😉
@@AlexNijv English humour, dryer than James Bond's vodka martini :-)
BROSM WoTB you like rambling, disjointed, and failing to distinguish between opinion and fact? How odd.
oh cool, he brought his own pop filter. A sound guy's dream
The tanks are still crying in the corners I believe.
I'm a Brit (English, to be tribally correct), and what makes me so proud about this excellent presentation is the honesty and total lack of nationalistic bullspit (whoops, typo).
There's no attempt to put a positive spin on anything. There's no pathetic flag waving, no excuses, no pulling of punches, no jingoism, no justification of incompetence in the name of patriotism.
Some countries wouldn't even MAKE a video like this, let alone broadcast it - uncensored - to the world in case certain long-term rivals were watching and might find cause to laugh at them. Yes, you know who I'm talking about.
Brits don't give a damn what other people think about them culturally, physically, mentally or militarily. I see that as a strength, not a weakness.
;-)
Now get Lindybeige to review the same tanks so we know how excellent they really were.
They agree, the Valiant is the absolute worst.
He's a plonker
@Deadpool Lindy is good at ancient topics. His knowledge of modern day equipment and tactics is pretty pitiful and downright cringy at times.
Never clicked faster
“Ya see! There you go Fletcher with them negative waves!”
Oddball, Kelly’s Heros
Woof woof woof! That's my other dog impression! ^-^
@@jeromethiel4323 Oh man, I only ride them! I don't know what makes them go. My approach to computers!
@@jerrygolding1056
Oddball was my hero after kelly himself. You can't not be a clint eastwood fan, but the actor who played oddball was excellent. Because you had to be a little bit crazy to crew a sherman. The thing was a deathtrap. Not the worst tank, by far, but not the best. The only reason it did as well as it did was numbers.
If you can't out tech 'em, or out fight 'em, out produce them. I call it the rabbit strategy.
@@jeromethiel4323 That man was Donald Sutherland, father of Keifer!
@@jeromethiel4323 He played a 1940s hippie.
".. Its got all the faults you could hope for..." Flectherisms , you gotta love 'em!
If you don't agree with David Fletcher MBE on tanks, you are wrong. And, yes, you should keep it to your self, if that is the case.
David Fletcher, where have you been all my life? Your British humor is flawless and I love tanks. How didn't I know of you sooner? I'm sure I remember seeing you on some TV shows when I was younger but I'm so happy to have found the Bovington Tank Museum's TH-cam channel. Makes me always think of Company of Heroes 2! Every time I order the Sherman Firefly around he says "just like driving around Bovington, eh?"
Eyy fellow company of heroes 2 player! I thought i was the only one!
Each one of these I look at it and think, 'oh, that don't look so bad. It looks like it could be used as a river scout or a...'
and then I hear him describe its internals and my heart sinks again.
Everyone else: "Leave your top five favorite tanks in the comments." David Fletcher: "If you disagree with me sod off!" Hahaha
Praise be to Tank Santa for delivering us such fine gifts!
The Valiant would have been great in 1940 as a self-propelled , anti-invasion, artillery piece for the home-guard
The driver would be heavily motivated to win the fight, if the tank catches on fire he's SOL.
30 minutes of David Fletcher
This is pure gold
Or pure amelinimum
"If you are designing a tank at home...."
genius
I very much appreciate Mr. Fletcher's time spent on bringing us this video. Love the sense of humor.
David Fletcher for prime minister 👍
'Sorry old man, no swaps, strictly cash . . .'
At least knighting....
We could never have that, David Fletcher is far too concise and knowledgeable to be in politics. He also has a terrible knack of common sense, not a prayer of making PM.
Reverend!
Brexit negotiations would be a treat to watch. "Now listen here, these are the terms, you will agree to them, or Berlin will look like it in 1945, understand?"
David Fletcher is the Papa Smurf of tank fanatics.
Great presentation! Regarding the Charioteer's history abroad , thou; the Finns didn't consider this thing a tank - but dedicated it into Tank Destroyer Battalions. Later the Finns even looked into the prospect of fitting thenew QF L7 105mm into the Charioteer, but there were no export availability for the gun. The leftover 20 pounders, instead, would have then been retrofitted into our Comet fleet - actually one such tank was buildt for trials.
I'm only at number 4, but I am sure that the Valiant is number 1.
Im hoping to see TOG II*
Damn, I already knew that the Valiant was absolutely horrible but it seems that it was even more horrifying than I thought.
It's the Law of Valiant: The Valiant is always more horrifying then you think it is, even if you take into account the Law of Valiant.
I have zero interest in tanks.. but I found this highly watchable. Thanks.
Why is the 'The Old Gang II' not in the Top 5, I hear you cry.
1) it is a superb tank in every way
2) It would take Mr. Fletcher too long to cover it all.
The Valiant would work in Warhammer 40k. What's the loss of the leg compared to the glory of serving the emperor ?
Do not anger the machine spirit or it will claim your leg.
Someone didn't perform the Litany of Gear Modification correctly.
"All the faults you can hope for in one vehicle" : priceless.
"This thing could only do 11 miles per hour on a good day, with a following wind".
So many great quotes. This guy is a national treasure (hence his MBE I suppose). :)