Britain's Tiger Killer - The 17-Pounder

Remember if the 17 pounder dont fit... PUT IT IN SIDEWAYS!!!

Dad always told me he was very happy when the 17 pounder came out. Big morale booster, and solid game-changer.

One of my Grandfathers served as a medic on Normandy, and after the link up with the British, his unit spent a lot of time in close proximity to British units, eventually developing a friend who remained a family friend until his death in the mid 2000s. Both my Grandfather and his friend would always talk about how much British and American troop's loved having Firefly tanks around, and how bad they felt for the Firefly crews who got pulled every direction because of officers mistaking hull down Panzer 4s for Tigers. They would also poke jabs at each other, how the Americans wouldn't advance without tanks or Air cover, or how the British would stop for tea at the exact same time every day to the point the Germans learned when they could relax.

My Uncle Gerry served in the RCA (Royal Canadian Artillery) during the war. He started out on the 2-pounder and eventually served as a Gunner for a 17-pounder. He always told me that it was such a deadly gun. He also gave me heck for joining the infantry. He sadly passed in December last year. Thanks for the great videos.

i think people really underestimate the effect of the smaller 6 pounder. it had a much faster fire rate and could pen pretty much everything up to a panther, but penning the tank isn't everything, often crews would bail out after one hit knowing that yet another round is incoming in short order. the main advantage of a six pounder is its hella manoeuvrable, you can slam that thing on the back of a universal carrier or a jeep and it'll get the battlefield much faster than a 17 pounder, which required a specialised tractor. great examples are postion 'snipe' in the second battle of el alemain where a 6 pounder section damn near destroyed 1/4 of the german tank force across a couple nights completely unsupported. *edit(maths)

The 77mm is actually a 76mm gun, but it didn't share ammunition with either the conventional 76mm or the 17 Pounder, so it was renamed to prevent confusion in the field. The gun was a bit shorter and the shells a little weaker, but they still retained more than enough power to ruin any tank it came across, while having superior ergonomics.

God bless British "fuck it, we ball" engineering

"Sir the boiling vessel won't fit!" "Cancel it and shut down production!"

5:50 Those puns packed quite a punch.

The amount of content you put on these short videos is amazing!

Some people get incredibly upset that this gun is actually better than the 88 on the tiger one, and it made a Sherman a big cat hunter.

Easily my favorite AT gun of WW2. I just love the name 17-Pounder. It just sounds so powerful. And its use in the Sherman Firefly, Comet, and Centurion 1 helped make them some of my most favorite British tanks in history. And solid puns at the end of the video.

You do a great job condensing so much information into these shorter form videos, they’re perfect to watch when taking a short break at work

"Sir, the gun won't fit!" "We did this seven times in the comments already."

The Comet's gun was named the 77mm high-velocity (17pdr. being 76.2mm) to distinquish the two shells for logistical reasons and avoid confusion with sending the wrong munitions to the wrong unit. While the projectile was the same in both, the 77mm had a different, shorter casing to fit into tanks better. It's a bit like how .38 Special and .357 Magnum cartridges are pretty much the same, but they're given different designations to avoid confusion (and the .357 casing is just slighly longer to make it harder to fit into guns designed for .38 Special, while it's perfectly fine to put .38 Special into a gun designed for a .357 Magnum).

My Grandfather fired one of theses things while doing an army instructors course on a range in 1943. He always talked about it being the most impressive weapon he ever fired.

Better muzzle velocity that the legendary "88", and for an anti tank gun velocity REALLY matters.

The Archer was a very appropriate name considering that the APDS fires a tungsten arrow. And the Firefly was more that capable of dealing with the Tiger tank with one famously killing three in one engagement. In another battle one firefly killed four panthers and knocked a fifth.

Amazing work keep them coming your getting better and better with every video

My father was in the Royal Artillery and told me at Woolwich arsenal he first saw the gun he told his captain who didn't believe a gun would have a breach as large as a tea chest, the story continued they sent out several guns to North Africa, the story went around his regiment the 17 pounder hit the first tiger going clean through and hitting the second German tank behind the tiger, perhaps a tall story to boost moral. It was a very powerful gun.