If you’ve ever seen a commercial for the chip brand Ruffles you’ve likely heard their
slogan “ruffles have ridges”.
Just like these crispy potato snacks German tanks during WW2 around 1943 also bore some
strange ridges.
Unfortunately this video was not sponsored by Ruffles but nonetheless we will be discussing
the reason Nazi Germany chose to slather their tanks in a strange mixture to create the distinct
textured look on mid and late war tanks.
Today’s video is not sponsored by anyone but I do want to give a quick mention to Odysee
where I have my youtube content mirrored.
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Now back to what you clicked on this video for.
Produced by the Chemische Werke Zimmer company in Berlin this coating was made up of 25%
Polyvinyl Acetate, 10% wood filler, 40% Barium Sulphate, 10% Zinc Sulphide, and 15% Ochre
pigment.
Known as Zimmerit its use was widespread on German armor during the mid and late war.
Aside from adding a rough looking texture to the tanks which likely helped with camouflaging
the machines, what benefit could adding this to every vehicle leaving the factory provide?
Well, similar to the much larger armored warships prowling the seas, tanks are primarily made
out of armored steel which is magnetic.
To combat this a technique called degaussing was common which
greatly reduced the magnetic field of a ship.
However this required a complex system of wires which would be far too impractical for
use on tanks.
Still, magnetic anti-tank mines did exist and the Germans were convinced it was necessary
to protect their armored vehicles against this threat.
Supposedly this was caused by the introduction of the Hafthohlladung anti tank weapon in
1942 which utilized magnets to attach a shaped charge to enemy tanks.
Fearing the Soviets could easily copy this design if any were captured, this caused the
typical German overengineering for a solution.Unlike the degaussing method Zimmerit itself did
not actually demagnetize the tank but rather acted as a sort of buffer to prevent a magnetic
attraction causing the mine to fail to stick.
Beginning in December of 1943 German tanks leaving the factory bore this new ridged coating.
Despite my overengineering joke this was actually a fairly simple process compared to much of
Germany's tank production.
As usual the tanks would normally be coated with an anti-corrosive primer, usually a distinct
red color, followed by the zimmerit.
When it arrived for application the coating had a paste-like consistency and had a solvent
mixed into it which reportedly smelled like acetone.
Most likely this was done to prevent it from hardening during transport.
When it came time to put it on the vehicle it would be applied in two coats using metal
trowels.
The first coat was 5mms thick and was applied in squares marked out using the trowel.
Following this the coating would need to dry for 24 hours before applying the second coat.
The base coat of squares would assist the second thinner coat in sticking and the distinct
ridges were added using a metal comb.
This wavy pattern helped provide that rough camouflage finish and a more difficult surface
for mines to contact with.
After this second coating was completed it would be dried using gas blowtorches.
The drying process, which took about an hour per tank, hardened the material and removed
the solvent from it creating a texture said to be similar to compressed sawdust.
If left to dry without the use of a torch it could take 8 days for the material to fully
harden and considering the desperate need for tanks this was not an option.
In fact one source puts the initial drying time for the base coat at only 4 hours.
With the 24 hour figure coming from a British report on the subject dating from 1945 this
does seem to be the more believable figure.
It is possible that this in some cases application differed due to supply issues or attempts
to speed up production so I can’t say for certain.
Regardless the application was a simple process which did not require experienced workers
but did still add several days to the production process.
The only real issue would be if a soft spot was left in the Zimmerit which could come
off the vehicle.
If properly hardened this was far from a concern as even when struck by projectiles very little
of the coating would be knocked off the armor.
It’s even reported that some tanks dug up decades after the war still bore trace amounts
of Zimmerit on them.
Unfortunately despite knowing virtually every detail about the production and application
process it is not clear how effective Zimmerit was in combat.
Despite the German fears neither Soviet or Allied soldiers were issued with magnetic
mines with only a few reports of captured German mines being used.
Britain also supplied around 159,000 “Clam” magnetic charges to the USSR but not much
is known about their usage and it only contained about 8 ounces of TNT which likely would not
cause significant damage unless placed on the suspension or another weak point on a
vehicle.
Some evidence was found from Soviet tests which believed the coating to be some form
of protection from molotov cocktails or a form of camouflage.
Strangely they found the Zimmerit to consist of 53% Barium Sulphate, 16-17% Quartz, 27%
Organic material, with the final 3% unidentified.
Since this is different from the actual mixture the German records show it’s possible their
samples may have been misidentified or contaminated somehow.
Either way the Soviets hypothesized that the ridges would concentrate liquid or heat from
flammable liquids causing the coating to melt and extinguish the flames.
Although obviously this was not the intention of the coating it was later found by the British
that a vehicle coated in Zimmerit when hit by a flamethrower would remain at a survivable
temperature inside whereas an uncoated tank would get so hot that the ammo could explode.
Although once again the increased camouflage was noted and similar coatings were tested
both before and after over 100 tons of Zimmerit was captured in Germany for concealment purposes.
The anti-magnetic properties were never fully tested but it was found that the ridges did
not add any noticeable increase in protection aside from concealment.
Some of the captured Zimmerit was shipped to Australia at the tail end of the war for
trials against Japanese magnetic mines but the war was over before it was tested.
Even the use of Zimmerit by the Germans was short lived with it being phased out in September
of 1944.
The reason for this is quite ironic as it was rumored to pose a fire hazard and an order
went out to halt application at the factories.
This was later found to be untrue but the halt on applications remained likely due to
the coating not being needed and adding unnecessary man hours to much needed tank production.
Realistically with only the Axis powers using magnetic mines in large quantities the coating
only served to protect from their own weapons anyways so why waste the resources on it.
In the end, Zimmerit itself was fairly unsuccessful in its intended role and was not used post
war due to magnetic mines being made obsolete by portable launchers, such as the Bazooka
and RPG among others.
Similar coatings, however, lives on to this day with various textured substances being
used on many modern tanks to increase concealment or aid in lowering thermal signatures.
Even during the second world war similar applications were attempted with the Soviets and Americans
using concrete as both additional armor and protection against mines.
I actually have a full video that you can watch after this one on that topic.
The Americans in particular tried a number of solutions to the Japanese magnetic mines
ranging from spikes to aluminum plates but I plan to cover those in a future video along
with other Pacific field mods.
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