![]() Maintenance was difficult because the engines were inaccessible. Immediately it became evident that their technical development had been insufficient, most breaking down the SRA even started to fall apart. On, the four prototypes were presented at the Atelier de Rueil, where they were compared, each having to drive over a twenty kilometre test course. A fifth producer, Delaunay-Belleville, whose project (an improved Renault FT) had been rejected beforehand, would be allowed to make 83 tanks the remaining 167 would be allotted at the discretion of the French State. Renault and Schneider would each get to produce 250 units, FAMH and FCM each 125. On these conditions four projects were started in 1921: two by a cooperation between Renault and Schneider: the SRA and the SRB, one by Forges et Aciéries de la Marine et d'Homécourt (FAMH), more commonly known as "Saint Chamond" from its location, and the last by Forges et Chantiers de la Méditerranée (FCM), the FCM 21. In exchange, to the industry very large orders of no less than a thousand vehicles were promised. To be allowed to join, they had to agree beforehand to relinquish any patents to the Army, which would be free to combine all projects into a single type. He used his position as Inspector-General of the Tanks to enforce the so-called "Estienne accord" on the industrialists, ordering them to "reach a mutual understanding, free from any spirit of industrial competition". Estienne, who in the war had personally witnessed the dismal effects of such a situation, was determined to avoid a repetition. In the past, this had led to much non-constructive rivalry. Two versions should be built, one a close support tank armed with a 75 mm howitzer, the other an anti-tank vehicle with a 47 mm gun instead.įrench industry was very interested in the project. The specifications included: a maximum weight of thirteen tonnes a maximum armour thickness of 25 millimetres a hull as low as possible to enable the gun to fire into the vision slits of bunkers a small machine gun turret to fend off enemy infantry attacks, at the same time serving as an observation post for the commander and a crew of at most three men. ![]() ![]() To minimise the vehicle size this gun should be able to move only up and down, with the horizontal aiming to be provided by turning the entire vehicle. To limit costs, it had to be built like a self-propelled gun, with the main weapon in the hull. In January 1921 a commission headed by General Edmond Buat initiated a project for such a vehicle. ![]() It had to be a "Battle Tank" that would be able to accomplish a breakthrough of the enemy line by destroying fortifications, gun emplacements and opposing tanks. in his memorandum Mémoire sur les missions des chars blindés en campagne. The Char B1 had its origins in the concept of a Char de Bataille conceived by General Jean Baptiste Eugène Estienne in 1919, e.g. After the defeat of France, captured Char B1 (bis) would be used by Germany, with some rebuilt as flamethrowers, Munitionspanzer, or mechanised artillery. A further up-armoured version, the Char B1 "ter", was only built in two prototypes.Īmong the most powerfully armed and armoured tanks of its day, the type was very effective in direct confrontations with German armour in 1940 during the Battle of France, but low speed and high fuel consumption made it ill-adapted to the war of movement then being fought. Starting in the early twenties, its development and production were repeatedly delayed, resulting in a vehicle that was both technologically complex and expensive, and already obsolescent when real mass-production of a derived version, the Char B1 "bis", started in the late 1930s. The Char B1 was a specialised break-through vehicle, originally conceived as a self-propelled gun with a 75 mm howitzer in the hull later a 47 mm gun in a turret was added, to allow it to function also as a Char de Bataille, a "battle tank" fighting enemy armour, equipping the armoured divisions of the Infantry Arm. The Char B1 was a French heavy tank manufactured before World War II.
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