what is this little thing shown in Panzer III plans?
it looks like a lever actuated locking pin. the plate says move the handle to the right to tighten, that means the plunger goes up when tightening. But can’t find drawings or photos showing where it goes.
it is a traverse lock and where does it go?
It’s a very simple mechanism. Raising the handle causes the shaft to go down - you can see the cog wheels connecting them.
The shaft goes into some kind of hole in the roof of the tank’s hull. I don’t have an image of it right now, but I will take a look. In the meantime, this is the hole in the Panzer IV hull roof, which had a very similar lock.
There may be two or even three holes, to lock the turret e.g. forward or backward.
David
But the plate illustrated show raising the handle loosens “Lose”, while lowering the handle tightens “fest”.
I would guess that plate attaches the other way around.
There are pages missing from Dmitry’s copy of D652/19, and they probably contained the answer to your question.
So I went back to his manuals for the 37mm armed turret.
Here is the traverse lock, tucked away in the front left corner of the turret. And another cross section that shows you the hole and sleeve in the hull roof. Seems to have a waterproof cap.
And here is the Ausf.N at the Tank Museum. You can see the traverse lock. I’m not sure if it’s exactly the same as the earlier one, its base looks smaller. And I suspect they’ve rotated it to be parallel to the edge of the ring.
David
My photo of the museum’s Ausf.L
Definitely they have moved it forward into the corner, compared to the original turret. And it has a smaller base now. I will check the Panzer IV manuals, it could be the same item.
David
This one is in a Panzer IV Ausf.H, and it’s very simplified. Doesn’t even have the cog wheels. Just a notch.
David
Thanks. That’s what I was looking for.
