When you buy through links on our site , we may earn an affiliate commission . Here ’s how it works .
The forthcoming World War II motion-picture show " Fury " put tank car war front and center in a delineation of the final Allied push into Germany in 1945 .
In the movie , a U.S. Army sergeant ( play by Brad Pitt ) commands a intermediate - size Sherman tank in battle against a Nazi force with superiorfirepower , include a well - equip Tiger I heavy tank . The film , which opens in theaters across the nation on Friday ( Oct. 17 ) , features the last working Tiger tank in the human race .
The original Tiger 131, the world’s last working Tiger I tank, features in the film “Fury."
TheSherman tank(officially called the Medium Tank , M4 ) was the most widely deployed tank in World War II . The workhorse fomite was used by the U.S. Army , U.S. Marine Corps and the British , Canadian and barren French military group , according to the Encyclopaedia Britannica . project and built in the United States , a total of 49,324 Sherman tanks were made between 1942 and 1946 . [ 7 Technologies That Transformed Warfare ]
The M4 was a reliable tank , but the German Tiger heavy tankful outclass it . The Tiger I ( officially know as Panzerkampfwagen VI Tiger Ausf . H ) was deploy on all German fronts during WWII . The formidable tank consider 50 tons ( 54 metric tons ) and was heavily armored . About 1,350Tiger tank were produce in aggregate , between August 1942 and August 1944 .
During a scene in " Fury , " four M4 storage tank go head - to - head with one Tiger I , and only one M4 survives the fight .
An M4 Sherman like the one featured in the film could get through the upper frontal Isaac Hull of a Tiger 1 from between about 1,600 and 3,300 feet ( 500 beat and 1000 m ) , while the Tiger could tap out an M4 from the front at about 2,600 feet ( 800 m ) , accord to a Tiger crew instruction manual .
Both tanks used in the motion-picture show — the Sherman M4A3E8 and the Tiger 131 — are real , and belong tothe Tank Museumin Bovington , England .
The Tiger 131 was built in Kassel , Germany , in February 1943 and was embark to Tunisia to link the 504th German heavy armored combat vehicle battalion , fit in to the Tank Museum ’s internet site . On April 21 , 1943 , the Tiger was taken out of action by a Churchill tank of the British 48th Royal Tank Regiment , and was captured and repaired . On Sept. 25 , 1951 , the Tiger was given to the Tank Museum .
The Tiger was " one of [ the ] most feared weapons unleashed bythe Nazis , " capable of destroy an enemy tank from more than 1.2 Admiralty mile ( 2 kilometers ) away , Richard Smith , the Tank Museum ’s director , told the BBC .
Yet despite its ferocity , the Tiger was n’t unvanquishable . Its tracks would suspend up with mud and snow in the winter , which Russian forces used to their advantage in battle . The tank engines ' were underpowered , create them difficult to drive . The armored combat vehicle also faced problems because of their large size . Since few bridges could do by the Tiger ’s weight , the first version contained a schnorkel that allowed the tanks to traverse river up to 13 feet ( 4 m ) deep , but later version miss this feature article , consort to the History Learning Site .
