Panzer III - Designs Based On Chassis

Designs Based On Chassis

• Artillerie-Panzerbeobachtungswagen III - Forward artillery observer tank. 262 produced.
• Bergepanzer III - In 1944 some Panzer IIIs were converted to armoured recovery vehicles. Mostly issued to formations with Tiger I tanks.
• Flammpanzer III Ausf. M / Panzer III (F1) - Flamethrower tank. 100 converted from existing Panzer III Ausf. M.
• Minenräumer III - Mineclearing vehicle based on a Panzer III chassis with a very highly raised suspension. (Prototype only.)
• Panzerbefehlswagen III - Command tank. Heavier armor, dummy gun, and long-range radios.
• Sturm-Infanteriegeschütz 33B - A close-support, Assault gun. Armed with a 15 cm sIG 33, 24 built. 12 used and lost in Stalingrad.
• Sturmgeschütz III - Assault gun / tank destroyer armed with a 75-millimetre (2.95 in) StuK.
• The Soviet SU-76i self-propelled gun was based on the chassis of captured German Panzer III and StuG III. About 201 of these vehicles, many from Stalingrad, were converted at Factory No. 37 in 1943 for Red Army service by removing the turret, constructing a fixed casemate, and installing a 76.2-millimetre (3.00 in) S-1 gun (cheaper version of the F-34) in a limited-traverse mount. The armour was 35 millimetres (1.38 in) thick on the casemate front, 50 millimetres (1.97 in) in the hull front, and 30 millimetres (1.18 in) on the hull side. It was issued to tank and self-propelled gun units starting in autumn 1943, and withdrawn to training use in early 1944. Two SU-76i survive: one on a monument in the Ukrainian town of Sarny and a second on display in a museum on Poklonnaya Hill in Moscow. It should not be confused with the Soviet SU-76 series.
• Tauchpanzer III - Some tanks were converted to "diving tanks" for Operation Sea Lion.

• Tauchpanzer III under test.

• Panzerbefehlswagen, Balkans, 1941.

• Finnish army Sturmgeschütz III

• Flammpanzer III