Panther Ausf A - Italy 1943 | Panther Ausf A Russia, NO ZIMMERIT

Wait, so they were in Russia!?

Yep! I'll put my money on the Bundesarchiv, any day, every day. Northern Russia it is.

Alright, I'm really out of here now.

Well there we go then, thanks a million! Wish I was as good at researching as you.. I need to build up a libary ;)

Liam

I've also just found this...

This is said to be one of the few existing photographs of a panther Ausf.A without zimmerit. It is a model, the 701, the panzer regiment 23 belonging to the Heavy Panzerregiment Bake on the Russian front in early 1944. According to this source  A few are without zimmerit, practically only those produced in August 1943 and that the production of that month has been assigned to all 23 panzerregiment. 

Personally I believe this is another tank from the link jgeratic posted.

I think this is a late D, not an early A. If I remember my research correctly, the cast cupola was fitted to the last of the D production. I believe the binocular gunners periscope in the mantlet is the giveaway. I'm doing this from memory so correct me if I'm wrong guys

The monocular (T.Z.F.12a) gun sight did not replace the binocular (T.Z.F.12) until late Nov. / early Dec, well into Ausf A production. (See Jenzt, Germany's Panther Tank, Quest for Combat Supremacy, page 64, note 4.3.7.) The Ausf A pictured on page 66 has the binocular sight. 

 Liam, it appears you have solved the mystery of where these unzimmed Ausf A ended up. Where did you find this image? I looked all over but didn't find any of this info, so obviously I'm missing something here.

I believe early type A's also had the same periscope on the mantlet, we can see it here:

And again here:

Well, I found the image on a forum here :)

But it has a D hull, letter box machine gun port etc. Therefore an early A model., or is it a late D?

Early A, I believe. The commanders cupola gives it away.

Ausf D and early Ausf A hulls are identical. The only externally visible changes between models occurred in the redesigned turret. The external differences between a Ausf D and a Ausf A have been discussed in several threads on Missing Lynx.

 To quote Roy Chow;

"Most older books (before Jentz' Panther: Quest for Combat Supremacy) mistakenly cite the switchover from D to A as the MG port to kugelblende MG mount. As others have said, this is wrong.

Often these older books will caption a photo of an early A (cast cupola, letterbox MG port) as a late D -- these would be wrong.

Books off the top of my head that share this mistake are:

Anderson's "Panther" by Concord

Culver & Feist's "Panther In Detail"

Squadron Signal "Panther in Action"

Sturm & Drang Panther

Hughes and Mann's "Panther tank" a coffee table book"

 I would add Spielberger's ; Panther and it's variants, to Roy's list.

Quoting Cran Smith;

"The puzzler is at Panzer Tracts 5-74, as you know, Robert. Jentz makes a general statement about drum cupolas going onto ausf A turrets. However, the single example of this practice that he adduces is a befehlspanzer, judging from the antenna mounts and the plugged coax port. We know about befehlspanthers with zimmerit and drum cupolas. Should we suspect others of being ausf As with new-style turrets (except for the cupolas?) More to the point, we have one example so far of new turret/drum cupola overlap, and it's not a line Panther. It seems pretty safe to argue that for a rule of thumb, drum equals ausf D and cast equals ausf A, until we have more counterexamples."

Quoting Terry Ashley of PMMS:

"The presents [sic] of this new cupola identifies it is an Ausf.A and not a late Ausf.D as some older references would indicate."

There is no mention of cast cupolas being used on the Panther Ausf D in Jentz' Germany's Panther Tank. To quote Jentz from page 57 of GPT; "Among the changes introduced with the first Ausf. A were: The commander's cupola consisting of a cast armor body..."

Again Jentz, Panzer Tracts 5-1; "These photos of Ausf.D produced in August/September 1943 are ample evidence that none were completed with cast commander's cupolas."

 In addition, a somewhat higher resolution copy of the above photo in question can be found on page 115 of;  Panzer Truppen Vol 2. The square-cut, turret side to turret front welding seam can be more clearly seen, a definitive Ausf A characteristic.