Your favourite tanks

[PanzerJaeger]

I think I read somewhere that the average Tiger I had something like a 12-1 kill ratio. Good thing for the allies that only maybe 6 out of a battalion of 45 would make it to the battle after breakdowns etc.

Also they were rather slow. Oh yeah, the cost was estimated at something like 800,000 DMs, and took 300,000 man hours to build. A lot of Panzer IV H Aufs could have been built for that.

Are you sure?

IIRC, production of the Tiger took only about twice as long as the PzIII/IV and cost only twice as much to build. (250,000RM)

In terms of combat effectiveness and force projection, I believe those 1355 Tigers were a far greater investment than 2710 PzIVHs would have been. Germany would have been vastly outproduced regardless, but the Tigers allowed the Panzerkorps' best asset (its trained and experienced crews) to engage much larger numbers of enemy armor and have a far greater chance of surviving such encounters.

Also, the Tiger was just as fast as a Sherman (38km/h); and while it was somewhat slower than the T-34 series (50km/h), it was by no means lethargic.

Edit: Wiki says...

The German designs were expensive in terms of time, raw materials and Reichsmarks, the Tiger I costing over twice as much as a contemporary Panzer IV and four times as much as a Stug III assault gun.

Generally speaking, it took about twice as long to build a Tiger I as another German tank of the period.

Of course that's by no means the most reliable of sources, but it corresponds to the books I've read.