The clearer S
from the Krupp company
The Räumer S was a heavy mine clearance vehicle developed by the Krupp company for the German Wehrmacht, which never got beyond the prototype stage and was never tested. It was an oversized penny-farthing vehicle with a central joint. The high weight of the vehicle was intended to detonate anti-tank mines.
As early as September 1940, the Weapons Office commissioned the Alkett and Krupp companies to develop a “device for mechanical mine clearance on the road and off-road, including during combat”. The vehicles should be self-propelled, armored and equipped with attached rollers, which should clear an alley 3 m wide. The dimensions were defined as follows: not more than 2.70 m high, 3 m wide, 10 m long with a weight of not more than 40 t. After work at Alkett had stopped again, Krupp created the Räumer S. This vehicle weighed 130 t.
The prototype vehicle, which was only produced once, consisted of two halves which were connected to one another via pins and hydraulic cylinders. This also made it possible to steer the vehicle. Each half of the vehicle could be turned 22°, i.e. 44° in total. Since the turning circle would still have been huge, the option of two driver's seats for forward and reverse driving was chosen. The vehicle was 15.63 m long and 2.93 m high. It had 53 cm wide steel wheels, which had a diameter of 2.70 m and were equipped with 15 cm thick rubber pads. Due to the different widths of the vehicle halves of up to 3.27 m, the widest possible mine lane should be cleared.
The 2.70 high steel wheels were well sprung, since they could jump up to half a meter high during mine explosions or fall into mine craters up to 90 cm deep. The ground clearance was between 1 m and 1.40 m. The armor plates of the superstructure were only 25 mm thick. The vehicle was powered by two Maybach HL-90-P-20-K engines. Each of these machines had an output of 350 hp. The vehicle should be up to 25 km/h on the road and between 4 and 8 km/h off-road when clearing mines. The vehicle, including the driver, had a crew of 8 people, all of whom had hydraulically sprung seats.
On June 4, 1943, the Weapons Testing Office 5 was shown the individual parts of the Räumer S. Due to the bombing raids on Krupp in Essen, further assembly of the vehicle was relocated to Hillersleben. On August 10, 1944, the vehicle was presented to the Wa Pruef 5 again with the stipulation that it be completed by September 1944. On October 20, 1944, Krupp was informed that the vehicle was not yet ready due to other problems, but that it would now be completed by November of that year. Tests should then take place in Kummersdorf.
When the Americans marched into the Hillersleben test site in 1945, they found the model vehicle there. It was examined and was then to be taken to the American depot 0644 near Paris for testing. The vehicle was disassembled into its two halves for transport, after which the trace is lost. The American booty report doubts that this vehicle was really intended for clearing mines, as it only had 53 cm wide wheels, which would only result in a clearing width of 1.06 m even with different axle widths on the front and rear axles - quite apart from the tremendous ground pressure of the vehicle. It was assumed that the Räumer S was only intended to be the towing vehicle for a special clearing device.
(Wikipedia)
