Benz / 21
The Benz / 21 was a wheeled armored vehicle that was used as a special vehicle by the protection and order police of the Weimar Republic . From 1921 to 1925, Benz & Cie. 24 vehicles built and delivered.
Common features of the special cars Daimler, Benz and Ehrhardt
Like the Daimler / 21 and Ehrhardt / 21 , the Benz / 21 was the result of a tender by the Reich Ministry of the Interior , which coordinated the acquisition of the special vehicles for the state police. According to Schmitt, “a large number of automobile companies” applied for the project, but after preliminary tests only the above three designs were accepted.
The common features of the special wagons were a tank structure with two diametrically opposed rotating towers each with a machine gun , a front engine, a reverse transmission and a disused double steering , so that the vehicles could be steered backwards at the same speed as they were forwards if necessary. They were built high to make getting into the vehicles difficult. Due to their great weight, they were able to push barricades aside with the help of built-in battering rams. In the so-called police fight they were used for violent reconnaissance, as vanguard or as support for the officers deployed in infantry .
Technical specifications
- Construction: Benz & Cie.
- Permissible total weight: 11.0 t
- Length: 5950 mm
- Width: 2565 mm
- Height: 3325 mm
- Wheelbase: 3.60 m
- Wheels: sheet steel disc wheels, solid rubber, twin tires at the rear
- Ground clearance: 36 cm
- Engine: Benz
- Cylinder: 4
- Displacement: 12300 cm³
- Power: 74 kW at 1200 rpm
- Maximum speed (road): 50 km / h
- Fuel consumption / 100 km: 80 liters
- Tank capacity: 270 liters in 3 tanks
- Driving range: 330 km
- Crew: 5 men
- Armor: 4 to 12 mm chrome-nickel steel
- Armament: 2 heavy MG 08 with water cooling in two armored turrets
literature
- Werner Oswald : The vehicles of the police and the Federal Border Guard. Police vehicles from 1920 to 1974 . Motorbuch Verlag, Stuttgart 1974.
- (Gustav) Schmitt: Street armored car: The special car of the protection police , Berlin (R. Eisenschmidt) 1925.
