Armoured bulldozers?

[madaxeman]

Anyone got experience they'd like to share in how best to incorporate armoured bulldozers into battlegroups?

Pendraken make some nice models for them, and there are very few games I've played against opponents using fortifications, minefields etc where I haven't ended up thinking I probably should have brought along a lot more more engineering equipment (and teams) to deal with defences.

Bulldozers are referred to in the engineering pages, but I've not managed to find them in the lists, nor in the scenario pages (which do list permitted fortifications for the defender).

Do they have template numbers for armour, saves, movement allowances?   Should they have a points cost, or be allowed "free" in some scenarios to balance the use of field defences?
 

[Lord Kermit of Birkenhead]

The best way is to treat them as the equivalent of the base tank. I doubt that the dozer blade will add much protectionand the majority of hits were on the turret anyway. OK it might deflect the incomming round but it's unlikley. The 44 British Rgt had 1 per squadron from memory, but could have been 2.

[OldenBUA]

There is the BRV 22 tankdozer, and the BRV 97 armoured bulldozer. Stats would be needed for both, I'd guess.

[madaxeman]

There is the BRV 22 tankdozer, and the BRV 97 armoured bulldozer. Stats would be needed for both, I'd guess.

Yep, those are the ones Im looking at !

[Lord Kermit of Birkenhead]

The armoured Bulldozer is easy, although Mark may disagree it's 3 Hits save 6, SLOW (very in real life) and posibly open. There are also soft skin ones which were used up front, no save 3 hits.

[Big Insect]

The armoured Bulldozer is easy, although Mark may disagree it's 3 Hits save 6, SLOW (very in real life) and possibly open. There are also soft skin ones which were used up front, no save 3 hits.

Very happy with those stats Ian - but they are very slow generally - it's that power to weight challenge - so a top speed of 5cm max. I think they could count as Save on a 5 to AP fire 45degrees to their front as the blades did appear to stop small arms quite well (or maybe treat the blade as one level of cover better) for both armoured or unarmoured types ... just a thought.

I have used armoured bull dozers in CWC games before - as part of my Dutch Engineering section - mostly for clearing wire or roads of debris or destroyed vehicles. But they tended to get 'brewed' quite quickly in the heart of a modern tank battle!

I'd need to check, but there might be something in the Optional Rules section of BKCIV around Refugees and road clearing - although that might just be about towing wrecks off the road.
Dozers were often used in their towing capacity.

[sultanbev]

Dozers were quite rare, and often allocated individually one per company, which is why they tend not to appear in army lists.

In the US and British lists I have done for BKCIV over on the Wargames Vault, I have included relevant dozers where I found them. It works out roughly 1 per engineer battalion and 1 per armoured brigade in terms of models. As Ian says, some US and British tank battalions had 1 tank dozer per squadron, but am sure this wasn't universal.
In BKC terms this means you could upgrade 1 existing tank model per battalion with a dozer blade, in US & CW armies mid 1944-1945 only.

The British armoured dozers appeared in only one unit of 79th Armoured Division, the 149th Assault Park Squadron, which had 26x D8 armoured bulldozers, for the entirety of the British Army in NW Europe in 1944, therefore 8 models in BKC. In 1945 this changed to a mere 12, with 36x Centaur dozers. So yes, quite rare in wargaming terms.

No doubt there were other corps level engineer units with more bulldozers, but most of their work was off battlefield.

I'd agree with a move of 5cm, in fact that is what I put in my lists, 3 hits, 6 to save if armoured. At this level of rules, the dozer blade isn't going to add extra armour. In my own rules dozers add 2cm of improvised armour, which is a poor-man's spaced armour against HEAT rounds.

[madaxeman]

OK... so that sounds like I'm better off with either a few dozer blades to add to my Shermans, or just buying more engineers. 

A dozer moving 5cm/turn isn't even going to get across the table to get in contact with the enemy fortifications or minefields, never mind get there in time to have enough turns top clear them!

[Big Insect]

OK... so that sounds like I'm better off with either a few dozer blades to add to my Shermans, or just buying more engineers. 

A dozer moving 5cm/turn isn't even going to get across the table to get in contact with the enemy fortifications or minefields, never mind get there in time to have enough turns top clear them!

Well ... there is a 'sneaky' way to move your dozers around.

Buy an HQ for your engineering section or you can use the HQ for your tank formation - both work equally well.
Buy your dozer and a couple of bases of combat engineers or pioneers and put all 3 into Reserve, attached to that HQ (see Page 61 Reserves)
The HQ moves up with the tank formation towards the enemy fortifications and then makes a Command roll to deploy the Reserves. They then appear on-table within 20cm of the command unit but no closer than 5cm to the enemy.

It might be construed as a bit sneaky ... but just reflects the fact that you have managed to moved them up under cover of the tank formation, without being spotted.
Worth a try 

[sultanbev]

Even easier way is using a tank transporter. Same price as a lorry, carries your bulldozer at normal lorry movement rate, just don't get it shot at! Deploy action unloads it near the scene of digging. In real life they would come with some kind of transporter or on a trailer towed by a big lorry, so it wouldn't be unrealistic.

[Big Insect]

Even easier way is using a tank transporter. Same price as a lorry, carries your bulldozer at normal lorry movement rate, just don't get it shot at! Deploy action unloads it near the scene of digging. In real life they would come with some kind of transporter or on a trailer towed by a big lorry, so it wouldn't be unrealistic.

A great idea and makes good use of nice tank transporter models 

[Lord Kermit of Birkenhead]

In effect the reserve trick is representing the tank transporter, but I suspect that in real life commanders would be reluctant to have a huge soft skin vehicle in the front line.

As to tank dozers

Allied - as far as I can tell the only gun tank to be fitted was the Sherman, although the Churchill AVRE could have been. Centar dozers were de-fanged

Soviet - never seen any evidence of one.

Axis - again never found any evidence of them having any tank dozers.