TIGER PROJEKT NM
(1945)
- photos by Gary Zimmer
Although all of its armor and wood components were readily available for the Tiger Projekt NM, this highly-unlikely concept for a mobile coastal defense battery (composed of three PzKpfw VI Tiger I tank turrets mounted on an I-beam girder and driven by three Tiger I chassis' topped by a false wooden rectangular building for camouflage), never got past the design phase.
A three-view plan of the Tiger NM can be found in the reference, "Der Panzer-Kampfwagen Tiger und Abarten (Translated as, "The Tiger Tank and Modifications") by Walter Spielberger depicts three Tiger I tank turrents with one 12.8cm gun each mounted to an I-bean girder frame of seventeen meters by fifteen meters. Three Tiger I chassis' would carry the three-headed beast with one at the front and two at the rear. All guns faced rearward. A wood building structure, rectangular in shape, would completely cover the turrets; albeit, not the gun tubes! Traverse and elevation of the three turrets would only be possible when the building's triple set of double doors were opened manually for firing. Total weight for the beast would probaly be nearly 200 tons (the weight of one of the Maus prototypes).
There is also no way for this colossus to cross any bridges nor maneuver in any reasonable manner on any battlefied except maybe in the desert which by 1945 had already been lost years beforehand. Engagement of other tanks and AFVs would also seem illogical as that work was already handled by independent Tiger I and II Königstiger tanks.
The wood building gives this project away as a mobile defense battery as it would not be out of place near the coast. Perhaps it was intended to fill gaps in the Atlantic Wall as it could be moved to prepared sites in sections and constructed on the spot. The wood building, as opposed to any bunker, would not draw too much attention anywhere; therefore, the building could essentially hide "in plain sight".
Ingenius for a colossal project, it nonetheless was another worthless paper project in the end.
Some believe that the NM designation stands for Nibelungenwerk Marine as a special Kriegsmarine project, but this cannot be either confirmed nor denied at this time. Disguising something as a building would only be of use where it would not look out of place. Even a solitary building on the coast would attract a lot less attention than three gun turrets. I imagine this vehicle reversed into a position overlooking some likely invasion beach, and pretending to be a harmless wooden building. As drawn NM could be shifted between prepared sites as a means of avoiding unwanted attention. I suspect the building would be considered expendable once the shooting started, and merely traversing the outer turrets would be sufficient to clear most of the structure away. Several hints point to German Navy involvement. Tank projects tended to have either a VK number, or a name (e.g. "Löwe") or some abbreviated descriptive name (e.g. NbFz). The Kriegsmarine were big on letters, "H and "J" were battleship projects, I believe. The extensive I-beam construction is fairly normal for warships, not AFVs. Finally, the "building" limits the vision of the gunners. However if the guns were controlled by a director sited elsewhere, it would not be a problem. Having several turrets aimed externally is something navies have been doing for many years. Weight of the whole assembly would be anybody's guess, however there would be an upper limit of 165 - 180 tons, based on the suspension capacity of the Tiger carriers.
~text by Rob Arndt
Description:
They don't come much stranger than this. A three-view plan can be found in "Der Panzer-Kampfwagen Tiger und Seine Abarten" by Walter J. Speilberger of what appears to be three large turrets, each with a 12.8cm gun, on an I-beam girder frame measuring approximately 17 metres by 15 metres. It is carried by three Tiger I chassis, two at the rear and one in front (the guns face rearward). The frame is topped by a rectangular wooden building that completely covers the turrets except for the gun tubes. The building has three sets of double doors, which when opened, allow some traverse and elevation of the guns.Projekt NM only existed on the drawing board, although all of its component parts were readily available.
It only takes a cursory inspection of this machine to rule out its use as a "tank". Firstly anything 15m wide would be extremely awkward to manoeuvre anywhere. Tactical mobility would be a problem, for to cross a waterway or ditch it would require three bridges or one very wide one. In order to engage the enemy, it must perform a stately U-turn in order for the guns to bear. This may be feasible in open country, however the building or shed covering the turrets would stand out while performing no useful concealment function. It would be of no more use for fighting other tanks than three separate tanks would.
The only likely use for NM that I can see is some sort of mobile coast defence battery, and I suspect it was probably a Kriegsmarine project after all. If anyone else has a better idea, please write to me. The reasons for this assumption are as follows: 
Making the model:
Despite its apparent complexity, it is actually an easy job and even if you haven't scratch built before, have a go. Apologies to 1/35 modellers, I am into the small scales and made my NM in 1/76, but there is no reason why it could not be done in large scale (apart from finding somewhere to put it!). Most of the comments below would still apply.
Frame:
I simply scaled from the plans in Spielberger. The Airfix tiger is 2.268 times as long as the Tiger carriers drawn on the plan, so it is a simple matter to measure from the plans, get out the calculator and multiply everything by 2.268. For 1/35 the magic number is 4.93.
There was nothing in the plans to suggest how the Tiger carriers connected to the frame. I made a guess that it would be some sort of coupling or turntable, similar to that on a prime mover except that so it does not twist the frame it should be fully oscillating, in other words it should be able to hinge side-to-side as well as fore-and-aft.
Turrets:
The turrets were made from pieces of 0.040" styrene sheet. Nothing difficult. Note that the sides taper in at a different place to where the roof slopes. The logical place for the turrets to pivot from is midway between the two I-beams they sit on, but that seems too far back. There are two further smaller pieces of I-beam under the turret, these are not shown as part of the main frame, I suspect they turn with the turret. Barrels and mantlets were turned from solid styrene rod, I used an electric drill as a poor man's lathe. I made the guns movable by having a pivot just inside the turret front. Each gun has a small lead weight inside the turret to balance the weight of the barrel and mantlet.
Shed and doors:
The four walls were made from 0.020" styrene sheet. On the sides I scribed parallel grooves about every 1/8" and then roughed up the surface with a razor saw blade. This produces a good wood-like finish on the surface. The roof was one 0.020" sheeT, bent to form the ridge. Before I assembled the shed, I scribed and cut the doors from the rear wall. Door hinges were made from small L-shaped pieces of fuse wire inside short styrene rings cut from tube. I admit these aren't pretty, but there doesn't seem to be a good alternative if you want 180 degree functional doors.
Other details:
STRANGE VEHICLES OF PRE-WAR
(1928-1945)
