The Magirus ARW model is here

At the end of the First World War, because of the Treaty of Versailles, Germany was denied any possibility of building tanks. The signing of the secret Rapallo Agreement in 1922, which established closer cooperation in military matters between Russia and the Weimar Republic, provided General Hans von Seeckt, Commander-in-Chief of the Reichswehr, with a plot of land trials for armored vehicles in Kazan, near the Volga. Located far from the inquisitive eye of the inspectors responsible for enforcing the terms of the Versailles diktat, it allowed the Reichswehr to restart the design of prohibited armored vehicles and saw a whole series of prototypes arrive from German factories.

To deceive the Allies, the latter were camouflaged with peaceful designations; thus the tanks were baptized Traktoren (tractors), the wheeled vehicles being called Gepanzerter Mannschaftstransportwagen, which, in effect, meant « armoured personnel carrier », the terms of the Treaty of Versailles authorizing the possession of machinery of this category for police and law enforcement purposes.

In 1926, the « Heereswaffenamt Wa Prüf 6 », in charge of the study of future armored vehicles, launched a secret program for the development of armored vehicles in search of innovative and optimal solutions. Soon a concept emerged, according to which light and medium armored vehicles should be built, differing both in technical appearance and in their intended use. For the light vehicles intended for reconnaissance and communications, it was decided to work on the basis of existing automotive chassis.

The development of medium armored vehicles advanced in two ways. The first option was to install an armored hull on the chassis of conventional trucks with a 6×4 wheel arrangement. This method was the simplest and did not require large material costs. The second was more difficult, since in this case it was planned to develop specialized chassis with improved driving performances.  These vehicles were to be used for fire support tasks. In March 1927, this program has reached the stage of issuing technical specifications to contractors and a request was made for a new medium armored car prototype. This project was called  Mannschafstransportwagen  or  MTW to meet the requirements of the Versailles treaty and hide the real class of the vehicle, the argument was that the SdKfz3 was obsolete. Each company was to produce two prototype chassis by mid-april 1928.

At first only the Daimler-Benz company was awarded for the project (project called DB-ARW : Daimler Benz – AchtRadWagen = eight wheeled vehicle) but later, on April 17, 1928, the defense ministry approved a Pzkw acquisition program for six trial vehicles to be completed by the spring of 1928 and tested in 1929. This is why Magirus ( project called M-ARW : Magirus – AchtRadWagen) and Büssing-Nag ( project called BN-ZRW : Büssing-Nag – ZehnRadWagen = ten wheeled vehicle) companies joined the project. It was planned in 1931 to form a number of Panzerkraftwagen Kompanien, or Armored Car Companies, with 9-11 vehicles in each unit. The Reichswehr assigned 3 600 000 Reichsmarks to this program, enough to build 36 vehicles.

Specifications determined by the Heereswaffenamt Wa Prüf 6 :

at least 8 fully-driven wheels

front and rear steering, each with a driver’s position
max. speed on the road – 65 km/h, be able to drive off-road
range at 32 km/h – 200 km
overcoming a ditch 1.5 m wide
climbing – 33°
wading – 1 m
overcoming a vertical obstacle – 0.3 m

ability to reverse in less than ten seconds and roll at the same speed both forwards and backwards
max. weight – 7.5 t

min armor 13,5 mm

armament of 37 mm L/45 gun and MG
max. specific pressure on the soil – 0.7 kg/cm2

crew : five

In 1928, the three new chassis projects were presented to the Reichswehr command and Magirus M-ARW was noted the most successful. For sea trials, an armature with a square shape made of cork was put on the body and a low superstructure replaced the turret. The two other firms were therefore eliminated and Magirus started the construction of a complete prototype.This second prototype was the only one which was completed with a turret and fully tested.

The M-ARW design had quite the same body as the competing project of Daimler-Benz . It was made of 13.5 mm armor, protecting the crew from small bullets weapons It was a very modern construction of rounded shapes made by Martini-Hünecke company from Salzkotten .
The front of the body accomodate the transmission devices and the driver. The central compartment was a rectangular compartment raised above the body of the vehicle and served as a fighting compartment, at the rear was the engine. The 100 HP 6 cyl Daimler-Benz M36 gasoline engine gave its power to the eight wheels and to the stern propeller. The gearbox, provided five speeds forward and five reverse. Interestingly, in an effort to save weight to reach the army’s specifications, the machine used light aluminum alloy wheels.The undercarriage of the M-ARW consisted of eight single wheels with a drive to all four axles. The front and rear axles were swivel, allowing to make turns with a minimum radius. The machine on water was driven by a two-bladed propeller with a diameter of 80 cm. The crew was of 5 men (driver, commander, two gunners and a radio operator).
Initially, the project Magirus M-ARW included a turret, which should have been developed and manufactured by Rheinmetall-Borsig with a 37 mm L/45 gun (66 shells) and a coupled 7,92 mm machine gun. Pointing angles (according to the project) ranged from -10 ° to + 70 °. The rotation of the turret and guidance of the gun was carried out manually. The second version of the tower received other weapons. In its frontal parts were placed two 7,92 mm MG08/15 machine guns. Ammunition consisted of 1050 cartridges in tapes.

In accordance with the project, the M-ARW armored car was supposed to have a length of 8,45 m with a width of 2,28 m and a height of 2,14 m. The combat weight was set at the level of 7,8 t. Having a power density of more than 13 hp per ton such a machine could reach a highway speed up to 65 km / h. The range was 250 km. The wheeled chassis made it possible to climb an 18-degree slope or a wall 30 cm high and overcome trenches 1,15 m wide.

During the winter1929-30, Magirus built the first complete prototype model of the future armored car. The Rheinmetal-Borsig turret was changed, instead of a cannon, the prototype received two water-cooled 7.92 mm MG08/15 machine guns. Each machine gun could move independently of the other. The complete prototype was then tested in Germany. After these quite succesful tests, a fully equipped armored combat vehicle with a “new” conical turret was completed at the start of 1930. This prototype was sent to the USSR to the now widely known Kama tank school near Kazan, where 10 new German tanks were delivered in the same period. These combat vehicles made such a long journey with one goal – to hide from the countries of the former Entente the presence of new equipment in the Wehrmacht. Tests of the M-ARW continued for a long time, although already in 1932 it was decided to abandon further work on the Magirus four-axle armored car. The machine turned out to be too complicated to manufacture (mainly due to the many functions assigned to it), insufficiently technologically advanced and too expensive due to the economic crisis in Germany at that time. Instead of the M-ARW, as a temporary and more economical solution, the three-axle Sd.Kfz.231 6-Rad was accepted for production, which from 1936 began to be replaced by the more modern Sd.Kfz.231 8-Rad.

After Hitler’s appointment as chancellor, military relations with the USSR became more distant, the tank school was liquidated and the removal of equipment began on July 20, 1933 and was completed in early September. On October 14 of the same year, the following was reported to K.E. Voroshilov:  “… Exported to Germany: 6 large and 4 small tanks, one eight-wheeled vehicle with spare parts, equipment, weapons …” . The final fate of this armored car is not known, it was probably scrapped.

The Mannschafstransportwagen project was finally closed in 1932. However, the developments obtained during the construction and testing of the Magirus M-ARW were useful in the design of the medium four-axle armored car Sd.Kfz.231 (8-Rad).