Before It Built the Enclave, Buick Built Tanks

Tank is a word sometimes used, both affectionately and otherwise, to describe the massive and sturdy Buick vehicles of the mid-1950s. Powered by V-8 engines and built with liberal amounts of steel and cast iron, those Buicks handily earned the name. But just a decade earlier, Buick built a real tank: the M18 Hellcat tank destroyer that helped Allied forces defeat the Axis powers in both Europe and the Pacific.

According to a recent Buick release, the M18 was a product of Harley Earl’s design studio (Mr. Earl was General Motors’ legendary design chief). And while the Hellcat was no lightweight at 20 tons, it was faster and more nimble than comparable German tanks. Capable of going 60 miles an hour over battlefield terrain, it was powered by a 450-horsepower 9-cylinder Wright R-975 radial aircraft engine, backed by G.M.’s stout Hydramatic transmission. Its suspension system was a torsion bar design developed by Buick engineers.

According to Bill Gross, a historian and M18 restorer, that suspension remains a common inspiration for today’s military vehicles. He said the Buick-built tank’s performance capabilities were laudable.
“The Hellcat was considered the hot rod of World War II,” said Mr. Gross. “To give some perspective, most German tanks of the day were capable of just 20 m.p.h.”

The Hellcat’s performance potential was partly the result of having been built with light armor that made it vulnerable to the effects of enemy fire. But its speed and handling helped fill the void. Its combat role was as a tank destroyer, used to take out enemy armored vehicles. Although the M18’s weaponry couldn’t penetrate the forward armor of German Tiger and Panther tanks, its nimbleness enabled it to get to a position where it could attack their flanks, which were much more exposed.
According to Wikipedia, the M18 Hellcat’s unit cost was $57,500 – a little over $900,000 in today’s dollars. The tank’s fuel efficiency is not known, but it was undoubtedly abysmal. It carried three fewer passengers than a modern-day eight-passenger Buick Enclave, and its interior lacked a modern Buick’s sophisticated climate-control system. The combination of the radial engine’s air-cooling system and the tank’s open-cockpit design ensured frigid cabin temperatures during Germany’s harsh winters.

A total of 2,507 M18 Hellcats were built on the Buick production line in Flint, Mich.
“The men and women who developed the Hellcat and assembled them on the Buick line in Flint contributed a great deal to the war effort and to military engineering history,” Mr. Gross said.


Courtesy of The New York Times