# How fast would be a tank engine put on a car?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-fast-would-be-a-tank-engine-put-on-a-car/803909>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [December 8, 2017, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-fast-would-be-a-tank-engine-put-on-a-car/803909 "2017-12-08T15:12:34Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 12\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\
**Post date:** [December 12, 2017, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-fast-would-be-a-tank-engine-put-on-a-car/803909/41 "2017-12-12T22:39:01Z")

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> [@swampspruce](#):
>
> . I can’t corroborate this and the only reference to a high speed tracked vehicle land speed record is by a [Scorpion tank](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_vehicle_speed_records) but the Ripsaw EV2 by the Howe Brothers can do at least 80 mph.

Interesting. That page lists the FV101 Scorpion. doing 51MPH, and later \* It holds the Guinness world record for the fastest production tank; recorded doing 82.23 km/h (51.10 mph) at the QinetiQ vehicle test track, Chertsey, Surrey, on 26 January 20  
\*

But the [M18 Hellcat - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M18_Hellcat) is listed with 60MPH top speed.

There are reports the Abrams hit 75mph without a governor.

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**Author:** ![swampspruce](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/swampspruce/32/261_2.png) [@swampspruce](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/swampspruce)\
**Post date:** [December 12, 2017, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-fast-would-be-a-tank-engine-put-on-a-car/803909/42 "2017-12-12T23:19:57Z")

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Again, if my friend is to be believed the M1 hull with modded tracks was hitting well North of that (closer to 90) but as I said, I can’t corroborate that anywhere else so take it with a large lump of salt… The Rover with the Meteor engine can do 140 mph according to the article so I guess that would be the answer to the OP’s question more or less. Now a J79 turbine powered school bus can go pretty damn quick, though… [Jet Powered School Bus - 300+mph! - Waterloo Airshow 2014 - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NfkOOt_Sf68)

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**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-fast-would-be-a-tank-engine-put-on-a-car/803909/43 "2017-12-13T01:44:26Z")

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> [@ExTank](#):
>
> …  
> \*I don’t think that Army MPs issue actual “tickets” to soldiers caught speeding in military vehicles; I think the “ticket” somehow gets magically converted into an Official Raft of Shit, gets carried to the top of a Hill, thereby to Roll Down at an ever-increasing rate of speed until it achieves some kind of military “escape velocity/bureaucratic critical momentum,” and lands at the bottom of the Hill (and directly on some unfortunate soul) in a veritable Poop Typhoon.  
> …

You Sir, have a way with words. As a veteran I was laughing a lot by the time I finished this.

I went to read it to my wife and had to stop several times to stop laughing enough to continue. My wife is a former JAG and so not unfamiliar with the flow of discipline up and more importantly, down the Hill. She too was laughing uproariously by the end.

You have truly captured the essence of military life right there. Poop Typhoon indeed.

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**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-fast-would-be-a-tank-engine-put-on-a-car/803909/44 "2017-12-13T02:36:09Z")

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> [@ExTank](#):
>
> My personal best was 57 mph…

OK, but 1500 HP in a car should get you 4+ times that speed (and require \< 1/4 of that torque). Again, you’d be using a different, much lighter transmission. Hypercars are equipped with that kind of power, and they don’t have 4500-pound transmissions.

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**Author:** ![ExTank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/35a633/32.png) [@ExTank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ExTank)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-fast-would-be-a-tank-engine-put-on-a-car/803909/45 "2017-12-13T15:04:55Z")

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> [@LSLGuy](#):
>
> You Sir, have a way with words. As a veteran I was laughing a lot by the time I finished this.
> 
> I went to read it to my wife and had to stop several times to stop laughing enough to continue. My wife is a former JAG and so not unfamiliar with the flow of discipline up and more importantly, down the Hill. She too was laughing uproariously by the end.
> 
> You have truly captured the essence of military life right there. Poop Typhoon indeed.

Thanks. I fortunately escaped the Poop Typhoon of “57 mph in a 25mph zone, in an M1 Abrams, on Motor Pool Rd.,” with little more than lots of Stank-Eye from a Lieutenant Colonel, a Major, a Command Sergeant Major, and my own 1st Sergeant (my Company Commander, a Captain\*, and my Tank Commander, a 1st Lieutenant, added little to the Power of Glower assembled there).

I think it got chalked up to [Exigencies of War](http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TankGoodness) and (thankfully!) quickly forgotten.

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**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-fast-would-be-a-tank-engine-put-on-a-car/803909/46 "2017-12-13T15:26:05Z")

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> [@ExTank](#):
>
> Thanks. I fortunately escaped the Poop Typhoon of “57 mph in a 25mph zone, in an M1 Abrams, on Motor Pool Rd.,” with little more than lots of Stank-Eye from a Lieutenant Colonel, a Major, a Command Sergeant Major, and my own 1st Sergeant (my Company Commander, a Captain\*, and my Tank Commander, a 1st Lieutenant, added little to the Power of Glower assembled there).
> 
> I think it got chalked up to [Exigencies of War](http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TankGoodness) and (thankfully!) quickly forgotten.

I remember walking behind (at a safe distance) the M1’s during winter training at Grafenwohr to keep warm. Those turbines generate a lot of heat! One of the tankers told me that if you parked a car directly behind one for long enough, it would blister the paint on it.

Speaking of which (and sorry for the hijack, OP), watching M1’s at Graf doing live fire training at night on a ridge overlooking the tank range, with a six pack of beer and a boombox blasting Ozzy Osbourne was about the most fun I had in the Army.

I can say that erecting then taking down those big ass tents (and all their assorted accoutrements) in Tent City is certainly NOT in the fun category, while stealing cans of diesel fuel from the senior NCO tent for your pot bellied stove in the middle of the night in winter rather than trudging all the way to the hand operated pump freezing your ass off and getting drenched in diesel fuel, IS fun. So is watching a drunk SSG piss all over a pot bellied stove thinking it was the latrine at two in the morning.

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**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-fast-would-be-a-tank-engine-put-on-a-car/803909/47 "2017-12-13T16:58:14Z")

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Wow, 90 is faster even than what my cousin ever told us. I guess maybe that, once in his life, he actually _did_ use a mode of transportation at less than its maximum possible speed.

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**Author:** ![ExTank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/35a633/32.png) [@ExTank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ExTank)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-fast-would-be-a-tank-engine-put-on-a-car/803909/48 "2017-12-13T18:02:10Z")

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> [@Machine\_Elf](#):
>
> OK, but 1500 HP in a car should get you 4+ times that speed (and require \< 1/4 of that torque). Again, you’d be using a different, much lighter transmission. Hypercars are equipped with that kind of power, and they don’t have 4500-pound transmissions.

Oh, certainly, certainly! No doubt!

I (and others; plenty of blame to spread around) were just digressing a bit, maybe extrapolating some on what a “car” can do with a tank engine, based upon real-life experience of what a tank can do, with a tank engine.

I was told by a fairly knowledgeable tank mechanic that the M1-series has two governors, a mechanical governor, and an electronic governor.

The mechanical one, supposedly easily accessed, allegedly only gets you approximately +5mph, give-or-take, over the rated/listed top speed of 45mph ;).

The electronic governor is much more difficult to access and…_change_. Doing so can cause the aforementioned Track Integrity issues. And Poop Typhoons.

When that MP clocked us with his radar gun, I don’t know if the Ol’ Girl was already “topped out,” or still had some little more “Go” left in her.  
“Sergeant! Just how fast were you going?”  
“Couldn’t say, Sir; the speedometer tops out at 60, and we buried the needle.”  
It’s just that 100+ mph in most typical land vehicles lacks the same kind of visceral impact a Main Battle Tank going 60mph +/- does.

Don’t ever underestimate what kind of hijinks bored, curious GI’s can get up to; that crosses Service boundaries ([Navy “bubbleheads” take bets on how far they can get Attack Subs to _fly_](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOqalX5FJ2c)) and even National ones, too.

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**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-fast-would-be-a-tank-engine-put-on-a-car/803909/49 "2017-12-13T18:21:27Z")

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> [@ExTank](#):
>
> It’s just that 100+ mph in most typical land vehicles lacks the same kind of visceral impact a Main Battle Tank going 60mph +/- does.

[For visceral impact, 60-0 is hard to beat.](https://youtu.be/jJpxThlrw8w?t=16)😃

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**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-fast-would-be-a-tank-engine-put-on-a-car/803909/50 "2017-12-13T22:23:51Z")

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> [@ExTank](#):
>
> …  
> Don’t ever underestimate what kind of hijinks bored, curious GI’s can get up to; that crosses Service boundaries ([Navy “bubbleheads” take bets on how far they can get Attack Subs to _fly_](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOqalX5FJ2c)) and even National ones, too.

National indeed.

The frogs are justly famous for lacking all sense of self-preservation: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZT4BdI7STE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZT4BdI7STE)

Anyone who’s ever fought alongside or against them gives credit where credit is due.

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**Author:** ![ExTank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/35a633/32.png) [@ExTank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ExTank)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-fast-would-be-a-tank-engine-put-on-a-car/803909/51 "2017-12-13T22:40:15Z")

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> [@LSLGuy](#):
>
> National indeed.
> 
> The frogs are justly famous for lacking all sense of self-preservation: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZT4BdI7STE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZT4BdI7STE)
> 
> Anyone who’s ever fought alongside or against them gives credit where credit is due.

I never subscribed to the whole “Cheese-Eating-Surrender-Monkeys” meme wrt the French; they may have had…_questionable_…leadership these last few centuries, but the skill and bravery of the French military overall has never, in my mind, been in any doubt.

OTOH, I don’t think we can call Guinness about new Land Speed Records unless the wheels are at least down and locked.

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**Author:** ![ExTank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/35a633/32.png) [@ExTank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ExTank)\
**Post date:** [December 13, 2017, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-fast-would-be-a-tank-engine-put-on-a-car/803909/52 "2017-12-13T22:47:19Z")

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> [@Machine\_Elf](#):
>
> [For visceral impact, 60-0 is hard to beat.](https://youtu.be/jJpxThlrw8w?t=16)😃

Tanks in power skids are fun!

They can be a little hard on the surrounding real estate, though.

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