FCM F1

FCM F1
FCM F1
Type	Super-heavy tank
Place of origin	French Third Republic
Specifications
Mass	139 metric tons
Length	10.53 m
Width	3.10 m
Height	4.21 m
Crew	9
Armour	100 mm
Main armament	90 mm DCA gun
Secondary armament	47mm SA37 gun and six machine guns; anti-aircraft twin 20mm Bofors
Engine	two Renault V12 KGM of 550 hp 1100 hp total
Power/weight	7.9 hp/t
Suspension	vertical coil springs
Operational range	200 km
Maximum speed	20 km/h

The FCM F1 was a French super-heavy tank developed during the late Interbellum by the Forges et Chantiers de la Méditerranée (FCM) company. Twelve were ordered in 1940 to replace the Char 2C, but France was defeated before construction could begin, a wooden mock-up being all that was finished. The FCM F1 was large and elongated, and had two turrets: one in front and one in the back, with a single high-velocity gun in each turret. The rear turret was superfiring, meaning it was raised higher and fired over the top of the forward one, a common practice in naval vessels. The vehicle was intended to be heavily armoured. Its size and protection level made it by 1940, at about 140 tons, the heaviest tank ever to have actually been ordered for production. Despite two engines its speed would have been low. The primary purpose of the tank was to breach German fortification lines, not to fight enemy tanks. The development path of the FCM F1 was extremely complex, due to the existence of a number of parallel super-heavy tank projects with overlapping design goals, the specifications of which were regularly changed. For each project in turn several companies submitted one or more competing proposals.