{"id":98156,"date":"2026-01-19T02:00:51","date_gmt":"2026-01-19T07:00:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=98156"},"modified":"2025-09-26T22:07:48","modified_gmt":"2025-09-27T02:07:48","slug":"king-tiger-v2-inside-the-worlds-oldest-tiger-ii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2026\/01\/19\/king-tiger-v2-inside-the-worlds-oldest-tiger-ii\/","title":{"rendered":"King Tiger V2 &#8211; Inside The World&#8217;s Oldest Tiger II"},"content":{"rendered":"<p align=\"center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"854\" height=\"480\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/KY-1AGZKSYY?si=-oBPOWf78MBVNqYX\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><strong>The Tank Museum<\/strong><br \/>\nPublished 26 Sept 2025<\/p>\n<p>King Tiger V2. It&#8217;s the oldest surviving King Tiger in the world. And it&#8217;s also the only King Tiger that survives with the unusual pre-production turret. This has, in the past, been referred to as the &#8220;Porsche Turret&#8221;. But why? And why did they change the turret on later models?<\/p>\n<p>There are many misconceptions and rumours about this tank \u2013 the most common of which that the turret was built by Porsche. It wasn&#8217;t. How did it end up on this tank? Well, that&#8217;s a bit of a confusing story, but it was basically down to Krupp and Henschel working on a winning design.<\/p>\n<p>The production of King Tiger would begin with three prototypes: V1, V2 and V3 \u2013 and the V stands for Versuchs, the German word for trial. V1 was a mild steel prototype that was used for demonstrations, and V3 was used as an engine test rig. V2, however, was retained for testing by Henschel and was captured by the US Army before being handed over to the British.<\/p>\n<p>V2 left Germany in one piece, but by the time it reached Bovington in 1952 a number of parts had gone astray \u2013 most notably, the gearbox! King Tiger V2 is now a star of The Tank Museum\u2019s collection, and the team have now begun to assess whether a restoration might be possible\u2026<\/p>\n<p>00:00 | Introduction<br \/>\n02:37 | Is it a Porsche?<br \/>\n06:15 | Krupp Gets Lucky<br \/>\n12:52 | V2: Today and Tomorrow<br \/>\n17:34 | V2: The Future<br \/>\n<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Help us restore King Tiger V2 to running condition! Visit our website to find out more: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/redirect?event=video_description&#038;redir_token=QUFFLUhqa2R4VVE0VW1MR096UFE5ZFVnTW9pUDlHZHBtZ3xBQ3Jtc0tuOURUeGlZMDY2ZHhSY2ItUnNUZ2NOX04tR08yaDQ2c1gwcThtY2FKM2dtbGdhUTduOXFkT3Jldzhjdm5BSU45RXMwbElwU2FBT2tlUFMxT0N6YUZUbWtDOXFMSk9vR2pjM2phaGJMaXNLTDRJclN3VQ&#038;q=https%3A%2F%2Ftankmuseum.org%2Fsupport-us%2Fktv2-fundraiser&#038;v=KY-1AGZKSYY\" target=\"_blank\">https:\/\/tankmuseum.org\/support-us\/ktv&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Or, you can buy exclusive King Tiger V2 merch from our online shop. All proceeds from the sale of these items will be allocated towards our fundraising target \u2013 and our goal to restore KTV2 to running condition: <a href=\"https:\/\/tankmuseumshop.org\/collections\/ktv2-king-tiger-v2-restoration\" target=\"_blank\">https:\/\/tankmuseumshop.org\/collection&#8230;<\/a> <\/p>\n<p>This video features archive footage courtesy of British Path\u00e9.<br \/>\nThis video features animated gameplay courtesy of World of Tanks.<br \/>\nThis video features archive material, courtesy of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Bundesarchiv.<br \/>\nThis video features archive material, courtesy of The Swiss Military Museum and the collection of Mr. E. Wegmann.<\/p>\n<p>In this film, Chris Copson takes us through the history of the oldest surviving King Tiger \u2013 V2. This vehicle was the second King Tiger ever built and is the only one to maintain its iconic pre-production turret. From clearing up the confusion over who actually built this turret, to turning up the truth on the age of its gun, this video will set the record straight about this fascinating prototype. <\/p>\n<p>Want to learn more about the King Tiger V2? Here are some of the sources we used to make this film:<\/p>\n<p>Melcher Stikkelorum, Haustenbeck&#8217;s Heritage in PanzerPlace.eu. 2022.<br \/>\nAndrew Hills, Panzerkampfwagen Tiger Ausf.B (Sd.Kfz.182) Tiger II in Tanks-encyclopeadia.com. 2019<br \/>\nTrojca, W., Tiger Ausf.B Koenigstiger, Katowice-Speyer 2014.<br \/>\nJentz, Thomas L. and Doyle, Hilary L., Germany&#8217;s Tiger Tanks, VK 45.02 \u2013 Tiger II., Schiffer, 1997.<\/p>\n<p>Support The Tank Museum!<br \/>\nFriends: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/redirect?event=video_description&#038;redir_token=QUFFLUhqazdzVFd6XzdCbXpxQ0phdU1IaDJNYnBITjEyQXxBQ3Jtc0ttajllVDM0Ty1qcXZfTWFPdUpGLVdpN0hha2N1bUNFbFA5QjVSbm42SnNoczg4U1RwQmNBc3R0S3B3ODUybVVFV016TEJQQjVCUkFua3hVQVZMUkcycER3SjVaZ3RHYng5SEluOWp6U0xweTJqNHl6WQ&#038;q=https%3A%2F%2Ftankmuseum.org%2Fsupport-us%2Ffriends-of-the-tank-museum&#038;v=KY-1AGZKSYY\" target=\"_blank\">https:\/\/tankmuseum.org\/support-us\/fri&#8230;<\/a><br \/>\nOnline Shop: <a href=\"https:\/\/tankmuseumshop.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">https:\/\/tankmuseumshop.org\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p>#tankmuseum<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Tank Museum Published 26 Sept 2025 King Tiger V2. It&#8217;s the oldest surviving King Tiger in the world. And it&#8217;s also the only King Tiger that survives with the unusual pre-production turret. This has, in the past, been referred to as the &#8220;Porsche Turret&#8221;. But why? And why did they change the turret on [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1118,7,5,663,230],"tags":[991,140,1298],"class_list":["post-98156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-germany","category-history","category-military","category-weapons","category-ww2","tag-afvs","tag-design","tag-museum"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hpV6-pxa","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=98156"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98156\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":98157,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98156\/revisions\/98157"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=98156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=98156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}