KV-1: the “Spectre” Returns

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Source: http://worldoftanks.ru/ru/news/pc-browser/remember-everything/kv_1_returns/

Hello everyone,

remember that post where KV-1 was pulled out of the river Don and it was said that the effort was supported by Wargaming? It was all true – Wargaming recently released a post about the event.

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The preparation for getting the vehicle out of water began as early as late 2013 as a cooperation between Wargaming, the people from the Kubinka armor museum and the local administration of Verkhny Mamon district of the Voronezh region. The bottom of the river was scoured and scanned in order to find the exact position of the wreck. Since the shape of the bottom was very complicated and the weather was not good, the entire operation was delayed until Spring 2014.

In the end, between 29th of May and 7th of June 2014, the people from National rescue agency lifted the KV-1 from the bottom and transported it to the shore with the assistance of the local people, many of who are World of Tanks players apparently. The experienced wreck recovery specialists said that this was their 55th recovery operation, yet it was the most difficult of all they ever did. The problems included the heat, strong water currents and zero visibility under water. Apart from that, the tank turned out to be stuck between the pillars of the old bridge and was covered by a one-meter-thick layer of mud. It took four days to drag the tank out using a specially designed mount, first 60 meters under water and then 20 meters on land.

In the end, the vehicle, dragged to the shore, was missing its turret, right track and the entire right side armor. These are yet to be recovered from the river. After the recovery is complete, the tank will be transferred to the Ostorog military area, where it will be restored and after that, it will be moved to the tank museum in Kubinka. It will be the first vehicle of this type for the Kubinka museum.

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39 thoughts on “KV-1: the “Spectre” Returns”

  1. One interesting thing from my Kubinka visit – the DO NOT have a single one KV-1. They have many T-34′s, they have KV-1S but not one from the the first versions – KV-1A/B/C.

      • They gave KV-1 and KV-2, togethere with T-28 to Central Museum of Armed Forces (those tanks being restored ATM) in ’60s.

    • Well, they will now :) great news for everybody

      But I am just surprised – after all soviet legends about reliability, I am dissappointed that they wouldn´t just start the engine and drive to Kubinka :( :D

      • Actually KV-1 wasn’t that reliable. It was too heavy for the suspension and gearbox to handle. The only reason it was accepted was because it was the only heavy tank with sufficient armor Russians had at that time.

      • KV-1 is one of the black sheep that most certainly didn’t contribute to such legends. Major pain in the ass on multiple counts AFAIK, which is doubtless one reason work on all-around improved successor designs started almost as soon as the things started coming off the assembly lines.

      • They were probably driven to destruction. The Soviets treated tanks like bullets, food and fuel.

        • IMO I believe it’s because their production was stopped very quickly and most of them were converted and sent to the front, unlike T-34s, which were massively produced, repaired, etc… it wasn’t great in any way, so no need to maintain the few they had.

    • I was a commercial diver at one time in my life, that would have been a great salvage job. I envy you guys, not everyone gets to bring a piece of history back from the past.

      Awsome!

      jon

    • They said it can still be restored. I’m no expert, but if all the pieces are intact enough, it’s just as a disassembled box (at least for the main components of the hull)

      • You don’t need to hit it, just pour oil and gasoline into its engine and it’ll run like brand new.

  3. -”In the end, the vehicle, dragged to the shore, was missing its turret, right track and the entire right side armor. These are yet to be recovered from the river.”

    Isn’t the right side armor the one in front of the tank?

    • “Apart from that, the tank turned out to be stuck between the pillars of the old bridge and was covered by a one-meter-thick layer of mud.”

      Putting two and two together here, but I’d suspect the lack of old bridge and how that old bridge was removed had something to do with it.

      • It reads like something is missing form the article. What was this old bridge about? And how did they know the tank was in the river if it was buried under a meter of mud? There must be some well-known Russian story the rest of us have never heard.

  5. I still don’t understand why building a new WW2 tanks isn’t cheaper than restoring one.
    It’s not like you need military grade steel, and with the technology we have today it’s easier to build tanks than it was during WW2…
    You just need a replica and leave the real things to those rich people that really want tanks…

    • Building a new (WW2 period) tank is cheaper today but you would build a WEAPON. Thus it needs special allowances and those aren’t cheap. (no wonder why are there only a few manufacturers)

      • For reference you can buy a brand new FW190A8 for 500,000 USD. The engine isn’t the original BMW and it has no guns. You don’t have to build a real gun into it.

      • I don’t think it is cheaper. All the parts have to be custom-made, not like 70 years ago when the tank was still in serial production. This makes the price go up quite a lot.

    • Possibly because Museums are about preserving, and restoring artifacts of history when they are available. Not making copies.

    • Pretty sure custom-building a complex 40-odd ton steel vehicle to order isn’t quite something most relevant businesses would have the means for without spending a certain amount of time “building tools to build tools” as it were. Plus at least some of the later KV models had substantial castings in the turret; good luck with those if the original moulds aren’t available (as is almost certain) – that manufacturing method was AFAIK mainly aimed at relatively cheap and rapid mass production but required quite substantial “tooling up” before you could get started.

      And yeah, a replica ain’t the same as the real thing.

  7. It doesn’t seem really restorable to me, the condition it is in, it’s due to fall apart soon, many pieces will have to be totally replaced and therefore the value as a museum piece is strongly diminished…
    Very weird though that they didn’t keep a single one KV-1 in kubinka… isn’t it Russia’s main armor museum? Some other museums in Russia do have the KV-1…

    • The turret will probably be in better shape (if it’s ever recovered), but IMO they just have to clean up the parts, reform them, weld it together and voila. It’s interesting how the right side fell off, yet the engine sits there intact.

      • I would not be surprised if Kubinka already has most of the parts needed to rebuild it in stock. Most collections have a very large supply of parts to keep things running.

  8. oh great, scrap metal, wouldnt it be cheaper and quicker to start from brand new metal components and just machine them…i mean cmon, wtf are they gona use from that pile of radioactive rusek shit…

    • Perhaps with your expertise you can set up an assembly and produce the tank just like how it was in WW2.

      Or perhaps you do not do it because you know nothing of tank.

    • We’re talking 40 plus tons of steel here whose parts have been out of production for something like seventy years now. The facilities to manufacture these things moved on to other things long ago so you’d probably pretty much have to recreate much of the production chain to get even started – which would be economically idiotic since there’s not exactly a major demand for these things.

      Also why the Hell would this wreck be radioactive? You fail physics forever.