Previous Q&A is here.

A long time ago (well, not too long), I received a question that was very long and very thorough. It could be split up into two questions:
1) Were specific Soviet tanks designed to withstand specific German guns?
2) What was the quality of steel used by the Soviets?

The questions were asked about specific vehicles, but I thought it would be more interesting to spread out the scope of it, partially because this is an interesting topic, and partially because I didn’t have (and still don’t have) all of the information that was requested.

The first part of the question is easy: yes, but not only German. Resistance to certain guns from a certain distance is a common requirement. For example, the KV-3 was designed to resist the German 88 mm AA gun, and the KV-4 went one step higher, resisting the 105 mm AA gun. The Shashmurin IS-2 was designed to meet the requirement of resisting the Panther, Tiger, and Ferdinand guns at any range from the front and at 500 meters from the side. The meek  MS-1 also had a similar requirement: resistance to .30 caliber AP bullets at 25 paces. That requirement migrated to subsequent T-26 and T-37 tanks, so I see no reason to doubt that the above requirements of resisting German cats were not applied to other tank designs of the era.

Some projects also come with hard armour requirements (ie. 180 mm instead of “impenetrable to 88L/71 gun at 500 meters”), but it is very likely that these figures were taken from the penetrations of real guns.

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It’s been a while since I’ve done one of these! Here’s a link to the previous edition.

Q: I found these on EnglishRussia, and there is a KV-2 turret on the IS chassis. Can you tell me more about this?

A: It is a movie prop, and one of dubious quality at that. If you look further, you can see “KV-1″ tanks that won’t fool even a casual observer. For instance, their guns are clearly immobile.

Q: Is there some pattern to gun calibers? Several nations seem to use the same ones, 20 mm, 37 mm, 75/76 mm, 105 mm, etc. 

A: A lot of gun calibers are in multiples of inches. 37 mm is about 1.5 inches, 76 mm (76.2 mm) is 3 inches, 152 (152.4 mm) is 6 inches. Doubling your shell’s diameter has an easy to calculate effect on its vital properties, such as weight. This lets an engineer get close to the desired performance, in theory. Of course, as he starts fine-tuning the performance, the diameter will change, so it won’t be exactly the multiple of an inch anymore. As modelling methods improved, the need to take old shells as reference ended, and modern shell designers don’t have to start with multiples of an old thing. Drastically different modern ammunition design doesn’t help either.

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No version of the Soviet tech tree features a captured PzIII (or T-3, as Soviet documentation called it). However, a number of vehicles are based on it: the SG-122, SU-85I, and the somewhat recently announced SU-76I. Let’s take a look at these vehicles and the vehicles they were based on from the Soviet point of view.

Unlike the lukewarm reception of the Panther, the PzIII was very interesting to the Red Army. An early modification of the tank was received after the Polish campaign as a part of a deal with Germany. The 37 mm gun was laughable by standards of the time, but Soviet military minds and engineers appreciated many features from the vehicle: its commander’s cupola, torsion bars, shock absorbers. Various components of the T-50 light tank were inspired by these features.

After the Wehrmacht poured over the borders of the USSR, the Red Army captured a number of new and improved PzIIIs, with modern 50 mm guns. This new vehicle was tested extensively. The results of the testing showed that while the tank wasn’t as fast as the Soviets’ own T-34, and the gun not as powerful, it was still a very good vehicle, worthy of the Red Army’s attention. You may recall that the flamethrower modification of the PzIII alone earned more pages devoted to it in Soviet technical reports than the Panther.

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Wargaming’s “legendary tank” turned out to be the KV-220. How appropriate that a “legend” should be worthy of what today’s hip youth would describe as an “epic fail”. First, some background.

The KV-220 (otherwise known as KV-220-2, T-220, Object 220, or just 220 in factory documents) was proposed in 1940, as a replacement for the KV-1 that was already considered inadequate by the Red Army. The T-150 was ordered in the same document. The T-150 was meant to have a 700 hp engine and KV-220 an 850 hp engine, but problems were encountered in building such powerful engines. By May of 1941, the KV-220 only had a V-5 engine turbocharged to 700 hp. The in-game T-150 gets that engine under the index V-5F (“forsirovanniy”, turbocharged). You’d think that the KV-220 would get its 850 hp engine too, right? Or at least the 700 hp one? Nope! It gets…650 hp. That’s kind of a downer, seeing as how the tank isn’t exactly tiny, and an extra 200 hp (or even 50 hp) would have come in handy.

The KV-220 and T-150 didn’t meet the Red Army’s expectations, and bets were hedged on the KV-3, 4, or 5 as the Red Army’s heavy tank for the years to come. However, the war began, and dreams of shiny new KVs vanished. As the Germans neared Moscow and Leningrad, everything with a gun and tracks was thrown into battle. Both SU-14s and the SU-100Y defended Moscow. The reject T-50, T-100Z, and other strange vehicles defended their factories at Leningrad. The would-be KVs were no different. The KV-220′s turret (available in game as the top turret of the T-150) defended the city separately from its hull, taking place in a gun battery. The tank itself fought with the 124th tank brigade.

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Light, Medium, and Heavy tanks are all done with, so let’s move on to the rest of the tech tree. I will be combining the two branches into one article, since the potential for extra hulls is a bit lacking on the SPG side.

Tier 2 does not give us very much. The AT-1 was released in a very limited production run (10 units), and it is unclear how far the SU-18 made it off paper. The tier 3 SPG SU-26 also does not have much in the way of alternate hulls. Since these vehicles were improvised in Leningrad during the blockade, the hulls are likely to vary visually, but nothing that would have any effect on the gameplay.

The SU-76 on the other hand is where we hit the jackpot. Aside from the experimental SU-16 (one drive wheel shorter), there was a variant of the SU-12 (SU-76′s initial index) with a 6 mm roof. My personal favourite would be this variant of the SU-76M, with a fully enclosed crew compartment.

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Previous edition

Q: What kind of crew did the KV-85 have? I found a source that gives it as commander-loader, driver, mechanic, gunner. Is there something about the KV-85 that prevented the mechanic from loading?

A: That’s almost correct, you just need to swap some punctuation: commander, loader, driver-mechanic, gunner. Soviet tanks had no dedicated mechanic crewman, the driver performed those duties.

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Here’s another batch of questions, fresh from tankarchives@gmail.com! Previous edition can be found here.

Q: Was the 107 mm F-42 based on the M-60? What tank would it be mounted on?

A: The F-42 predated the M-60. It was developed before any tank large enough to fit it, as even the roomy KV-2 could only fit the reduced size ZiS-6.

Q: What is the firing procedure of Russian or German tank crews? 

A: I don’t know about German ones, but the Soviet ones would be Ай бля шухер, Ваня ебни по нему бронебойным as follows:

A crewman that spots the target announces its position and range. Position is given in angles (to the right of the tank is plus, to the left is minus). If the target is close and next to a visible landmark, the crewman may give its location relative to the landmark, or, preferably, combine it with the previous method. Direction is given first, then target, then distance. Example: “Plus 30, haystack, left 50 meters, cannon, 500″.

If the tank is in motion, the commander makes a decision whether or not to move after firing. If the tank will move after firing, the command is “Korotkaya” (short). When this command is given, the driver will resume motion immediately after the gunner has fired. If the commander does not wish for the tank to resume motion after firing, he orders “Stoy” (stop) or “Za ukrytiyem, stoy” (behind cover, stop). If the commander wishes to fire on the move, he orders “Menshe hod” (slower speed). In this case, the driver would seek flat terrain, and announce that it is more suitable for firing with “Dorozhka” (road).

If necessary, the commander will mark the target with tracer fire and/or announce its presence on the radio to his platoon.

The commander determines which type of ammunition is more appropriate and signals the loader. This can be done by announcing the type of shell he wants, but in the heat of battle, a hand signal was enough: closed fist for armour piercing, open palm for explosive fragmentation. When the loader completed loading, he replies with the command he was issued, ending it with “Gotov” (ready). When the commander orders “Ogon’” (fire), the gunner will seek out the target and fire when he is ready. The commander observes the target and corrects the fire. In a tank where the commander doubles as the gunner, the driver corrects fire.

After firing, the loader continues loading the same shell type until he hears “Ne zaryazhay” (do not load). That is a signal to clean up spent casings and replenish the ready rack.

Q: There are some Yugoslavian penetration tests on the internet, what is their source?

A: Who knows where the original source is (probably Yugoslavia :P ), but Bojan put up a whole bunch of them here.

That’s it for this time! Well, not all, but there’s a question that’s large enough in scope and interesting enough that it deserves an article all on its own. Stay tuned!

Having already explored medium and light tank options, heavy tanks are the next logical choice. You should already be familiar with how this works, so let’s get to it.

The first Soviet heavy tank is the KV-1, at tier 5. Its hull options were exhaustively explored in a previous article. I was going to suggest that the KV-1S hull be available as an upgrade to make the tank go a little faster than its current sluggish pace, but alas, the KV-1S (KV-85) was revealed to be a future tier 5 heavy tank literally today, making a lightened hull option very unlikely. The only remaining option is the KV-6 (KV-1 with 90 mm of hull armour) and KV-1 with additional armour screens (100 mm of hull armour). Both changes are rather predictable, a more armoured, slower tank.

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