In the mid-thirties of the 20th century, tank designers of almost all countries of the world considered that one of the main characteristics of this rapidly developing type of weapon should be speed. Considering fighting vehicles as a kind of mechanized analogue of cavalry, strategists and tactics were captured by certain stereotypes. Reflection of this error was made by some examples of equipment that were later recognized as unsuccessful. An example is the Soviet T-46 tank, however, with some reservations. If they could create it in any other country, then, quite possibly, it would be recognized as a technical masterpiece. But not in the USSR, where in the Stalinist 30s the highest demands were placed on tanks.
How appreciated the ingenious Christie in the USSR
The remarkable American mechanical engineer John Walter Christie, in his twenties, invented something that became the decisive trend in the development of tank building for many decades. At home, however, appreciated the flight of his creative thoughts low. America was then an exceptionally peaceful country, and the government was more interested in tractors than military tracked vehicles. In Britain, where Christie sold his sample, they also could not figure out the merits of the invention. But in the Soviet Union there were experts who understood why such a suspension of road wheels was needed.
It was under the guise of an agricultural machine that the undercarriage of John Christie 's design was loaded onto a ship and delivered to Leningrad. There she quickly found use. The tilt-spring suspension had excellent characteristics and had a dual purpose, it could be equipped with both a caterpillar and a wheeled mover.
Differences from other Soviet tanks
In the mid-thirties, the main tank of the Red Army was the T-26. The BT high-speed model line was constantly improved. Military equipment is aging rapidly, and it was supposed to replace it with a new product, called the T-46. In 1935, the first prototype left the gates of the assembly shop, which differed from its predecessor in a slightly larger cylindrical tower, weight and improved chassis design, which, like on the BT, could be easily turned into a wheeled one by removing the tracks. At the same time, the rear track rollers became leading, two out of four on each side, which significantly improved cross-country ability. The front rollers could turn like a car.
The scheme is modern, but ... outdated
A brief review of the T-46 allows us to conclude that the designers of the Kirov plant during the design period did not yet find the main fundamental layout scheme, which later became the rule for all Soviet tanks. The transmission was front, a fifteen-millimeter frontal reservation protected the crew and mechanisms only from bullets and fragments, the engine ran on gasoline. The mass of the car exceeded 17 tons. The caliber of the gun was quite decent at that time, 45 mm, it was enough to hit any foreign tank of that time, including promising samples. There was another sign indicating the lack of revolutionary design T-46. The photos of this tank clearly demonstrate the absence of even attempts to position the armor plates obliquely to increase the likelihood of a rebound when a projectile hits. This tank is clearly not designed for the conditions of active artillery counteraction.
Thus, we can conclude that the T-46 was the embodiment of all the advanced ideas of the world tank building of its time, and overtook them in the design of the chassis, but at that time much more advanced ideas had already appeared in the USSR.
Disadvantages and advantages
The main indicator that “our tanks are fast” was still impressive, the tank accelerated to 80 km / h on the highway, which was caused by a powerful engine (330 hp). On the tracks he walked at a speed of 58 km / h. 19 tons of horses carried each ton of weight, which is quite good for many armored beauties in the 21st century. The situation was worse with reliability. A complex and heavy transmission often failed, which, combined with a small engine resource, did not allow the machine to be used in long battles.
The armament was impressive. In addition to the mentioned “forty-five” tank T-46 was equipped with three machine guns of caliber 7, 62 mm or two and one flamethrower.
A negative result is also a result.
In general, the project of this tank, given the high class of the Soviet engineering school, pulled on a solid collective diploma project of a graduate of a technical engineering university. It seems that everything was in its design, at that time known from open printed sources and intelligence data on the state of armored vehicles of countries - potential opponents. The T-46 was no worse than any of them, and in some ways even better, but there was no “highlight” characteristic of our school. This set the sad fate of the project, he never went into the series, only a few cars were built.
However, the efforts of the engineers of the Kirov plant cannot be called in vain. Having passed several dead ends, they became convinced of their futility and began to work in other directions, confidently gaining fame as the creators of the world's best tanks.