Probably everyone heard about the legendary Soviet “thirty-four”. And if you ask what the T-35 tank is, the majority will answer that it is an updated thirty-fourth. But this will not be true, because the development of the 35th model went according to a completely different scheme, with similar protection, but completely different firepower.
Even the picture above shows that this tank does not closely resemble the T-34. Another side view, a larger crew, a completely different weapon - to list the distinguishing features can be infinite. He did not go through the whole war as a light maneuverable thirty-fourth, but nevertheless took his place in the history of Soviet industry. Thanks to its specifications, which will be discussed below, this machine can be safely called heavy. That's what they called it - the heavy T-35 tank. Below we consider all the characteristics, advantages and disadvantages of the "Stalinist monster", as it was called in the years of its release.
Project
In the early 1930s, Soviet engineers received an order to develop a heavy tank. It should enter service by the end of 1938 for the fire support of mid-range tanks, as well as infantry crews. The first copy was expected by September 1933, and although it was presented, but this version revealed many significant flaws, one of which was an inoperative main gun. Subsequently, this model received the designation "T-35-1 heavy tank" (existed until 1936).
Two months later, in November, a new project is launched, taking into account the shortcomings, as well as the wishes for unification with the T-26 and T-28 medium tanks. The result is a completely new car. Changed were tank carts, small, medium towers and other minor details.
Nevertheless, in 1933, the Soviet T-35 heavy tank went into mass production. In the entire history of the creation of the gate of the Kharkov Locomotive Plant, 61 cars and 2 prototypes got out. The release of the tank was completed in 1939, but, despite this, each new version had its own updates.
Design
The military received exactly a heavy tank. Reinforced armor, additional weapons - everything was designed to occupy and maintain positions on enemy territory. But at the same time, the speed declared by the designers was to be 28 km / h. The hull of the tank was welded from armor, the average thickness of which was 20 mm. To strengthen the structure, riveting was used in some places. The turret shells had 30 mm armor.
At the rear was a motor. To access it, the rear of the bottom had 13 hatches. There was also a separate hatch for access to the engine compartment. During movement, the hatch was closed by an armored cover into which the hood of the air purifier was mounted. Also near the hatch several slots were arranged for air access to the radiators. There was a gearbox next to the engine in the same compartment: 4 speeds forward, one back. The connection between them was with the help of the main clutch, which had belt brakes. He was unreliable, often broke. During the war, most tanks were abandoned precisely because of the breakdown of this unit.
The chassis had 8 rubberized rollers, as well as 6 supporting rollers. Driving wheels - at the rear. Front - guides. Between the guides and the support, additional rollers were installed, which were supposed to prevent the caterpillar deflection when climbing up vertical obstacles. All rollers were mounted in pairs on tank carts. Carts on brackets were fixed on the sides of the tank. By the same principle bulwarks were attached. For a smooth ride, as well as overcoming minor obstacles, a pair of coil springs was installed. The bulwark, like the rest of the armor, was made of several layers.
One of the inherent features of this tank is called the presence of 5 towers. Multi-tower was not a new solution. Such options have already been used in lighter versions. But five towers were installed only on the T-35 tank. We will consider their characteristics in more detail below.
Towers and tiers
As in a conventional tank, five towers stood in the center of the upper part of the hull, without the niches that were on the prototype models. The main tower was installed on a hexagonal base, with blocks for creating a smoke screen located along its free edges. A 72-mm cannon was installed on it - a tank version of the 1927 model gun.
All five towers were located in three tiers. The main, being the highest, was the upper tier. The middle tier is a pair of separate towers with 45 mm cannons. And the lower tier is another pair of towers where machine guns were located. It is worth noting that the T-35 tank received not two machine guns (in the number of towers), but many more. For example, some tanks had a machine gun above the driver’s hatch, located on the front left.
The cannons of the towers of the second tier were mounted in tandem with a machine gun. Machine guns could also be installed next to the main gun and on the hatch of the main tower.
The towers of the second and third tiers were located opposite each other, diagonally. The cannons were on the right, front, and left, behind. Machine guns, respectively, front, left, rear, right of the main tower.
We add that the ammunition was 96 rounds for the main, 220 for 45-meter guns. The stock of machine-gun bullets was more than 10,000. Thus, the heavy T-35 tank in terms of armaments could be compared to a small fortress, whose firepower was equal to three tanks of a lighter type.
Crew
The serial tank could be called a stretch. Each batch had its own design features, the result of which was a different number of crew in different machines. But the famous song "Three Tankers" was not written about this tank. T-35 had from 9 to 11 crew members. However, in some cases, one person performed several duties.
For example, take a crew of 10 people. Three are in the main tower, this is the commander (aka gunner), radio operator (aka loader) and machine gunner. Four in pairs are sitting in the cannon towers - the gunner and the machine gunner. In machine-gun towers is one person. And finally, another person is a driver.
The front and rear towers had pairwise communication with each other, and the main one was separated by an additional partition. It can also be noted that the design did not provide for movement inside the tank. Each tower had its own hatches for the crew. There was a separate hatch for a soldier who was acting as a driver.
Electrical equipment
An interesting feature is that the railing on the upper tower did not retract, as is done on submarines. The railing had a dual function. In addition to the support, they were also an antenna for a walkie-talkie, powered by 12 V. In addition to the walkie-talkie, the tank also had electric telephone communication (7 subscribers) and a smoke exhaust system. The main tower also turned on the electric drive. At the same time, the designers provided a signal prohibiting the gunner to rotate the tower if its hatches were open.
Minuses
Not without cons. Three guns made it possible to fire round-the-clock, but this entailed a complication of the design, an increase in the number of crew and its own weight, which, in turn, led to movement problems. The huge size also affected the draft capabilities of the engine, which often had to work to the limit. Add here that the tank often had to be driven blindly. Far advanced caterpillars far blocked the view, and the driver’s position was in the same place as in other tanks, in front, between them. All these details in the aggregate prevented the effective use of the T-35 tank.
The characteristics of the armor also left much to be desired. At low speed and maneuverability, weak armor made the tank an excellent target. The disadvantages include the design of the hatch for the driver. It could only be opened for exit if the left front machine-gun turret would be deployed with left-to-side weapons. Thus, if it was damaged, the driver could not go out on his own.
Modifications Held and failed
In the Great Patriotic War, T-35 tanks practically did not take part. 7 copies were lost in the battles of 1941, 6 remained in repair, and 35 were abandoned and destroyed by crews due to breakdowns. In connection with the above disadvantages, the main field of action of these tanks were military parades 1933-1941.
In 1938, KhPZ proposed to re-equip the T-35 with a new 76-mm L-10 gun instead of a CT, but the ministries did not accept this option, motivating that two 45-mm guns would be enough to combat armored vehicles, and CT would have enough power to accompany infantry . And last year the tank left the main gun with 72 mm. It is not known what would have happened by 1944 (the birth of an 85 mm gun), maybe the T-35-85 model would have turned out. The T-34 tank received such a gun, and in the last years of the war, as well as in other battles, only the T-34-85 was used. The designation stands for T-34 with an 85 mm gun. In fairness, it should be mentioned that one T-35 tank participated in the battles of 1945, but on the side of the Germans. The Germans got one of the 35 abandoned models that German engineers managed to restore.
Around the same years, on the basis of the T-35, the development of a self-propelled installation - SU-14 began. The main difference was the tower part, while the body of the experimental machine remained unchanged. Instead of towers, self-propelled artillery received one spacious cabin, and instead of a cannon, a 203-mm howitzer of the 1931 model (known as the B-4) was installed. Due to the length of the barrel, the wheelhouse moved to the rear, which entailed internal changes: the motor, along with the transmission, moved to the front. The crew of self-propelled guns was 7 people. In 1937, work on the installation was frozen and restored only in 1940, a number of modifications were carried out, and the new version receives the code number SU-14-2.
In 1936, the SU-14 modification appeared - the howitzer was replaced with a 153-mm high-power gun (Known as BR-2). After the same modifications in 1940, she first received the name SU-14-1, then - SU-14-BR-2.
Both developments were planned to work on the Mannerheim line, but the modification (1939-1940) passed behind schedule, and the army received them much later.
In 1938, the development of a new T-112 tank began . The prototype of the model was to serve as the T-28. It was planned to borrow a chassis from the T-35, but this option remained at the stage of the drawings.
Specifications
Some indicators in the text have already been given. Here we indicate the remaining parameters that the T-35 multi-tower tank received. Engine specifications are as follows:
At the same time, these data relate only to the marching on the highway. The traffic lane movement reduced these figures by more than half. The tank weighed 50 tons, tank capacity - 900 liters, height - 5430 mm, width - 3200 mm, length - 9700 mm. Ground clearance - 530 mm.
Regardless of the fact that each party had its own changes, the thickness of the armor, as well as engine performance, was unchanged. The Soviet T-35 tank on armor received the following indicators: 20 mm - feed, sides, bottom, frontal part; 10 mm - the covers of the towers and the bulwark covering the suspension; 50 mm - the front inclined sheet - the only part that had armor that meets the standards of the beginning of World War II. In this case, the roof of the case, a little further than this sheet had a thickness of only 10 mm.
Currently
Of the 61 tanks released, the Red Army (Red Army) received 48 units. The remaining 13 went to military schools or were registered for repairs. The T-35-2 tank (one of the prototypes) was in the museum, and the T-35-1 was decommissioned in 1936. Currently, there are only 2 copies in the world. Tank number 0197-7 in 1938 went to the Kazan Tank School and did not take part in real battles. Now it is a museum exhibit and is located in Kubinka (Russia), in the armored museum. It still has a native working (!) Motor and is on the go.
The second copy is also in the museum in Yekaterinburg. The tank was recreated according to the drawings and photographs at the restoration site of Uralelectromed JSC. The recovery period lasted almost 5 months, and the restored version is almost no different from the original copies of the 1930s.
Modeling
The T-35 tank (1:35 - such is its scale) is made by the Chinese. They offer the model in three versions - an early tank (one large hatch on the main tower), a release until 1938 (two hatches and an anti-aircraft turret) and a late - release 1938-1939.
The tank is made of plastic by injection molding. There are some metal parts in the kit. In addition, there is the option of selecting functional tracks. On the same scale, Russia also produced models at one time. The same scale was with Ukrainian models, but at the moment the release is also discontinued.
In Russia, a limited batch of models was released on a different scale. The T-35 tank (1:72 - model scale) was attached to the magazine Russian Tanks (No. 18). The same option can be bought from Polish manufacturers (Modelkrak company).
"Star"
And finally, another Russian company announced the release for amateurs and not only for everyone who wants to receive the Soviet T-35 heavy tank in their collection. Zvezda, a company that is well known to all collectors, announced in early 2016 the imminent appearance of a model on the shelves of online stores.
Precisely calibrated geometry and detail of the model are especially noted. Initial information promises a scale of 1:35 and a total length of 28 cm. The tank will consist of 428 parts. Estimated price starts from 2000 rubles.
Conclusion
Like many powers with a developed tank industry, the Soviet Union released its land monster - a five-tower tank T-35. But his fate repeated the fate of the same in other countries. Weak armor, an engine not designed for such a colossus - and the tank, which had the ability to arrange a whole sea of fire around itself, did not reach the front. And those instances that got due to their flaws did not return back.