T-34-100: history of creation

2024 Author: Howard Calhoun | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 10:16

T-34 at the time of its appearance in 1940 met the highest requirements for this type of weapon. The 76-millimeter cannon mounted on the tank hit all existing tanks in the world without any problems. During the war, German designers radically improved the armor protection of their tanks, to which the Soviet designers responded by installing a more efficient and powerful gun of the D-5T model with a caliber of 85 mm on the T-34.

First developments

However, it quickly became clear that the effectiveness of such a weapon is not enough to confidently defeat modern enemy tanks. The Soviet 85 mm gun was noticeably inferior to the German 7.5 cm KwK 40 L/70 both in terms of armor penetration and accuracy of fire. In addition, German tanks began to be equipped with rangefinders and night vision devices, which put the Soviet tanks with the D-5T in even more disadvantageous conditions.

There was no potential for a further increase in power from the serial 85-mm gun. Attempts were made to create guns of the same caliber, but with greater power, within which experimental designs of the ZiS-1 and V-9 appeared. But both guns could not pass the tests and were rejected. Not tested andversion of the B-9K, which had a conical barrel. This design of the gun provided the initial speed of the projectiles up to 1150 m / s. Because of this, by 1945, all work on guns of this caliber was stopped. Therefore, many design teams of the USSR began to develop variants of the T-34, equipped with a larger caliber gun. The option of placing a 100-millimeter gun in a conventional turret is on the photo.

Among these teams were the designers of plant No. 183 (Uralvagonzavod, or UVZ) and Design Bureau No. 9. The employees of these design bureaus made an attempt to place the gun in the usual narrow T-34-85 turret. However, already at the stage of preliminary work, it became clear that while maintaining the old diameter of the turret ring (which was 1600 mm), it would not be possible to assemble a new artillery system. There was a proposal to use a turret from a heavy IS tank with a shoulder strap of 1850 mm. This option required a completely new hull design and was not accepted.

UVZ option

At the UVZ plant at that time there were already prototypes of the T-44 tank, which had a turret shoulder strap expanded in diameter up to 1700 mm. It was such a tower that they decided to install on the body of a conventional T-34-85 tank. Due to the difference in the diameters of shoulder straps, the hull received some improvements and did not have a course machine gun in the front plate. Due to the absence of a machine gun, the crew of the vehicle was reduced to 4 people.

Due to a wider shoulder strap, the layout of the fuel tanks had to be changed - they were moved to the control compartment. Suspension of the second and third balancer supportrollers was made according to the scheme similar to the first roller. A characteristic external difference was the use of drive wheels equipped with five rollers to drive the caterpillar. The T-34-100 in this design had a total weight of almost 33 tons and was assembled in February 1945.

Tests

The machine was tested at the Gorohovets training ground (near Gorky), as well as near Sverdlovsk. As the main weapon on the new Soviet medium tank T-34-100, two artillery systems of various designs were installed - ZIS-100 or D-10T. The transported ammunition consisted of 100 shells and 1500 rounds for a single machine gun coaxial with the gun. The power plant and transmission did not differ from serial tanks and consisted of a 500-horsepower V-2-34 diesel engine and a five-speed gearbox. Photo of T-34-100 with ZiS-100 below.

The cast tower had a thickness of frontal parts within 90 mm. The armor scheme of the hull remained the same and consisted of 45 mm front plates with large angles of inclination:

• 60 degrees for top sheet,
• 53 degrees for bottom sheet.

Variants of the tank with ZIS-100 and D-10T

The ZIS-100 artillery system was created by the Design Bureau of Plant No. 92 (Gorky, now Nizhny Novgorod). The gun with a caliber of 100 mm was a combination of the design of the serial ZIS-S85 gun (caliber 85 mm) and a new barrel of increased diameter and length. However, the recoil force of such an installation turned out to be too large, which adversely affected the transmission and chassis of the tank. Attempt to reduce returnsthe installation of a muzzle brake (with a slotted circuit) did not bring any effect. The installation diagram of the gun in the turret is shown below.

The test results of the D-10T showed a low accuracy of the battle, although the load indicators on the tank units during the shot still went beyond the permissible limits. Despite this, representatives of the Red Army insisted on continuing work on the machine, which led to the creation of another version.

Testing the variant with LB-1

At about the same time, another cannon was created by the Design Bureau of Plant No. 92 with the designation LB-1 (short for Lavrenty Beria). One of the goals of creating such a gun was to reduce the recoil force, which would allow the gun to be used on medium tanks.

It was proposed to install such a gun, equipped with a muzzle brake, in the T-34-100 turret with an extended shoulder strap. One of the drawbacks of the gun was a very long barrel, which extended beyond the dimensions of the tank by more than 3.3 meters. At the same time, the total length of the tank was 9.15 meters, which worsened the geometric cross-country ability of the vehicle.

In April 1945, a new version of the machine was tested. The test site was the Gorokhovets test site. According to the test results, the LB-1 system showed good results in terms of accuracy of fire. In addition, the recoil force of such a tool turned out to be much lower and was within acceptable limits. During the tests, the gun fired about 1000 shots without any complaints about the performance of the design. At the same time, the tank itself droveover 500 km.

Final results

Despite the positive test results, the T-34-100 variant with the LB-1 was not included in the series. The main reasons were the end of the war and the start of testing the first prototypes of the T-54 tank, which had a more modern design and powerful armor.

At the same time, the LB-1 gun continued to develop further and in 1946-47 was used to equip experimental versions of the T-44-100 and T-54. It did not show any noticeable advantage over the D-10T and was not mass-produced.