Steel monsters: super heavy tanks of Russia / USSR

10
In Russia, the idea of ​​creating superheavy tanks turned already during the First World War. At the same time, two projects related to this period amaze the imagination with their unusual appearance and weight and size characteristics. So, just a look at the Tsar Tank, which is also known as the Lebedenko wheeled tank, is enough to forever remain in your memory. This amazing machine of enormous size was developed by Nikolai Lebedenko in 1914-1915 and was even built in metal. And developed from 1911 to 1915. Mendeleev’s tank with its mass (more than 170 tons) could compete with the German Mouse, until the development of which there were a few more decades.

"Tsar-tank"

Apparently, the initial draft of this unusual combat vehicle matured in Lebedenko’s head back in the 1914 year. To create a tank with huge wheels, it was driven by the Arabian car, which could effortlessly overcome wide ditches. True, at that time Nicolas Lebedenko still had no team of designers and qualified specialists, without whose help it was impossible to implement his project. But in just a few months, the Russian inventor managed to win over B. Stechkin and then A. Mikulin.

This tank "Tsar-tank", which is also called the "Bat" or tank Lebedenko, of course, was not. It was an armored mobile combat device, overshadowed by its dimensions all the projects of armored combat vehicles of the XX century. In many ways, this project was implemented in metal due to a personal meeting of the inventor with Emperor Nicholas II. It is not known how, but Lebedenko managed to get an audience with the monarch, it took place on January 8 (January 21 in a new style) 1915 of the year. For a personal meeting, Nikolay Lebedenko brought a skillfully made self-propelled model of his “tank”, it was made of wood and could move thanks to a gramophone spring. According to the recollections of the courtiers, the emperor and the designer were carrying around with this model for several hours “like small children”, creating for it various artificial obstacles from improvised means, which were also delivered by several volumes of the “Code of Laws of the Russian Empire”. Nicholas II was so impressed with the model presented to him, which Lebedenko finally presented to him that he approved the financing of the work on this project. In total, about 210 thousand rubles were allocated for work.

Steel monsters: super heavy tanks of Russia / USSR


The tank designed by Lebedenko was made in the form of a huge gun carriage. The two front spoked wheels had a diameter of 9 meters, the rear roller was significantly smaller — about 1,5 meters. It was the rear roller was leading. The car was driven by a bunch of two powerful Maybach engines with HP 240 power. each, such power was achieved at 2500 revolutions per minute. The engines were captured, they were removed from the German Zeppelin airship in the year of 1914. It is worth noting that not a single tank of the First World War could boast such a powerful power plant, which, as tests showed, was not enough. Another acute problem was that the Russian Empire simply did not have its own engines of such power, and their development in wartime conditions was fraught with serious difficulties.

The upper stationary machine-gun cabin was raised above the ground by approximately 8 meters, and the total width of the T-box box was 12 meters. The upper tower was supposed to simultaneously perform the function of the observation deck, in it and in the lower cylindrical tower it was planned to install up to 8-10 “Maxim” machine guns. It was planned to place sponsons with 37-mm (according to other data with 76,2-mm) tools, which would have 180 degrees of guidance angles, protruding beyond the plane of the wheels of the extreme points of the hull.

According to the project, the hull booking of this unusual combat vehicle was supposed to be 5-7 mm, towers - 8 mm. In practice, booking the forehead, sides and stern of the hull reached 10 mm. The maximum design speed of the Tsar-tank should have been about 17 km / h or 28 meters per minute, which for a combat vehicle of this size was a good indicator, the average technical speed was 10 km / h, and the cruising range should be 60 kilometers. The combat weight of this vehicle was 60 tons, exceeding the design figures by 20 tons.



In August, 1915, the Tsar-tank, was assembled at an improvised training ground located near the town of Dmitrov in the Moscow region. The use of large wheels justified itself, the combat vehicle broke birch trees like matches. But the rear-driven roller due to its small size and the overall incorrect distribution of the weight of the combat vehicle almost immediately after the start of the test was stuck in soft ground. Neither big wheels, nor powerful captured engines helped the car. In addition, the military "recalled" Lebedenko all the flaws of his design. The most vulnerable spot was the undercarriage, especially in the context of shelling. If a projectile or shrapnel hit the spokes, or worse, into the wheel hub, the tank would be completely immobilized. Getting into the car, considering its gigantic size and low speed, was not a particular problem. And 10-mm armor could not protect the crew and the power stop from artillery shells. As a result, already in September 1915, the work on this project was finally phased out. And the car remained at the test site, where it stood until the year 1923, until it was ordered to disassemble it for scrap.

Tactical and technical characteristics of the "Tsar-tank":

Overall dimensions: body length - 17 800 mm, width - 12 000 mm, height - 9000 mm.
Combat weight - 60 tons, design - 40 tons.
Armament - 2x37 or 2х76,2-mm guns, up to 8-10 machine guns "Maxim".
Reservations - forehead, sides and body feed - 10 mm, bottom, roof - 8 mm.
Power plant - two aviation carburetor engine "Maybach" with a capacity of 2x240 hp
Maximum speed - 17 km / h, medium technical - 10 km / h.
Power reserve - approximately 60 km.
Crew - 10-15 people.

"Armored car", or the super heavy tank of Mendeleev

The “armored car”, which was developed by Russian naval engineer VD Mendeleev, can be safely attributed to one of the most elaborate projects of World War I super heavy tanks, if one does not take into account the German K-Wagen practically built in 1918. Work on this tank, which could rather be attributed to the super-heavy self-propelled guns of fire support, began as early as 1911, however, only 24 August 1916, the design of the tank was referred to the GVTU commission. Unlike many other proposals, the Mendeleev tank was favorably distinguished by a thorough level of study. The description of the combat vehicle was divided into several separate chapters: the internal deployment of personnel, specification, calculation of the reference surface, the table of weights, the passage (transportation) by rail.

Vasily Mendeleev, a shipbuilding engineer, believed that the tank should become a “land battleship”, therefore he borrowed a number of constructive solutions in shipbuilding. According to his project, the body of combat vehicles had a pronounced box shape. The front and stern sheets, as well as the side panels, were solid-cast, and the roof had to be assembled from 5 transverse sheet sections. The periodicity of the Mendeleev tank was also much lower than that of real battleships - in the frontal part of the hull the thickness of the armor was 150 mm, along the sides and in the stern - 100 mm. Mendeleev believed that such a reservation would help protect the car from armor-piercing projectiles of caliber up to 6 inches (152,4 mm), but theoretically it could withstand the impact of more powerful ammunition. The frame of the hull Mendeleev also designed like a ship, it consisted of frames and stringers.



Under the reservation was and weapons. At the front of the hull, on a stand with a structure similar to that of a ship, the 120-mm Kane gun with a movable flat mask should have been installed. The ammunition of the gun was in a kind of “hook-up camera”, 46 shells were in packing, 4 was on the cart and one in the breech of the gun. Shells were supplied using a suspended monorail and carts. Additional armament was represented by one Maxim machine gun, which was mounted in a retractable turret on the roof of the combat vehicle hull. The thickness of the walls of the tower should have been 8 mm. In the stern of the hull was armored door, designed for loading into the ammunition, and landing / disembarking the crew.

A single liquid-cooled carburetor engine should be used as the power plant. The engine developed the power of the 250 hp, the use of such an engine on a machine with a calculated mass of more than 170 tons seemed very optimistic. The engine was located in the rear of the tank closer to the left side. Close to the center of the Mendeleev tank were fuel tanks, which were under the armored flooring. The transmission of this combat vehicle was mechanical, it was paired with a four-speed gearbox. To start the engine on the tank there was a pneumatic system, which included a compressor and cylinders with compressed air. Also inside the fighting compartment there was lighting, which included 16 electric lamps.

Chassis "armored car" Mendeleev had a very original design. Assuming that the tank would have to act off-road, the designer suggested equipping each of the 6 rollers (on board) with an air suspension with vertical cylinders. Such a solution was to ensure horizontal stability and maximum smoothness on rough terrain. But such a running gear, with all its attractiveness, was rather expensive and very difficult to manufacture. The total length of the track support surface was 6 meters. The driving and guiding wheels of the tank had a pentagonal shape. Since the tracks almost completely covered the body of the combat vehicle, the driving wheels were at the back above. He took into account the designer and a strong return 120-mm guns, while firing the hull of his tank was to fall to the ground.



According to the project, the crew of an unusual tank consisted of 8 people, not so much for the combat vehicles of World War I. It consisted of a commander, helmsman, chief mechanic, gunner, three gunners and a machine gunner. All crew members had their own jobs, except for the commander, who was supposed to be a “jack of all trades”. During the battle, he had to lead the crew, observe through the loopholes, adjust the fire of the gun. While driving, he moved into the nose to the driver.

Despite the fact that the project of Vasily Mendeleev was worked out fairly well, the military department, which was overloaded with work, was not carefully considered. Most likely, the fact that the tank was simply gigantic and oversaturated with various innovations played its part. However, practically all tracked combat vehicles of those years suffered from these “ills”. With a calculated mass of more than 170 tons, the tank would have had many problems in operation. Obviously, the proposed engine would provide the tank with a power density of only 1,5 hp / t. This almost completely eliminated the use of a combat vehicle in the “lunar landscape” of a real battlefield; the tank would move at a snail's pace. This means that the declared characteristics - in 14 km / h of maximum speed and 25 degrees of overcome climb - were too optimistic.

Tactical and technical characteristics of the tank of Mendeleev:

Overall dimensions: body length - 11 000 mm (with forward gun - 13 000 mm), width - 4 400 mm, height - 3500 mm (on the roof of the body), 4450 mm (with raised machine-gun turret).
Combat weight - 173,2 t.
The armament is one 120-mm cane cannon, one 7,62-mm Maxim machine gun.
Reservations - hull front - 150 mm, hull sides - 100 mm, feed - 100 mm, bottom - 8-10 mm.
The power plant - carburetor engine liquid cooling horsepower 250.
Maximum speed - 14 km / h.
Power reserve - approximately 50 km.
Crew - 8 man.

Projects of tanks KV-4 and KV-5

11 March 1941, a Soviet intelligence agency provided a report in which it reported that work began on the production of heavy tanks in Germany. The largest of these tanks, the Type VII, allegedly had a mass of about 90 tons and armed with an 105-mm gun. The Soviet leadership reacted seriously to this intelligence report. The answer to this information was the start of work on new heavy tanks, which would be the answer to German developments. The result of the work of Soviet designers was the creation of several extraordinary projects of heavy tanks KV-4 and KV-5, which in their mass (of the order of 100 tons) could be easily attributed to super-heavy tanks.

KV-4 project Spirit


The tactical and technical requirements for the tank, which was to receive the KV-4 index, were ready for the 21 March 1941. Estimated combat weight of the new machine was supposed to make 70-72 tons. The forehead of the turret and the front of the hull were to receive armor 130 mm thick, the hull sides were 120 mm. The main armament was considered 107-mm gun ZIS-6, auxiliary armament consisted of 3-x machine guns. The ammunition of the gun was supposed to make 70-80 shots. The power plant of the new tank was supposed to be an engine with an 1200 horsepower, however, the installation of the B-2CH engine with a power 850 hp was considered as a temporary measure. With the installation of a more powerful engine, the maximum speed of the tank was estimated at 35 km / h.

According to the draft resolution of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, adopted by 27 in March of 1941, samples of new heavy tanks needed to be produced by November 1 of 1941. Requirements for new tanks indicated that the design of the KV-4 and KV-5 would need to be carried out, if not from scratch, then after a very serious revision of the existing concepts. Before J. Y. Kotin, who at that time headed the KB of the Kirov Plant, was set a very difficult task, which had to be solved in a very short time frame.

Work on the projects of combat vehicles began to boil in early April 1941. The competition conditions provided engineers with a fairly loose frame. The weight of 80-100 tons, M-40 engine and armament tower were reserved. In this case, the multi-turret layout was permissible. As an additional weapon to the 107-mm ZIS-6 gun, at the insistence of the military, an 45-mm gun could be added. As a result, 27 projects of the new KV-4 tank were submitted to the competition right away.



NL Dukhov, who was not going to engage in fantasies on a given topic, managed to cope with the task most successfully. Nikolai Leonidovich decided to approach the issue of designing a tank most conservatively. In fact, he decided to develop the design of the heavy tank T-220. It slightly lengthened and expanded the hull of the tank, for this reason the number of road wheels on board increased to 8. On the evolutionary path, he launched the development of the tower, which was very similar to the enlarged turret of the T-220 tank. From the latter, he took (with changes) and the commander's turret, equipped with a machine gun DT. The armament of his tank consisted of a 107-mm gun ZIS-6 and 45-mm tank gun, which were placed in a single installation.

Although the combat mass of the tank, which offered the Spirits, was supposed to be about 82 tons (according to this criterion, the machine can be attributed to super heavy), it was the lightest of all the presented KV-4 projects. At the same time, his booking fully met the specified tactical and technical requirements, and the estimated maximum speed should have been 40 km / h. The project Dukhova in the end and was chosen the winner of the competition. However, work on the creation of the KV-4 tank proceeded rather slowly. According to the decision of SNK, the spent technical design and the tank mock-up should have been ready by mid-June 1941, however, judging by the available correspondence, there has been no particular progress in these matters. As a result, Marshal Kulik intervened in the situation, who demanded that the work be accelerated. It is not known how the marshal's appeal helped, since his letter was sent to 12 June, 10 days before the start of World War II.

Tactical and technical characteristics of the KV-4 Spirit:

Overall dimensions: length - 8150 mm, width - 3790 mm, height - 3153 mm.
Combat weight - 82,5 t.
Armament - 107-mm gun ZIS-6, and 45-mm tank gun in one turret, 2x7,62-mm DT machine gun.
Ammunition - 55 shots to ZIS-6, 155 to 45-mm gun, 5544 cartridge to DT.
Reservations - hull forehead - 130 mm, boards, feed, turret - 125 mm, bottom and roof - 40 mm.
The power plant is a diesel engine based on M-40 or M-50 with HP 1200 power.
Maximum speed - 40 km / h.
Power reserve - 150-200 km.
Crew - 6 man.

If we talk about the KV-5 tank, then until June 1941 there was almost no work on this combat vehicle. In this case, the basis for the KV-5 was taken by the project HF-4 N.V. Zeitz. The project of Nikolai Valentinovich took the third place among all the projects of the KV-4 tank. At the same time, Zeitz was the most experienced engineer at the Kirovsky Design Bureau at that time. He began his career in the 1920-e years, so he had already a whole galaxy of different machines. The project proposed by Nikolai Zeitz was progressive and conservative at the same time. He refused the second gun, finding it useless and rudimentary. A feature of his tank was to be a fairly high tower, which allowed the 107-mm gun and unitary shots to be placed vertically along its sides. Theoretically, such a design should significantly simplify the work of the loader. To compensate for the substantial height of the tower and save weight, the tank hull was planned to be as low as possible.

KV-5, illustration by Yuri Yurov


The tank was powerful and possessing an unusual, memorable appearance. His body was very low - height 920 mm. This decision led to the fact that the driver and radio operator received upward towers. In the diamond-shaped tower on the chase 1840 mm and directly below it there was a fairly simple combat compartment, in which the commander of the combat vehicle, the gunner and two loaders were located. When transforming his KV-4 project into KV-5, Zeitz abandoned the rounded shape of the tower, making it more technological. The thickness of the frontal armor of the tank reached 180 mm, which automatically made it almost invulnerable to the artillery of those years.

Since the M-40 engine for the KV-5 was not yet made, in June 1941, the tank was redesigned for the installation of two B-2СН diesel engines. And because of the impossibility of producing a stamped tower with thick walls, a welded tower was taken into development. By August 1941, the KV-5 project was completed, but due to the difficult situation that had developed at that time near Leningrad, the production of the KV-5 prototype tank was canceled, and all the forces of the Kirovsky Design Bureau were abandoned to improve the design of the KV heavy tank -1, which was needed front.

Performance characteristics of the HF-5:

Combat weight - about 100 t.
Armament - 107-mm gun ZIS-6, 2х7,62-mm machine gun DT.
Reservations - the front of the hull and the tower - 180 mm, the hull and tower side - 150 mm, the bottom and the roof - 40 mm.
The power plant - two diesel engines В2СН with power 2х850 hp
Maximum speed - 40 km / h.
Crew - 6 man.

Information sources:
"Armored car." The project of super heavy tank D. Mendeleev // AviArmor. URL: http://www.aviarmor.net/tww2/tanks/ussr/pr_mendeleev.htm.
Wheeled tank Lebedenko // AviArmor. URL: http://www.aviarmor.net/tww2/tanks/ussr/lebedenko.htm.
Alexey Statsenko. Super heavy tanks: steel giants // Warspot. URL: http://warspot.ru/1223-sverhtyazhyolye-tanki-stalnye-velikany.
Yuri Pasholok. Tank building on the verge of common sense // Warspot. URL: http://warspot.ru/4995-tankostroenie-na-grani-zdravogo-smysla.
M. V. Kolomiets. Stalin's supertanks, JS-7 and others. Super-heavy tanks of the USSR. Moscow: Eksmo, 2015. 144 with.
Materials from open sources.
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10 comments
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  1. +4
    15 March 2016 07: 55
    The power plant consists of two Maybach aircraft carburetor engines with horsepower 2х240 hp...From a downed German airship ..
    1. -3
      15 March 2016 11: 01
      Did they get knocked down? ... Or he fell and had to be thrown away?
      1. +3
        15 March 2016 11: 42
        It happened that they shot down ....
        1. -3
          15 March 2016 12: 02
          The Sikorsky bomber (there were such) was shot down only once ...
          1. +2
            15 March 2016 13: 05
            Quote: Generalissimo
            Sikorsky bomber (there were such)

            The famous "Ilya Muromets"! Who doesn't know smile hi ??
        2. The comment was deleted.
    2. The comment was deleted.
    3. The comment was deleted.
  2. +3
    15 March 2016 07: 56
    Thanks to the author for an excursion into the history of Russia. I read about tanks Lebedenko and Mendeleev in childhood, I think that in Russia in the first war there was a bright galaxy of technical thought, of course, the military were skeptical about military engineering, it would be if now instead of living soldiers attack sending humanoid robots would be the same distrust. But it was easier to be born into heavy tanks in the USSR, there was an engineering school, but the most important thing was the concept of the tank, although there was also a distrust of the red marshals-cavalrymen, remember the designer Koshkin when he drove his tank to Moscow from Kharkov, to be shown to the leadership, but the reaction of the People’s Commissar Voroshilov was negative, and only the intervention of the Chief of General Staff Zhukov allowed the release of thirty-fours. The times are different, but the approaches of the cavalrymen to the tanks remained the same.
    1. +4
      15 March 2016 10: 23
      Quote: semirek
      Well, it was easier to be born to heavy tanks in the USSR, there was an engineering school, but the most important thing was the concept of the tank, although there was also a distrust of the red marshals-cavalrymen, remember the designer Koshkin when he drove his tank to Moscow from Kharkov to be shown to the leadership, but the reaction of the people's commissar Voroshilov was negative, and only the intervention of the Chief of General Staff Zhukov allowed to begin the release of thirty-four

      Well, why be trusting the tank if only one of the two vehicles that left Kharkiv got to Moscow without serious damage, and it had to be driven to tank plant No. 37 for repairs?
      We will pay dearly for the production of insufficiently efficient vehicles. (C)

      And what does Zhukov have to do with it?
      The fate of the A-34 was decided on March 31, 1940, when a re-inspection of the car took place and a meeting was held with the participation of the people's commissar of defense K. E. Voroshilov, his deputy G. I. Kulik, head of the ABTU D. G. Pavlov, and the people's commissar of secondary engineering A. Likhachev, his deputy A. A. Gorelyad and chief designer M. I. Koshkin.

      Quote: semirek
      Times are different, but the approaches of cavalrymen to tanks remained the same.

      Heh heh heh ... but do not remind me - who was comrade Zhukov? In which troops did he serve before ascending to Olympus after Khalkhin Gol? smile
  3. +4
    15 March 2016 11: 12
    What a fresh and relevant article!

    "Tsar-tank"
    http://topwar.ru/53975-car-tank.html

    Unusual tanks of Russia and the USSR. "The Tsar Tank" of Captain N.N. Lebedenko
    http://topwar.ru/7477-neobychnye-tanki-roscii-i-sssr-car-tank-kapitana-nn-lebede
    nko.html

    Tsar-tank: our answer to Chamberlain
    http://topwar.ru/5759-car-tank-nash-otvet-chemberlenu.html

    Big tank - big wheels
    http://topwar.ru/31324-bolshomu-tanku-bolshie-kolesa.html

    The first Russian tanks
    http://topwar.ru/1115-pervye-russkie-tanki.html
    well and so on
  4. 0
    15 March 2016 12: 45
    Design for design.
  5. +7
    15 March 2016 13: 01
    As for Lebedenko's tank, the article reveals a significant error - "It was the rear roller that was the leading one." The rear roller was steerable and the main wheels with a diameter of 9 meters were driving! The transmission diagram is shown in the figure. hi
    1. 0
      15 March 2016 16: 45
      This always happens when you use editions of the 1948 of the year and others like them, and you take the schemes of Mostovenko’s books.
      1. +4
        15 March 2016 17: 02
        Quote: kalibr
        This always happens when you use editions of the 1948 of the year and others like them, and you take the schemes of Mostovenko’s books.

        Here are some more drawings. (cry)
        If the rear wheel was the driving one, one could not talk about cross-country ability at all! smile
    2. The comment was deleted.
    3. 0
      16 March 2016 09: 42
      Quote: Bayonet
      As for Lebedenko's tank, the article reveals a significant error - "It was the rear roller that was the leading one." The rear roller was steerable and the main wheels with a diameter of 9 meters were driving! The transmission diagram is shown in the figure.

      What to take from the author? He just took and wrote almost all of his article using Wikipedia, without delving into the technical data. Regarding the "rear driving roller" generally a jamb! If the author took a closer look and took his article more seriously, he could find this
      In August 1915, the first tests took place. The tsar tank started off, rolled off the log floor, and suddenly stopped. The rear skating rink landed in a deep hole. The driver pressed on the gas, but everything was in vain. The tank is stuck. The error in the calculations affected. Most of the weight of the machine fell on the shank. The front wheels dug the ground, but could not pull the rink out of the pit. The commission concluded that the Lebedenko tank is not suitable for cross-country driving. There was a war, there was no money in the treasury to finalize the project, and they decided to curtail it.
  6. +1
    16 March 2016 12: 44
    I didn’t learn anything new, but sorry (((
  7. 0
    12 May 2020 12: 45
    Tanks that remained only on the drawings




    And how do you like it wassat

    invented project Lenin-Stalin

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