Monday, August 6, 2012

[WoT] Digging Through Archives: U-20 - Soviet Turreted Tank Destroyer

The first research related to T-34 based tank destroyer dates back to the summer of 1940. Two chassis were sent to Kaliningrad plant N8 (Kalinin's plant). Two open-top turreted prototypes with 85mm AA gun 52-K were planned. However the development took longer than expected, and eventually the work was stopped.

In the autumn of 1941 plant N8 along with all staff who worked on the project were evacuated to Sverdlovsk. Later, in November, a similar project was started. It was called U-20.

On January 3, 1942 the prototype was presented to the command of Uralmash. The development was led by famous gun system engineer - F.F. Petrov.


The first U-20 prototype was basically a T-34 tank with open-top turret for the crew of 3. Front turret armour was 45mm, side - 20mm. Instead of 52-K gun, U-10 was used. It was basically the barrel of 85mm K-52 gun mounted on the gun carriage of 122mm howitzer M-30. This design decision allowed to decrease the overall size and get a relatively compact construction. However the gun stuck out in front of the full for some 850mm, which was considered as a huge drawback.

General blueprint

Longitudinal plan

Together with turret and its inner layout


Central Archive of the Russian Ministry of Defence, fund 81, inventory 12038, case N90

After the discussion held in the April of 1942 following the resolution of GRAU it was stated that the project was a failure. In the meantime, the Americans were working on T35 SPG (future M10 Gun Motor Carriage).

19 comments:

  1. Ahh D.Max counterpart. Pen 210, Dmg 400 and 15 rpm...pretty balanced.

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    1. Chill out mate, in WoT premmy tanks are pretty balanced, instead of other premium items in other games ; )

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  2. it would be nice if there weren't huge watermarks over the top of the blueprints. It's kinda hard to look at details with them.

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  3. If GRAU thought it a failure, why put it in the game?

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    1. We already have some failed prototypes in this game. Some are even X tiers feared by many other tankers :)

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    2. World of tanks, where vehicles that sucked in real life can kick some ass!

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    3. vehicles dont suck... even the worst vehicle in game doenst suck that bad as long a good player is driving it... its a shame wargaming balances their vehicles based on overall statistics wich are mostly based on bad players playing hard to master vehicles, a great example is the ridiculous low victory ratio in kv-5 in overall statistics wich i have almost 1000 battles with and 60% victory ratio with about 2200 average damage, and never needed to fire single gold shell in a random

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  4. Projects can be deemed as failures based on many circuntances, time to build, budget, design flaws, etc. Of all these I will consider the last one the sole reason not to have it on WOT.

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  5. they need to fix the super pershing first. Its like driving a T34 with a smaller gun... no acceleration at all, and a KV5 dragged me off and disappeared into the sunset....

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    1. superpershing its perfectly balanced, it has gun depression, a very good armour and special matchmaking... it has more than enough points in its favor to decide many of the battles it gets into

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  6. Hi Overlord,

    I have 2 questions:

    1.Can we expect the second medium lines (I think it's only for Germany and France) this year?

    2.Is the Jagdpanzer E-100 underperforming compared to other tier 10 TDs?

    Thanks.

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    Replies
    1. 1. No.

      2. Most likely, it is. Haven't seen the detailed stats yet.

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  7. I smell a new premium ... or the 3rd russian TD line :D

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  8. Now give us SU-152 Taran instead of this obj 263 ugly thing. NOW!!! Pretty pleaseeee:<

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  9. will this fill the gap in the 2nd line? i hope it does,i really do

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  10. Can you look in the Archives over the Lend and Lease M3 Lee? Specifically if a rearming was planed? (85mm :P)

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  11. I'm still waiting for the ZSU 57-2 as a TD, and useable on Airfield for it's original purpose.

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