Created in the USSR at the end of the 30s, the 14, 5x114-mm cartridge was successfully used throughout the war in the anti-tank guns of the PTRD and PTRS.
The BS-41 bullet with a metal-ceramic core fired from these guns had armor penetration along the normal: at 300 m - 35 mm, at 100 m - 40 mm.
This made it possible to destroy light tanks and armored vehicles, and also ensured the penetration of the side armor of the German medium tank Pz. IV and self-propelled guns created on its basis, which were used from the first to the last day of the war and formed the basis of the enemy's armored forces.
However, anti-tank guns posed a certain danger to heavy vehicles. Unable to penetrate thick armor, they were quite capable of knocking down a caterpillar, damaging the chassis, smashing optical instruments, jamming a turret, or shooting through a gun.
The experience of using anti-tank systems during the war shows that they had the greatest effect in the period until July 1943, when the enemy used light and medium tanks, and the battle formations of our troops were relatively poorly saturated with anti-tank artillery.
In the future, their role in the fight against tanks gradually decreased, but they continued to be used to combat armored vehicles and against firing points. There were cases of successful firing at air targets.
At the final stage of the war, the number of PTRs in the troops decreased, and since January 1945, their production was discontinued.
In the classic work of DN Bolotin, "Soviet Small Arms", a letter is quoted written by a group of front-line soldiers to the famous designer VA Degtyarev on August 23, 1942: “We are often tempted by the thought of what formidable weapon an anti-tank machine gun would be against tanks … to be a decisive means of fire in repelling enemy attacks and destroying his manpower."
The very idea of an anti-tank machine gun was not new - it dates back to the First World War. And in the 20s - early 30s, large-caliber machine guns were created taking into account the "anti-aircraft" and "anti-tank" requirements. In December 1929, the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR reported to the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks that "the adopted system of infantry armament of the Red Army provides for the introduction in the near future … of a large-caliber machine gun - to combat armored parts and an air enemy, caliber 18-20 mm."
However, the Red Army received a 12.7 mm DShK machine gun. But in 1938, a more powerful 14.5-mm cartridge, designed for use in automatic weapons, already appeared, and attempts were made to develop a 14.5-mm machine gun on its basis. However, the matter did not go further than prototypes, and the new cartridges served as ammunition for anti-tank rifles.
In the course of the war, it became necessary to create large-caliber rapid-fire weapons for firing not only at armored vehicles, but also at accumulations of manpower and equipment, enemy firing points at ranges of up to 1,500 meters. Such weapons could also be used to repel low-altitude attacks by armored attack aircraft.
It became necessary to supplement the 12.7-mm DShK with a machine gun with a large armor-piercing bullet effect, superior to Degtyarev and Shpagin's weapons in range and height. In December 1942, the Main Artillery Directorate approved the tactical and technical requirements for a 14.5 mm machine gun.
Attempts to create such a weapon based on the technical solutions used in the DShK were unsuccessful. The high pressure created by the 14.5 mm cartridge made the operation of the automatic gas engine sharp, made it difficult to extract the spent cartridge case, the barrel survivability was low when firing with armor-piercing bullets.
In May 1943, S. V. Vladimirov (1895-1956), an employee of the Plant's Chief Designer Department, began the development of his own version of the machine gun, taking as a basis his 20-mm V-20 aircraft cannon with a recoiling automatic engine (in 1942, this gun lost to the B-20 Berezina).
In the Vladimirov's large-caliber machine gun, automation was used using recoil energy with a short barrel stroke. The barrel is locked at the time of the shot by rotating the clutch fixed to the bolt; the inner surface of the coupling has lugs in the form of intermittent thread segments, which, when turned, into engagement with the corresponding lugs on the breech of the barrel. Rotation of the clutch occurs when the transverse pin interacts with the shaped cutouts in the receiver. The barrel is quick-change, enclosed in a perforated metal casing and removed from the body of the machine gun together with the casing, for which there is a special handle on the casing. The cartridges are fed from a metal tape with a closed link, assembled from non-scattering pieces for 10 cartridges each. The connection of the pieces of tape is carried out using a cartridge.
Machine gun weight, kg: 52, 3
Length, mm: 2000
Barrel length, mm: 1346
Rate of fire, rounds / min: 550-600
Already in February 1944, the Vladimirov machine gun with the modernized Kolesnikov universal wheeled-tripod machine was tested at the Scientific Testing Range of Small Arms and Mortars.
In April 1944, the GAU and the People's Commissariat of Armament ordered factory number 2 to produce 50 machine guns and one anti-aircraft installation for military trials. The machine gun received the designation KPV-44 ("Vladimirov's large-caliber machine gun arr. 1944"). The machine gun and the anti-aircraft gun got to military trials immediately after the end of the Great Patriotic War - in May 1945.
In May 1948, the KPV-44 was tested on the infantry machines of several systems - G. S. Garanin (KB-2), G. P. Markov (OGK plant number 2), S. A. Kharykina (Leningrad OKB-43) and the Kuibyshev Machine-Building Plant. The choice in the end fell on the Kharykin machine, modified in Kovrov at KB-2.
The Vladimirov large-caliber machine gun was adopted only in 1949, in the form of an infantry machine gun on a Kharykin wheeled machine (under the designation PKP - Large-caliber Infantry Machine Gun of the Vladimirov system).
The new machine gun used ammunition previously used in the PTR:
B-32-armor-piercing incendiary bullet with a steel core, BS-39-armor-piercing bullet with steel core, model 1939, BS-41-armor-piercing incendiary with a metal-ceramic core, BZT-44-armor-piercing incendiary-tracer bullet mod. 1944, To solve new problems, 14, 5-mm cartridges with bullets are accepted:
ZP-incendiary bullet, MDZ-instant incendiary bullet (explosive), BST-armor-piercing incendiary-trashing bullet.
The brass sleeve was replaced with a less expensive green lacquered steel sleeve.
Bullet weight 60-64 gr., Muzzle velocity from 976 to 1005 m / s. The muzzle energy of the KPV reaches 31 kJ (for comparison, the 12.7 mm DShK machine gun has only 18 kJ, the 20 mm ShVAK aircraft cannon has about 28 kJ). The aiming range is 2000 meters.
KPV successfully combines the rate of fire of a heavy machine gun with the armor penetration of an anti-tank rifle.
However, the infantry machine gun on a wheeled machine was not widely used, despite its high combat qualities, the large mass significantly limited its use.
Much more recognition was given to Anti-Aircraft Machine Gun Installations (ZPU) and a variant intended for installation on armored vehicles (KPVT).
Anti-aircraft machine gun mounts of 14.5 mm caliber were intended to combat enemy aircraft at altitudes up to 1500 m.
In 1949, in parallel with the infantry, anti-aircraft installations were adopted: a single-barreled ZPU-1, a twin ZPU-2, a quad ZPU-4.
ZPU-1
On the basis of the BTR-40, a self-propelled anti-aircraft gun was created by installing a ZPU-2.
An anti-aircraft mount with two KPV machine guns of 14.5 mm caliber was mounted on a pedestal in the troop compartment. The maximum elevation angle of machine guns is +90 / declination - 5 °. For shooting at ground targets, there was an OP-1-14 telescopic sight. airborne - collimator sight VK-4. Ammunition - 1200 rounds. The installation was controlled by one gunner using a mechanical manual drive.
In 1950, an order was issued for the development of a twin unit for the airborne forces. This was due to the fact that the ZPU-2 did not correspond to the specifics of the combat operations of this type of troops. Field tests of the installation took place in 1952. When it was put into service in 1954, it received the name "14.5-mm anti-aircraft machine gun installation ZU-2". The installation could be disassembled into packs of light weight. It provided a higher azimuth guidance speed.
Due to its low weight and increased maneuverability, the ZU-2 became a battalion anti-aircraft weapon. However, the transportation of ZPU-1 and ZU-2, not to mention ZPU-4 on a four-wheeled cart in mountainous terrain, presented great difficulties.
Therefore, in 1953, it was decided to create a special small-sized mining installation for a 14, 5-mm KPV machine gun, disassembled into parts, carried by one soldier.
The installation successfully passed field tests in 1956, but did not enter mass production.
She was remembered in the late 60s, when there was an urgent need for such a weapon in Vietnam.
The Vietnamese comrades turned to the leadership of the USSR with a request to provide them, among other types of weapons, with a light anti-aircraft gun capable of effectively fighting American aircraft in a guerrilla war in the jungle.
ZGU-1 was ideally suited for these purposes. It was urgently modified for the tank version of the Vladimirov KPVT machine gun (the KPV version for which the ZGU-1 was designed was discontinued by that time) and in 1967 it was put into mass production. The first batches of units were intended exclusively for export to Vietnam.
The design of the ZGU-1 is distinguished by its low mass, which in the firing position, together with the cartridge box and 70 cartridges, is 220 kg, while fast disassembly (within 4 minutes) is ensured into parts with a maximum weight of no more than 40 kg each.
Later, during the Afghan war, the capabilities of ZSU-1 were appreciated by the Afghan mujahideen.
Having the opportunity to obtain Western-made anti-aircraft guns, they preferred the Chinese version of the ZGU-1. Appreciating it for its high firepower, reliability and compactness.
In the navy, in the post-war years, large-caliber machine guns were not installed on large ships. This was due, on the one hand, to an increase in the speed and survivability of aircraft, and on the other, to the emergence of relatively effective anti-aircraft guns. But 14, 5-mm machine guns on column mounts are widely used on boats of all classes.
Thus, 2M-5 installations were received by torpedo boats of projects 123bis and 184; 2M-6 - armored boats of project 191M and part of boats of project 1204; 2M-7 - patrol boats of the "Grif" type of project 1400 and project 368T, minesweepers of projects 151, 361T, etc.
In the 70s, the ships were hit by a 14.5 mm Vladimirov machine gun on a wheeled machine. At that time, a large number of pirate boats appeared in the Indian Ocean in the waters adjacent to Somalia and Ethiopia. So it was necessary to put army machine guns on hydrographic or other auxiliary vessels to protect against them.
In 1999, at the MAKS-99 exhibition, a 14.5-mm naval pedestal machine-gun mount MTPU was presented, created on the basis of a 14.5-mm KPVT machine gun (Vladimirov's large-caliber tank machine gun). Installation is carried out by the Kovrov plant named after. Degtyareva.
The body of the machine gun has slight structural differences compared to the Vladimirov machine guns in the 2M-5, 2M-6 and 2M-7 installations. Ammunition and ballistics are the same. Air cooling of the machine gun. The KPVT machine gun is mounted on a swivel, which in turn rotates on a light pedestal. Manual guidance drives.
The most numerous modification of the machine gun was the version intended for installation on armored vehicles.
The tank version of the KPV machine gun, bearing the designation KPVT (Vladimirov's large-caliber tank machine gun), is equipped with an electric trigger and a pulse counter of shots. The barrel cover is expanded to facilitate maintenance of the machine gun. Otherwise, it has the same characteristics as the CPV.
Initially, the KPVT was installed on domestic heavy T-10 tanks, where it was housed in a turret, in a twin gun with a 122 mm cannon and as an anti-aircraft gun, on the tank commander's hatch. Since 1965, the KPVT is the main weapon of domestic wheeled armored personnel carriers BTR, starting with the BTR-60PB model, as well as the armored reconnaissance and patrol vehicle of the 2nd model BRDM-2.
In armored personnel carriers (BTR-60PB, BTR-70, BTR-80) and BRDM-2 KPVT is installed in a unified rotating conical tower, together with a twin 7.62 mm Kalashnikov PKT machine gun.
Recently, KPVT began to give way, on the latest modifications of domestic armored personnel carriers BTR-80A and BTR-82, a 30-mm cannon is mounted as the main weapon.
The Vladimirov heavy machine gun was effectively used in many large and small local conflicts.
Often installed on homemade handicraft turrets and civilian vehicles.
He had a significant impact on the formation of the appearance of modern Western armored vehicles.
Based on the experience of the Vietnam events, where the CPV easily penetrated the frontal armor of the most massive American M113 armored personnel carrier, from the 1970s to the present, requirements for protection from fire 14, 5-mm machine gun.
To meet this requirement, the thickness of the sides of combat vehicles is 35-45 mm of steel homogeneous armor. This was one of the reasons for the almost two-fold excess of the combat mass of the main NATO BMPs relative to the Soviet BMPs.
Until recently, it had no analogues in the world, the Belgian FN BRG 15 chambered for 15, 5x106 mm, never entered mass production.
In the PRC, its own version of the KPV was put into production, characterized by a tape device for 80 cartridges, some changes in the tape feed mechanism, and barrel ribbing. This machine gun with a body weight of 165 kg is used mainly as an anti-aircraft gun. In China, several 14, 5-mm anti-aircraft machine gun mounts were produced. Type 56 is practically similar to ZPU-4, Type 58 - ZPU-2, Type 75 - ZPU-1 on a tripod-wheeled installation. Type 75 and its modification Type 75-1 was supplied to a number of countries.
The PLA entered service in 2002 with a 14.5 mm QJG 02 heavy machine gun.
It is designed to combat low-flying aircraft and helicopters, as well as to combat lightly armored ground targets. The 14.5 mm QJG 02 heavy machine gun is intended to eventually replace the Type 58 machine guns of the same caliber in service with the PLA.
For export, a variant of the Type 02 heavy machine gun is proposed under the designation QJG 02G, the main difference of which is the machine, which has rubber wheels that allow towing the machine gun behind the car.
Despite its venerable age (next year the CPV will be 70 years old), the machine gun, due to its high combat qualities and high prevalence, continues to remain in service. And it has every chance to celebrate its 100th anniversary in the ranks.
