Perhaps, nowhere did ideology have such an impact on the processes of creating armored weapons as in the USSR. Moreover, everything, in general, was good until "Black Thursday" October 24, 1929. This day is considered the day of the beginning of the global economic crisis. True, there was still a short-term rise in prices on October 25, but then the fall took on a catastrophic character on Black Monday (October 28), and then on Black Tuesday (October 29). October 29, 1929 is considered the day of the Wall Street crash. Throughout the year, the US economy gradually collapsed, until at the end of 1930 depositors began to withdraw their money from banks in large quantities, which also led to bank failures and a wild contraction of the money supply. The second banking panic came in the spring of 1931 …
Tank TG. Photo of 1940.
Well, how did the USSR react to all this? Already on December 27, 1929, in his speech at a conference of Marxist agrarians, Stalin called for a transition to a policy of total collectivization of agriculture and the elimination of the kulaks as a class. And already on December 30, 1929, I. Khalepsky's commission went abroad to "buy tanks". At the same time, negotiations began in Germany with the aim of inviting knowledgeable BTT design specialists to work in the USSR.
The connection between all these events is obvious. Before that, there was a decline in the revolutionary wave in the West, and in the USA they started talking about the "period of prosperity", the revolutions in Germany and Hungary suffered defeats, and now only the newspaper Pravda wrote about the world revolution, but Makar Nagulnov dreamed of in Sholokhovskaya "Upturned virgin lands". And then suddenly there was a crisis, and at that time even a child knew that revolutions would come after the crisis.
TG tank on trials in 1931.
And it seemed obvious that they were about to come, the proletariat of the Western countries would rise to fight, ask us for help, and then we would give him … no, not a helping hand, but an iron armored fist, which should sweep off the face of the earth all the still unbroken bourgeoisie. But … it was with the fist that there were big problems. There were no tanks in the USSR at that time, which, firstly, were suitable for mass production, and secondly, they were superior in their performance characteristics to the tanks of our western probable opponents, that is, the tanks of Poland, France and England.
Tank TG. Front view.
And it was then that Khalepsky went to the West to look for all this, but in addition from Germany in March 1930, the designer Edward Grotte also arrived in the USSR, who in April was given the task to design a tank weighing 18-20 tons, having a speed of 35- 40 km / h and armor thickness of 20 mm. The armament of the tank was supposed to be very powerful for that time: two guns with a caliber of 76 and 37 mm and, in addition, five machine guns. All other characteristics of the tank were left to the discretion of the designer. Control over the work of the Grote group was carried out by the Technical Department of the OGPU - that is, the organization is more than serious. Meanwhile, the commission of the Khalep time did not lose in vain, and already in March 1930 acquired in England 15 Vickers Mk. II tanks, Cardin-Loyd Mk. VI tankettes and another Vickers 6-ton tank, the latter being bought together with a license for its production. Well, a month later, two of his T.3 tanks were bought from Walter Christie in the United States, albeit without the towers and the weapons he was supposed to.
Tank TG. Back view.
To develop a prototype, the AVO-5 design bureau was created at the Leningrad Bolshevik plant, where, in addition to Grote himself, young Soviet specialists also worked, for example, N. V. Barykov, who became his deputy from our side, and then one of the famous creators of domestic armored vehicles.
The new tank, designed as a medium or "powerful medium tank", as it was often called in documents at that time, was given the designation TG (Tank Grotte). Work on the tank was carried out under the strict supervision of the OGPU and was considered top secret. On November 17-18, 1930, the People's Commissar for Military Affairs Voroshilov came to the plant. First of all, to check how the work with the TG is going, especially since Grotte in Soviet Russia managed to get seriously ill and it turned out that the entire burden of fine-tuning the prototype fell on the shoulders of Soviet engineers.
The TG tank on tests overcomes an elevation of 40 degrees. Autumn 1931
Nevertheless, the tank was ready in April 1931, after which its trials began immediately. It was decided that if they are successful, the first series of 50-75 cars will be released in the same year, and already in 1932, start their mass production and produce at least 2,000 of them!
But what did the Soviet military specialists get after so much trouble and … the payment of a considerable salary to foreign technical specialists, who, as you know, did not agree to work with us for cheap? And they received a medium tank of an unusual layout for those years and, in addition, with a three-tiered arrangement of cannon and machine-gun armament and, as indicated, just bulletproof armor.
Tank TG. Side view. Pay attention to the identification "asterisks". For the first and last time, they were first riveted and then painted.
The hull, as well as the turret of the tank, were made completely welded (and this was done in the USSR for the first time in the world!). The tank had a bow with armor that had rational angles of inclination, a streamlined gun-room and a hemispherical rotating turret, crowned with a stroboscope, located on it. According to the project, this very wheelhouse was also supposed to rotate. That is, it would be more correct to say that the tank should have had a tower with a two-tier arrangement of weapons in the lower and upper towers with individual rotation, but it so happened that the shoulder strap of the lower tower was deformed during installation, and the first sample with a tower had to be made. welded to the body, and willy-nilly turned into a "wheelhouse". Although in the future they wanted to eliminate this defect, and make the lower tower rotating as planned. The hull armor was three-layer, and the armor thickness reached 44 mm. On the sides, the armor was 24 mm thick, and at the wheelhouse and the upper tower it was 30 mm. But the most, perhaps, the main advantage of the TG tank was its armament, completely unprecedented for that time.
Another hand-drawn projection of the TG tank. The lack of hatches for such a large crew is striking. Well, if only they arranged doors in the rear of the wheelhouse.
So, on it stood the 76, 2-mm semi-automatic gun A-19 (PS-19) - at that time the most powerful tank gun in the whole world. It was developed by the designer P. Syachintov on the basis of the 76, 2-mm anti-aircraft gun of the 1914/15 model. (Lender's or Tarnovsky-Lender's cannons), which was seriously altered for installation on a tank, equipped with a sleeve catcher and, in addition, a muzzle brake - which was just something out of the ordinary for the tanks of that time!
The gun was mounted on trunnions in the frontal plate in the wheelhouse of the tank. She had a semi-automatic loading, which allowed her to have a rate of fire of the order of 10-12 rounds per minute. Well, the initial velocity of the projectile was 588 m / s, that is, according to this indicator, it was only slightly inferior to the later guns on the T-34 and the American cannon on the M3 "Lee / Grant" tanks. She could shoot 6, 5-kilogram shells from the "three-inch", which made her a very, very destructive weapon, since even her shrapnel projectile, put "on strike", could well break through 20 mm armor of any tank of that time. True, when firing, it turned out that the semi-automatic firing from this gun envisaged by the project was actually impossible, since the semi-automatic equipment often fails, and then it has to be unloaded manually. Ammunition of shells for it consisted of 50 shots of different types, that is, it was a match for this weapon!
The second gun in the upper spherical turret was a 37-mm PS-1 high power gun, also designed by P. Syachintov. At the same time, it not only had a circular shelling, but also such an angle of ascent that it could shoot at planes. The long barrel length made it possible to provide an initial velocity of the projectile of 707 m / s. True, according to this indicator, it was inferior to the 37-mm anti-tank gun of the 1930 model, but it was adapted for installation on a tank. Its ammunition, located in the upper turret, was 80 shells.
For some reason, auxiliary weapons were three "Maxim" machine guns in the gun room and two diesel fuel in the sides of the hull. The latter fired through round embrasures in the armor screens. This is not to say that the machine gun armament of the TG would be thoughtful. So, in particular, the installation of the Maxim machine guns in the wheelhouse made them extremely difficult to use, moreover, they needed water, and their covers themselves, unlike the machine guns installed on British tanks of those years, were not armored and therefore were vulnerable to bullets and debris. The machine guns relied on 2309 rounds of ammunition, both in belts and in disk magazines.
But here it is clearly seen that the gun barrel is too short, and a very strong muzzle wave will affect the control compartment and the headlights located here.
The three-tiered armament of the tank, as conceived by its creators, was supposed to create a high density of fire in all directions. For example, it was believed that a tank could stand across the trench and shoot it with machine-gun fire from both sides. However, in practice, all these theoretical installations turned out to be of little use, but the technical solutions that provided them made it very difficult for tankers to perform more important and real tasks.
But the creators of the TG took care of installing the most modern observation devices on their tank at that time. So, to aim the guns, sights were used, covered with domed strobe lights, which had two cylinders of armor steel inserted into one another with slots 0.5 mm wide, which each rotated towards each other with its own electric motor at a speed of 400 - 500 rpm. Similar strobe lights were on the roof of the small gun turret and in the driver's seat. Moreover, to observe the terrain, the latter had three "windows" at once in the frontal sheet of the hull, but at the same time his head was inside the stroboscope, so he looked through them, being protected by his armor!
The engine on the tank was also not quite ordinary, and it, like the tank itself, was developed by Edward Grotte. It was distinguished by a number of specific features, in particular, it had an unusual lubrication and cooling system for that time, low noise level and (theoretically) had high reliability with a power of 250 hp. The latter indicator for a vehicle of this weight can be considered insufficient, besides, it was not possible to bring the Grote engine "to mind", so an M-6 aircraft engine with a capacity of 300 hp was installed on the experimental tank. with. But since the M-6 was somewhat larger than the Grotte engine, it had to be installed openly in the hull. By the way, with this engine, this tank was again very close to the American M3 "Lee / Grant", the engine power of which was 340 hp. with a weight of 27, 9 tons, while the TG weighed 25, their indicators in this regard were almost equal, although the American car was younger than ours by a whole decade!
TG - the angles of inclination of the frontal armor of the hull are clearly visible.
The transmission of the tank included a dry-friction disc main clutch, a gearbox, side clutches, and single-row final drives. The gearbox was designed in such a way that it provided the tank with the ability to move at the same speed both forward and backward in four gears, and their smooth shifting. Chevron gears were used in the design of the gearbox.
The controls of the tank also differed from the generally accepted ones: instead of two levers, the designer put an aviation-type handle on it. That is, in order to turn the tank left and right, it was necessary to reject it in the right direction. Moreover, the transfer of forces was not mechanical, but by means of pneumatic drives, which greatly facilitated the driver to control such a heavy machine.
Inside the tracked belt on the tank were five large-diameter rollers with semi-pneumatic Elastic tires, spring suspension and pneumatic shock absorbers, four rollers supporting the track, a sloth in front and a drive wheel at the rear. All this together provided the Grotte tank with a very soft and smooth ride.
The brakes on the tank were also pneumatic, and they were installed not only on the drive wheels, but also on all road wheels. It was believed that in the event of a broken track, this would make it possible to instantly brake the tank, and it would not have time to turn its side towards the enemy.
Since almost everything in this tank was original, the tracks were also installed on it of an unusual type. In the Grotte tank, they consisted of two roller chains, between which stamped tracks were fixed. This design increased the tensile strength of the track, however, it was much more difficult to repair it in the field than usual.
Getting into the tank was, of course, not very convenient!
It was repeatedly noted that the TG, thanks to its undercarriage on a flat and dense surface, could be freely rolled by the efforts of just a few people, while this was simply impossible with tanks of other types. For communication, a German-style radio station was to be installed on the tank.
The crew of the tank consisted of five people: the commander (who is also the gunner of the 37-mm gun), the driver, the machine gunner (who was supposed to serve his numerous machine guns), the commander of the 76, 2-mm gun and the loader. But one machine gunner was not enough for the designers, and in one of the versions of their project they added another one to the wheelhouse with a cannon, although it was already very crowded there. The tests of the tank took place from June 27 to October 1, 1931, and this is what emerged during them.
The planned speed of 34 km / h was achieved. The tank handled well and had sufficient maneuverability. The transmission of the TG on chevron gears proved to be strong and reliable, and the pneumatic drives made the control of the tank unusually easy, although they were constantly out of order due to the poor quality of the rubber.
At the same time, it turned out that the gun room was too cramped for the 76, 2-mm gun and three machine guns, which were simply impossible to shoot while firing from the cannon at the same time. One single crankcase of the gearbox and side clutches made it difficult to access them during repairs, and it also overheated when driving. The brakes worked, again, not too satisfactorily due to the poor tightness of the seals, and the track showed poor permeability on soft ground due to the low height of the lugs.
On October 4, 1931, by order of the government of the USSR, a special commission was created, which was supposed to carefully study the new tank and its test data and decide its fate. And the commission did all this and decided that the TG tank could not be accepted for service, but could be considered only a purely experienced tank and nothing more.
As a result, AVO-5 was immediately disbanded, and the German engineers led by Grotte were sent back to Germany in August 1933. Attempts were made on the basis of the developments obtained to create tanks more acceptable for the domestic industry, but nothing came of this idea either. The technological level of Soviet industry was already very low at that time.
What happened to the TG tank itself is unknown. Judging by the photographs in 1940, it still existed in the metal, but did not survive the Great Patriotic War, but rather was sent to be melted down.
The 1936 French Char de 20t Renault, better known as the Char G1Rl, was a pathetic parody of the TG.
Nevertheless, it should be noted that even with the help of German designers, the USSR managed to create a tank, which, by its performance characteristics, determined all other vehicles for a whole decade. The tank had the highest firepower, good armor protection, the most modern surveillance equipment, should have had a radio station, and besides, its creators, almost for the first time in the history of the BTT, were concerned about the convenience of the crew. The tank was much "stronger" than the T-28 that was being developed at the same time, not to mention the modern foreign tanks. However, all these qualities would be depreciated primarily by its low reliability, which, in turn, was a consequence of the extremely low level of development of technologies in the domestic industry of that time. The TG required many complex and precisely manufactured parts, which meant the practical impossibility of its serial production and meeting the needs of the Red Army in tanks in the conditions of the impending "world revolution", which ultimately determined its fate. But, of course, he gave a certain experience, and this experience was more or less successfully used by our engineers later. By the way, it should be noted that the foreign analogue of the TG, the British Churchill Mk IV tank, had a 350 hp engine. and two guns - a 42-mm turret and a 76, 2-mm howitzer in the frontal hull. However, the latter had a low power, and it is impossible to compare it with the gun of the TG tank. In France, in 1936, they tried to create (and created) a prototype of the Char G1Rl tank, but it was armed with only a 47-mm gun in the "wheelhouse" and two machine guns in the turret and could not be compared with the TG.
British tank "Churchill-I" Mk IV in 1942 in one of the training units in England. He surpassed TG only with his booking …
Well, now let's dream a little and imagine what it would be like if the creators of the TG somewhat "reduced their agility" and designed their car "standing on the ground, and not soaring in the clouds." Well, let's say, they would get rid of the pneumatic drives, put the usual levers, would not create a new engine, but would make a tank for the M-6 right away, and, of course, would remove all the “maxims” from the wheelhouse, and lengthen the gun barrel at least by 30 cm (by the way, this would increase its armor-piercing qualities) so that the driver's viewing windows are not under the muzzle of the barrel and the muzzle brake.
Then they could well have turned out a tank of "their time", and the level of tank building that was ahead of that time was not so radical. It could well be produced in a small batch, and … who knows how this would affect the overall level of development of the domestic BTT. By the way, there are a number of alternative projects of a "more perfect TG" that could, say, be carried out already in Germany. For example, it could be tanks with an upper turret from the T-III and a 75-mm German tank gun in the wheelhouse, and with its subsequent replacement with a long-barreled gun with a high penetrating power of the projectile. However, the Germans did not do any of this either, and our TG remained "on its own", the only and inimitable "super tank" of the early 30s!
