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T-111 (Object 111)

1938 X-TANK

History

The widely accepted tank theory before WWII (mostly in the 1930s) was to use two distinct tanks when trying to destroy an enemy's defenses. This idea includes "fast tanks" designed to overwhelm the enemy at speed, and "infantry tanks" used to fight alongside advancing infantry units. Infantry tanks contradict the design of fast tanks as they are supposed to have heavier armor protection and larger caliber main weapons - which makes them slower but harder to stop.

In 1937, Soviet tank engineers started working on the latter tank with the "Object 111" or "T-111" at the Kirov factory at Factory No. 185 in Leningrad.

The new car is classified as a "light tank", but is still used in the infantry role. It is designed to contain enough armor protection to withstand the power of 37mm shells fired at close to medium distances and 76.2mm shells fired above 1,000 meters.

The tank was originally designed to show a combat weight of 20 tons or less. However, when its chief engineer was arrested during Stalin's "purge", work was significantly delayed - leaving the T-111 in limbo until work progressed enough to launch a pilot vehicle in April 1938 ( prototype).

The final 32-ton tank had a conventional layout: its crew consisted of three people (driver, commander and gunner), and the main armament was housed in a fully mobile turret. With the crew in place fore and middle of the hull, the engines were left aft. Armor protection for critical fairings (i.e. front and sides) ranges from 20mm to 60mm, but this extra weight comes at a price.

Dimensions include a barrel length of 5.26 meters, a width of 3.1 meters and a height of 2.4 meters.

Power comes from a single MT5-I 12-cylinder diesel engine rated at 300 hp to drive a modern track arrangement with six twin wheels on one side of the hull, drive sprockets at the front and tracks at the rear Idler. Three sprockets are used to guide the slender links to the upper part of the side of the fuselage.

The vehicle can theoretically reach a top road speed of 30km/h and a range of up to 150km - but only on prepared roads and not off-road.

Primary armament is the proven 45mm 20K L/46 main gun mounted to the front of the turret. Carry up to 3 7.62mm DT machine guns to protect the vehicle from infantry and attack infantry positions within range. One was mounted on a coaxial bracket next to the main gun on the front of the front turret, while the other was mounted on the rear of the tank on the rear turret wall (to protect the more vulnerable rear quadrant from infantry).

Searchlights are mounted on the main gun near the mantle.

The T-111 was eventually evaluated on the basis of two completed pilot vehicles, but the design quickly proved cumbersome and bulky, and lacked the firepower needed to deal with today's growing threats. The Object 111 program was completely abandoned before the end of the decade, as there were few additional improvements to be extracted from the existing design.