Chapter 335 "Xuanwu"
As the culmination of the Soviet Stalin series of heavy tanks, the IS series heavy tank turret integrates the best defensive appearance and equivalent armor of that era. Its powerful defensive performance in actual combat is undoubtedly beyond doubt.
The semi-arc gun shield with a physical thickness of 100 mm in front of the entire turret not only has an extremely excellent ricochet appearance, but also a semi-arc gun shield that is a compromise between inclined armor and vertical armor. It also has the characteristics of not occupying too much internal space of the turret and having equivalent armor.
Strictly speaking, the excellent turret appearance design of the IS1/2 series heavy tanks born during World War II played a very important role in the inheritance of a large number of Soviet main battle tanks with eggshell heads in later generations.
The overall rounded and smooth turret appearance characteristics, rather than vertical edges and corners, can still be traced back to its predecessors during the Second World War even on the T64 and T80 series main battle tanks that spanned the Cold War. This extremely excellent heavy armor turret bulletproof appearance design was first started on the KV85 heavy tank.
This 40-type tungsten core armor-piercing projectile that hit the front edge of the turret of Malashenko's vehicle was directly bounced off by the semi-arc gun shield without any suspense because its impact angle was too small, less than 20 degrees. The 40-type tungsten core armor-piercing projectile, which has extremely powerful vertical armor penetration, only left a shallow ballistic scratch on the edge of the gun shield and then disappeared.
Under the impact of the powerful impact, Iushkin immediately lost control and hit the main gun sight in front of him. Although the sighting eye ring made of rubber ring protected Iushkin's eye socket from direct contact with hard metal, the fierce impact still caused Iushkin's entire right eye socket to hurt instantly.
"It didn't penetrate the armor! The shell hit the edge of the gun shield and bounced directly! Keep fighting, Iushkin, how are you?"
Malachenko, who was almost unaffected by the previous shell impact, raised his head and continued to give orders and command the battle after realizing that his armor was not penetrated. However, Iushkin, who was separated from him by a breech block, stretched out his right hand to cover his right eye, which made Malachenko, who also had his right eye injured, worried.
Iushkin covered his burning right eye with his hand and felt the pain that was about to tear him apart gradually subside. Realizing that the battle was not over and he had to continue fighting, Iushkin immediately released his right hand.
"My right eye frame hit the scope. Fortunately, Karamov cleverly installed a rubber ring on it in advance, otherwise my right eye might have been completely scrapped."
After hearing what Iushkin said, Malashenko remained silent for a while and did not say much. Although the classic turret used in the later Stalin 1/2 series heavy tanks has extremely excellent protection performance, it is abnormal in 1941 when it was born in advance.
But even so, it does not mean that this type of heavy armored turret is absolutely invincible. The best choice for the current situation is to destroy it before the enemy opens fire again.
"Since nothing is wrong, let's continue aiming and firing. Those Germans are aiming at us again!"
"We're already doing it, comrade commander!"
Boom--
Ding--
Before the words fell, another huge sound of unpenetrated armor-piercing shells resounded in the space inside the vehicle. Because the caliber was only 50 mm and the fixed-mounted integrated shells were used, the loading speed was extremely fast. After a missed shot, the experienced German anti-tank gun team only took 7 seconds to complete the action from loading to aiming again. The German gunner who put the aiming ring on the upper front armor plate of Malashenko's vehicle again fired again without hesitation.
Just like the KV1 prototype with enhanced protection that Malashenko left in Leningrad and failed to bring back.
The fierce battle situation that had already broken out did not allow Soviet tank designers to make any adjustments to the thickness of the upper front armor plate of the vehicle body that was cut and then welded on the existing production line.
If this were done, not only would the existing Soviet armor plate processing procedures be forced to be overturned and started over again, but the re-determined homogeneous steel armor plates of different thicknesses would also add an extra burden to the tank production line, thereby increasing the production time of a heavy tank and unnecessary costs. All of this is obviously contrary to the Soviet tank steel torrent tactics of pursuing "large quantities and full supply".
Based on the guiding spirit of this steel torrent tactic, the simple and crude tank design team under Kotin directly welded an additional layer of rolled homogeneous steel additional armor with a physical thickness of 25 mm on the upper and lower parts of the body of the 8 newly produced prototype tanks, hoping to use this to enhance the KV1 heavy tank chassis's already somewhat inferior defense in front of the German 88 gun.
In this way, the KV1 heavy tank chassis has an equivalent armor defense of more than 100 mm on the upper armored part of the vehicle body. In actual combat, as long as the impact angle is tricky enough, it can even withstand one or two of the German 88 guns. Malashenko, who drove the previous KV1 prototype vehicle, has fully experienced this. As for resisting the 50 mm small water tube toothpick cannon, which is far less powerful than the 88 gun, it is naturally a piece of cake.
The Type 40 tungsten-core armor-piercing bullet, which hit the upper front of Malashenko's vehicle with a high angle of incidence of more than 60 degrees, was lucky enough and did not ricochet like the previous armor-piercing bullet. .
However, the 75 mm thick armor on the front of the car body plus the 25 mm thick additional armor, plus the tilt angle, the equivalent armor thickness on the front of the car body is already more than 120 mm. This solid "unyielding wall"-like defense in 1941 At that time, except for the possibility of breaking through the defense with the 88 gun, all other types of anti-tank guns were almost out of the question.
This type 40 tungsten-core armor-piercing round accurately hit the armor plate on the front of the car body. The projectile immediately twisted and deformed. Due to the strong kinetic energy impact when it hit the armor, it turned into a lump of iron and fell to the ground, leaving an empty space. The tungsten-core armor-piercing body wrapped inside the projectile is like a javelin and pierces the external additional armor, which is extremely eye-catching.
"Damn it! The turret ricocheted and the car body couldn't penetrate! These Ivan heavy tanks are simply monsters! What kind of opponent are we fighting!? Damn it! Damn it!!"
The German gunner, who finally cursed the terrible situation, still refused to give up this last hope. However, when the loader reported that the loading was completed and closed the breech, the German gunner once again put his right eye on the sight next to the breech. At that moment, a sudden flash of orange-red light was the last scene he saw in his life.