GeTZ Gvaroversk Tank

A photograph of a Type-3 Gvaroversk tank in Vakhodnoye Mountains.

## Production History

### Designed By

• Gvaroversk Tractor Factory (organisation)• Lieutenant Kostya Rodin (design superviser)

### Manufacturers

• GeTZ Gvaroversk Tractor Plant (Type 1)
• Shurm Avtomatmaschina Factory (Type 1)

• KhTZ Khvalovo Factory (Type 1)

• Chudovagonzavod Factory No. 9 (Type 2)

• AnTZ Antsiferovo Tractor Plant (Type 3)

### Produced In

• 1631 - 1633 (Type 1)
• 1634 - 1636 (Type 2)

• 1636 - 1638 (Type 3)

## General Characteristics

### Length

• 5 meters (Khvalovo plant)• 5.5 meters (GeTZ / KhTZ)

### Crew

• Driver
• Commander

• Gunner / Loader

## Propulsion and Performance

### Engine

KhontAMZ 4-cyl. liquid-cooled diesel engines; 60kW
or

Shurm Avtomatmaschina 4-cyl. liquid-cooled diesel engines; 54kW

### Transmission

Manual 4-speed gearbox transmission; 3 forward, 1 reverse
or

S-1 manual 3-speed transmission; 2 forward, 1 reverse

## Protection

### Armour

Front: 28/30mm glacis plate at 61°
Side: 10 - 12mm sides at 85°

Rear: 8 - 10/11mm rear

Turret: 12 - 20mm turret

## Armament

### Main Armament

2A38 30mm Autocannon; 80 rounds
or

KPV 14.5mm Heavy Machine Guns; 360 rounds

## Equipment

### Electronics and Equipment

• KRUS Strelets information control system
• 1G82 gunner day sight

• LPU-4R "Anode" laser rangefinder

###### *From: Russian Ground Forces*

The **GeTZ** or **Gvaroversk** (Rossi: Гвароверск, **Gvaroversk**) is a series of tanks built during the Kem Troubles in the (O.S.) 1630s built by many of the nations within Russia starting from Nova Nadezhaya for their respective ground forces and were extensively used as infantry support vehicles.

The GeTZ tanks would be the earliest examples of tracked, armed armoured vehicles to ever enter combat in Russia. The Gvaroversk tanks were put in multiple names which varied from armed forces to armed forces, with the umbrella term of Gvaroversk tanks or simply 'G' tanks being the general term for vehicles of this design. The Gvaroversk tank was designed to be able to replace the ageing T-13 'Opekun' infantry fighting vehicles of the Soviet era. The GeTZ tanks were the first mass-produced armoured combat vehicles in Russia and were highly capable for their time; able to survive heavy small-arms and machine gun fire, best rough terrain and crush barbed wire or other small enemy fortifications.

Many of these tanks are armed with the venerable 2A38 30mm autocannon, the GeTZ type's components belonged to many salvaged and decomissioned Soviet vehicles, such as electronics and track links in particular. The tanks are distinguished by their tractor like appearance with a relatively high climbing face and excellent ground clearance they were given the nickname "Koza" (Rossi: Коза, "Goat") due to their general ability to also traverse steep slopes.

## Background

The GeTZ Gvaroversk was a development of the S-1 tractor, which was an open cabin tractor built by Gvaroversk tractor factory (Rossi: Гвароверский Тракторный Завод, Gvaroverskyy Traktorniy Zavod) by Lieutenant Kostya Rodin, a former tank battalion commander from the Soviet Red Army between (O.S.) Mozhet and Sventyabyr 1630 (May - September 230A.C.) where Rodin had discovered that tractor vehicles begun production of tractor vehicles in Gvaroversk, Uuotovio Prefecture and observed that the S-1 had a worthy terrain crossing capability during a field testing of the tractor. The idea of a formalised armoured vehicle that the Nadezhayan National Police Force that could supplement their infantry in their fight against The People's Commonwealth militias in the Vakhodnoye Mountains nearing the end of the Kem Troubles. The revival of armoured units became the National Police Force's general staff priority after being persuaded to become involved and supplied the Gvaroversk Tractor Factory funding and resources.

Requirements for armour and armament had made their way into the Gvaroversk design. However this design requirement would not be reflected with the current industrial capabilities of the Russians of the time. During the Kem Troubles, the National Police Force was saddled with the fact that the Nadezhayans are saddled with an array of tractor factories which ranged from mediocre to bad. A prototype tank which was simply a heavy modification of the S-1 tractor was ready in Dekabris 1630 (December 230A.C.) and was named "Mest'" (Rossi: Месть, "Revenge") where it successfully demonstrated good terrain crossing to the NPF's general staff; running around a course simulating rockies and steep off-road terrains, with a second course simulating battlefield conditions and barbed wire obstacles which was finished some weeks later further impressing and giving the NPF's confidence.

The new tank was named the Type-1 tank and was pressed into serial production.

The first order for tanks was placed in 12 Fevral 1631 on three tractor factories:

* GeTZ Gvaroversk Plant
* Shurm Avtomatmaschina Factory
* KhTZ Khvalovo Factory

Gvaroversk successfully built 116 tanks, Shurm building 85 and Khvalovo producing 47. Making a total of 248 Type-1 tanks in the span of 1631 to 1633. With their first appearance in combat, the Type-1 was capable enough of significantly improving NPF morale simply by their appearance alone, albeit if used en tandem with the BTR and BMP fighting vehicles confidence with these tanks aren't as well recieved. When news of the first use of these tanks, Lieutenant Valentine Iskomorilin Mutsov who at the time led one of the earliest armoured units in Russia commented:

> "Admittedly, our expectations with the use of new tanks within the overland force were quite higher than we thought. But we have to suspend our belief simply from the fact that the most complex we could actually make these days are triple-expansion engines. Whatever that means, its such an old design from last I've read about it. Some of our men from the Soviet Union actually thought we'd get some sort of replacement that looked akin to say.. A T-14M2 'Angara'? But fresh minds here are still enthusiastic simply from the fact that we can make new tanks now. So I can't put much complaints to what we have at the moment, with so little what we have."
>
>

The first Type-1 tanks introduced lacked a standardised design which came from a strong need to hasten the production of these tanks in order to defeat The People's Commonwealth militia forces in the Vakhodnoye Mountains meant that much of the Gvaroversk tanks were very unique from eachother from manufacturer to manufacturer. Various attempts to produce replacements fell by the wayside due to the technical and financial reasons. With many minor modifications from factories have included the addition of a sandwich of thin machine steel, boiler plating with wood or rubber sheeting to improve protection against explosives and fragmentation. The resulting machines from the production of the Type-1 led to many different fighting vehicles developed during the troubles.

## Design (Type 1/2)

### General Characteristics and Construction

Both the Type 1 and the Type 2 was produced along eachother during the Kem Troubles in (O.S.) 1631 and 1632 respectively. These tanks had a simple layout of simply known as the "straight-edge" layout, with a crew of three in a straight line; driver forward, the gunner/loader in the centre of the turret and the commander behind them. Due to the size of these tanks the Gvaroversk tanks were particularly cramped which was intensified by the tumblehome shape of these tanks making minimal headspace for the crew. The tanks thusly required smaller guns which the 2A38 30mm guns were a fitting choice for it. The hulls on the Gvaroversk tanks were made of any steel the Russians could use which was assembled using armour plates welded to a frame. Some tank manufacturers could not produce steel plates thick or of any acceptable quality enough that was up to the requirements of the National Police Force and instead multiple plates were riveted ontop the hull plate to improve the protection of these vehicles.

The Gvaroversk tanks were between 2.55 — 2.8 arshina (5 - 5.5 meters) and 1.07 arshina (2.1 meters) wide. Appearing most similarly to the S-1 tractors the Gvaroversk tank design was based off. This discrepancy of size between the Type 1 and Type 2 was only based solely on what manufacturer built these tanks, GeTZ and KhTZ favoured producing their G tanks longer than other factories of the time. Military standardisation efforts from the Russian Red Army would rectify these inconsistencies with the Type 3.

### Mechanical

The Type-1/2, depending on manufacturer used either the KhontAMZ or the Shurm Avtomatmaschina four-cylinder diesel engines which is designed to go a top speed of 18km/h on optimal road conditions, while allowing it to go at 10km/h. The KhontAMZ was a high energy-density diesel engine designed initially for the Khontomash FT-18 heavy tractor was also used on the Type-1/2 tanks. This engine used a steel crankcase and an aluminium engine block, the engine had a straight-four cylinder layout having a displacement of 1.7cm³ per cylinder; bore 125mm, stroke 145mm and could spin at 3,000rpm. This allowed the engine to develop 60kW of total power.

The secondary powerplant of the Gvaroversk tank is the Shurm Avtomatmaschina engine which was designed specifically for the G tanks which Shurm factory exclusively fits to their vehicles. This was also a straight-four cylinder layout, instead using a 2.5cm³ displacement for each cylinder at a rpm of 2,800. These engines were of poorer construction and developed 54kW of power instead.

Both of these engines are liquid-cooled, using water as coolants on the top of the engine blocks in order to regulate temperatures of the Gvaroversk tank.

Transmission housing of the G tank made of three cast sections bolted together or cast as one piece fitted to the front of the tank to move both drive sprockets. This system was often seen to be damaged when traversing steep rocky terrain in the Uuotovio Prefecture. In order to prevent this many manufacturers in (O.S.) 1632 would modify the design of the G tanks to accomodate a swinging steel guard plate in the front of the transmission in order to absorb the damages from hitting rocks while traversing rough terrain, on the Type-2 the transmission instead was moved backwards instead.

## Ballistics

#### 2A38 30mm Autocannon

Since their first introduction the Type-1 and Type-2 Gvaroversk tanks is armed with the **2A38 30mm** **autocannon** weapon system which many belonged to old BTR armoured vehicles which retained their twin-axis gun stabiliser and was used as the main multi-role weapon of the vehicle. These guns are capable of firing some existing some ammunition types (APBC-T, APFSDS-T, HE-I) at a considerably greater muzzle velocity than any tank gun of the time. Most G tanks use some modifications of AA and HE-FRAG shells as these were still considered the main ammunition type for fighting armoured targets at medium to long range as expected from armoured vehicles found in the Kem Troubles. Many of these 2A38 guns were modified into the 2A38S shortening their original 80 calibre (2,416 milimeters) down to half at 40 calibres (1,208 milimeters) which made these guns more suitable for infantry support roles.

The 2A38 is formerly a dual belt-fed autocannon lacking the variable fire rate selection system and instead was modified to be a manually loaded, open-bolt system which could allow it to fit onto the Gvaroversk tank. The gun's dimensions however remained relatively the same, weighing 108.9 t'syatsha (115 kilograms) with a length of 1.54 arshina (3.027 meters, 2.4 meters for gun barrel length) and is chambered in 30x165mm cartridges which is fired at a muzzle velocity of 960 m/s at a total range of 6.14 daleko (4,000 metres) and retained the gas-operated action from it's original form as an automatic weapon. The 2A38 being manually loaded takes between 6.5 - 5.04 seconds to reload, there are 20 rounds on either side of the turret (both BTR-101 and Bashnya turret cupolas) with addditional 40 rounds underneath the commander's seat on an armoured box sealed off by a rubber mat.

##### Turret and Fire Control

All 2A38 guns were found in either a modified BTR-101 turret retaining their advanced fire control systems and sights or the 'Bashnya' cylindrical turret cupola often made from steel plates folded and secured on with additional armour plates. These new turrets would become the standard cupolas installed on the rear of the driver compartment and is protected by 12 - 24.3 milimeters of steel plating and rotates on a fully traversible mounting which requires a hydraulically actuated manual handcranking to rotate at an abysmal rate of 5.71° per second, in comparison the BTR-101 turret using an electrically traversed turret ring that can go 46° per second.

Both turret forms use the 1G82 gunner day sight which allows a variable zoom of 4x, 8.8x, 12x, and 18x through a 18x33mm optical sight which used a modified LPU-4R "Anode" laser rangefinder which offered improved accuracy at longer ranges. In addition to the use of Old World Soviet technology many of these fire control systems were not present in later production models of the Gvaroversk tanks due to the severe lack of facilities that could maintain and replace these systems and were substituted for with simpler periscope sights and a 4x gunner sight using a stadiametric rangefinder instead.

##### Available Ammunition

The main weapon that most Type-1/2 Gvaroversk tanks use is the 3UOF8 high-explosive incendiary (HE-I) multipurpose cartridge that is used by the National Police Force during the Kem Troubles. These projectiles had a weight of 36 deyat (389 grams) with 4.5 deyat (49 grams) of high-explosive filling on it. This projectile's warhead contained A-IX-2 explosive contained in a copper jacket surrounded by an aluminium body and ballistic cap meaning it could develop a higher muzzle velocity of 960m/s.

#### KPV 14.5mm Heavy Machine Gun

The **KPV-14.5 heavy machine gun** (**KPV** is an initialism for Krupnokaliberniy Pulemyot Vladimirova, in Russian as Крупнокалиберный Пулемёт Владимирова, or **КПВ**) is a Soviet heavy machine gun originally used as an infantry based weapon from 1949. This weapon was used as the secondary option for G tanks where the 30mm autocannon could not be used. This weapon combines the rate of fire of a heavy machine gun with the armor-piercing capabilities of antitank rifles and was designed to combat lightly armored targets, firepower and manpower of the enemy located behind light cover, as well as to be an anti-aircraft machine gun.

The KPV is a short-recoil system which had a rate of fire of 600 rounds per minute. It used the powerful 14.5x114mm cartridge which could deliver an excellent stopping power of 31 kJ making it most optimal for a variety of uses, particularly against infantry, lightly armoured vehicles and some fortifications at a muzzle velocity of 1,005m/s down a range of 4.6 - 6.1 daleko (3,000 - 4,000 meters).

The KPV would be fitted on Bashnya turrets and could fit either single or twin-guns to compensate for the lost firepower from the 2A38 gun and were often fitted with simple iron sights, periscopes or optical sights, the KPV would be used more as an anti-infantry role which it performed well as in the Kem Troubles. The KPVs are belt-fed with a 90-round link for 14.5x114mm cartridges, with additional links stored in two ammunition boxes making for a total of 360 rounds.

## See Also

* Equipment of the Russian Ground Forces
* Russian Ground Forces