Category Archives: Historical Articles

Lansen C: Not so swedish

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by Historical Articles, WoT •

Since the Lansen C was just released in World of Tanks, I’ve decided to write this article to show you the truth about the Swedish Lansen C.

SP15 and I already had a laugh at it when it was first announced as it’s a frankenstein of a tank.

While I don’t know much about the Lansen from the perspective of Sweden, i know a lot about the Swiss changes to the Lansen which basically made it a completely new tank that looked like the original Lansen.

First of all: The Lansen itself was initially a 75 mm Armed light tank with a maximal armor thickness of 50mm on the Turret and 38mm on the hull. In addition, the 105mm gun the Lansen C gets is wrong, Lansen C never even was considered with a gun of that caliber. Other Lansen designs possibly had it, though since I don’t know the story from the Swedish side, i can’t confirm nor deny that. The Lansen C also never was planned with the Volvo engine that WG ended up giving it.

Secondly Lansen C was a swiss made design in collaboration with sweden and less sweden designing it for the swiss.

As Wargaming had mentioned was the Lansen had multiple gun options such as a 84mm ( 20pdr) gun with the length being L/65, which would have resulted in the maximal possible recoil the Lansen could have handled, They also suggested a L/75 84mm gun, but that would have been to much for the tank to be able to withstand. another plan was it to mount a 90mm L/60 gun which would have barely been able to fit in the turret, but the Muzzle velocity would have to be reduced to 800-850 m/s and a projectile weight of merely 11 kg in order for the tank to withstand the recoil. Continue reading →

Swiss Wheeled vehicles branch proposal 2.0

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by Historical Articles, WoT •

Author: Mizutayio

Since the French wheeled vehicles have been in the game for about a month now, I’ve decided to take a look at the swiss wheeled light tank branch and while I already made a post on them a while ago, I have made many changes to said line and the whole tree for that matter.

For now I’ll be talking about my idea of a swiss wheeled vehicle branch, how it would look and what it could bring to the game.

First of all we could talk about the overall gameplay that we could expect from these vehicles. While they would all be 4×4 except for the tier 10 vehicle, which would be 6×6. So a switch system would not work. It would only be one speed and one mode of agility. So alternatively while looking at the vehicles I had chosen I’ve noticed an interesting feature the tier 8-10 candidates have: they could all swim. While there certainly are vehicles in the game that could swim on their own (without many preparations like the Strv 103 or the Sherman for example) the Swiss wheeled lights would be a great way to introduce such a mechanic. And while it would be very situational and could not be used on every map, it could certainly give them the ability to escape from places other vehicles can’t, like the bodies of water at the Abbey map, the ability to flank a lot easier on the southern end, or even get a short-cut through the water in the middle of Malinovka. They could even get a better passability through water, so they barely slow down  those maps with some water. But this is all just an idea and it’s unlikely we’ll see that at all, they could just end up being normal vehicles without any fancy gimmick. Continue reading →

Swedish tanks Revisited: Sav m/43 & variants

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by Historical Articles •

Author: SP15

Welcome back everyone! Today we are going to take a look back at the Swedish assault guns. But before we do that id like to announce that I will be doing a couple of articles on WG’s recently announced Swedish medium branch, and the new Swedish premium tanks. I will also be holding a general Q&A over at my Blog: From the Swedish Archives:

https://fromtheswedisharchives.wordpress.com/.

Sav m/43

The Sav m/43 was a WW 2 era assault gun that served with the Swedish armed forces between 1945 and 1973. In total of 36 were built during 1944-47 by Scania-Vabis. These vehicles were initially equipped with short 75 mm guns but all vehicles were retrofitted with 105 mm guns in 1946. They would serve with both the infantry and artillery where they were organized in independent assault gun divisions or platoons. The Sav m/43 would be superseded by the Ikv 102 & 103 infantry support guns which featured a similar main gun on a much lighter and more mobile chassis.

Continue reading →

Swedish tanks: Strv m/38 – m/40k

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by Historical Articles •

Author: SP15

The strv m/38, m/39, m/40L & m/40k were Swedish light tanks that served with the Swedish army troughout and beyond ww2. At one point they were some of the most advanced tanks in the world but after the war they would be religated to the role of reconnaissance vehicles.

 

Background

In the mid 1930s as tensions were starting to rise in mainland Europe the Swedish army began looking at the acquisition of new tanks for its first tank battalion. The Swedish army had since 1922 operated an experimental tank battalion at Göta livgarde which had allowed them to gain experience with operating tanks. The tanks used by the Göta livgarde tank battalion were however severely outdated and due to a lack of spare parts half of the vehicles ended up being cannibalized.

Several attempts were made to find a replacement in the late 20’s – early 30’s but despite testing numerous potential designs and even funding the development of a domestic tank design (the strv m/31) mediocre trial results and a lack of funds forced the army to delay the purchase. I wont go into detail about those attempts here but If you want to know more about them I have an article on the Strv m/31’s development. Continue reading →

War Graves:The Tank Museum

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by Historical Articles •

Honouring the Fallen of the First World War

As we approach armistice day a very apt video.

On a visit to the Cambrai Memorial to the Missing at Louverval, Curator David Willey took the opportunity to explore the Allied First World War graves. In this video he explains how they were set up by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission during WW1 and why they look the way they do.

We will remember them.

 

Swedish tanks Revisited: Ikv 91 & variants

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by Historical Articles •

Author: SP15

Welcome back everyone!

 

Im glad to announce that the articles on Swedish tanks are back and (hopefully) better than ever. For those of you interested in shorter and more technical posts and articles not suitable for RSR i have created own blog. There I will archive my older content as well as post semi-regular updates about everything from Swedish composite armor development to translations of datasheets and manuals. You can check it out here: From the swedish archives

Ikv 91OGwhFlL

The ikv 91 was a light tank/tank destroyer built specifically to provide Swedish infantry with effective and mobile fire support. Between 1975 and 1978 a total of 212 vehicles were delivered to the Swedish army, these served until the early 2000’s when they were retired without a replacement. Continue reading →

World of Warplanes Devblog: Junkers Ju 86E and Heinkel HE 111 H-2

by Historical Articles, WoWP •

Taken from the Wowp Devblog

After defeat in World War I and the Treaty of Versailles, Germany was forbidden to build military aircraft. But the growing ambition of the Reich dictated the necessity of a new fleet of warplanes, so its gradual increase in aerial might was kept secret. Bombers of the 1930s were an example of this tactic, for example, the Junkers Ju 86 and Heinkel 111.

Junkers Ju 86E

The Junkers Ju 86 was created in 1934 as a dual-purpose aircraft. Officially it was a commercial airliner for Lufthansa and foreign clients that could transport 10 passengers. But the main advantage of this machine was its ability to be easily and quickly transformed into a medium bomber.

repülőtér,_junkers_ju-86_repülőgépek._fortepan_9202_big Continue reading →

BT-5 Odd Road Wheel System

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by Historical Articles •

Just as a curiosity we have a photo of a model of a proposed BT-5 tank with a caterpillar-roller drive, designed by engineer N. Tsyganov. 1935.

The track drive (rearmost sprocket) is normal Russian practice of a roller sprocket driving the track center guides. Forward of that is another sprocket with drive pockets in its circumference. This appears to pick up and drive the ends of the road wheel axles. The road wheel axles look to be linked together into a chain with the road wheels forming the chain rollers. The track is tensioned at the front with an eccentric mounted wheel that supports the ends of the road wheel pins. The top run is guided by a channel and the working bottom run has a channel with extra guide plates for the ends of the wheel pins. It didn’t see service, I wonder why.

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This is a photo as it saw service with Christie suspension.

BT_-_5

Source WoT Leaks and Wikipedia.