Greetings, dear fans of World of Tanks! Just yesterday, another tank went to the super test. This time we are talking about the Soviet heavyweight Object Object 279 (p): the car is a promotional vehicle, it will be at level 10. Note that this is not a premium vehicle, and the tank will be the main prize for the new stage of the LBZ, which is expected in the fall of this year.
The first initial name of the tank was Object 726, then it was changed to Object 279 (r).
What's special about this car? The fact is that a very interesting arrangement of the chassis of 4 tracks is assumed here. Do you think that the developers have begun to introduce fantastic cars into the game that were born on the outskirts of their own imagination?
No. They actually tried to assemble a 4-track mutant in 1947 according to the design of designer Troyanov. According to the engineering plan, such a tracked propulsion system was supposed to significantly increase the vehicle's maneuverability and survivability.
In particular, the chassis here is located under the hull, increasing the space of the fighting compartment, the fuel tanks are located in longitudinal support beams, 4 tracks allow you to continue moving with a damaged track. The designers even assembled a prototype, but the matter stalled there. Let's see how Wargaming managed to implement this idea.
Object 279 (r): performance characteristics
Let's start the Object 279 (p) guide with the fact that the new Soviet heavy was initially declared as a potential imbecile, and there are some reasons for this statement. Let's start with the fact that they offer us a safety margin of 2,400 units, which is quite a decent indicator.
The tank’s viewing radius is quite standard for a “ten” and is 400 meters. If anyone is interested: the stealth coefficient is 11.8%. Of course, it will not be possible to properly camouflage a 60-ton carcass in the bushes on a raised tracked chassis, but the equipment will be able to get a chance to fire the first shot.
Let's move on to the chassis and see what real advantages the installation of 4 tracks gives the Object 279 (r) WoT. Considering the layout, one might assume that a super-fast heavy will appear in the game, but this is not the case.
The newcomer accelerates only to 40 km/h, so it becomes the slowest heavy tank of the USSR. The slowness is explained simply: a monster weighing 60 tons is driven by an 850-horsepower diesel engine. Of course, 14-odd “horses” per ton is clearly not enough for high-quality acceleration. In place, the rod rotates quite quickly: 30 degrees per second.
Let us remember that the real prototype was conceived as an all-terrain tank, and judging by the characteristics from the test, the game model has very mediocre resistance to soil. Therefore, contrary to expectations, the car will not cheerfully cut through the sands and swamps, but, like all its classmates, will begin to lose speed. The second point that requires attention is the caterpillars. 4 rollers in the frontal projection simply hint that the tank will always be on the gusle.
How the mechanics of shooting down/repairing the caterpillar and the movement of the tank will be implemented at this moment is still unknown, but if WG does not attend to this issue, the imba they announced will be instantly sent to the hangar, barely reaching the point of combat contact between the teams. Let's explain why. 
The installation of an additional track pair deprived the Object 279 (p) of its lower armor plate, so we can assume damage was caused through the mounting beams, which, by the way, also double as fuel tanks. As a result, the tank will be forever repairing downed tracks, taking damage along the way.
In terms of weapons, Object 279 WoT looks good. A 122-mm M62-T2A gun with an armor penetration of 258 mm is installed here; if you load gold, this value can be increased to 340 mm. One-time damage also looks quite decent - 440 units.
Considering that the reload time is 9.2 seconds, we get an average DPM of 2,900 units. The gun is brought down in 1.9 seconds and has fairly good accuracy: a dispersion of 0.33 per hundred meters. Let us add that the gun has good stabilization, which allows you to comfortably fire while moving, when turning the chassis and turret. The negative declination angle is expectedly sad - only 5 degrees.
Reservation Object 279 (r)
Let us immediately note that the new Soviet heavy aircraft is well protected, so it seems to be a rather formidable adversary. A cast rebound turret with a frontal armor thickness of 350 mm is installed here. Please note that not all “tens” in the game can boast of such indicators. The gun mantlet here is small, however, there are no noticeably protruding elements on the turret.
The upper frontal part has a quite correct angle of inclination, which significantly increases the thickness of the declared 200 millimeters of armor in the given value. The side armor of the hull and turret is 150 mm. Note that due to the atypical layout, the hull is raised above the chassis and, therefore, is not protected by tracks and screens. Preliminary characteristics of the tank show low strength of the ammunition rack, which, given the unprotected fighting compartment, can be fatal.
Brief summary of the Object 279 (r) tank
Before drawing conclusions, let’s conduct a comparative analysis of positive and negative characteristics.
The undoubted advantages are:
- Reservation of the turret and hull.
- Economics of ammunition.
- Weapon accuracy.
- Alpha and DPM.
- Margin of safety.
- View radius.
The disadvantages include:
- Speed.
- Lack of NLD.
- Gun declination angles.
- Dynamics.
At first glance, the technology has few shortcomings, but this is only a preliminary analysis made on the basis of the characteristics declared for the supertest. If WG fails to properly implement this project, the vehicle will turn out to be quite dull: a slowly crawling giant with a constantly damaged chassis.
In addition, the vehicle has a publicly visible fighting compartment with 150 mm of armor. From this we can conclude that every successful hit on board is a guaranteed critical of the internal module or injury to a crew member.
Instead of a conclusion, we will add that the characteristics are not final and may change before the release of the machine.
Additional photos object 279 (r)
Today, not a single visitor to the museum of armored vehicles located in Kubinka can pass by one of the most unusual tanks of our time. We are talking about a heavy tank with the index “object 279”. This tank is a real flying saucer, only placed on tracks and having a turret. But the strangeness does not end there, since this heavy vehicle has not one pair of tracks, but two.
The most surprising thing is that this heavy tank could well have been adopted by the Soviet army, although in the end it shared the fate of many experienced heavy tanks, never reaching the factory assembly line.
Excursion into history
The idea of putting a tank on 4 tracks has existed for quite a long time. The first idea about a four-track vehicle belongs to the German company Daimler., which during the First World War decided to develop the first all-terrain armored vehicle, for which an option was proposed with installation of tracks on trucks instead of rear wheels.
The idea seemed good and already in 1915 the military issued an order for the construction of such a machine. To increase the cross-country ability of the Marienwagen - this is the name given to this vehicle - it was decided to install it on 4 tracks: 2 in front and 2 in the rear. However, the attempt was unsuccessful. It was not possible to install a rather impressive box made of 9-mm armored steel onto the flimsy chassis. And it would be a stretch to call this vehicle a tank, because it did not have a turret; rather, it was an armored vehicle, but on 4 tracks.
The second to embrace the idea of creating a four-track tank were the British.. According to their concept, tanks were a kind of “land fleet”, and, therefore, in the tank forces, as in the fleet, there had to be a kind of leader, invulnerable to artillery fire. The British began developing such a tank in 1915.
As a result of their work, a huge tank was born: about 10 meters long, weighing about 100 tons. In appearance, it resembled a massive armored carriage on four tracks. It was supposed to be driven by 2 engines with a total power of only 210 hp, so you could forget about any mobility.
The tank was armed with a 57 mm cannon and 6 machine guns, which created a continuous wall of fire around it. Despite the fact that the tank's armor protected it from the fire of German 77-mm field guns, almost immediately after the tests the tank was sent for scrap.
The Americans were the third to set their sights on creating a tank with 4 tracks.. In 1943, the United States launched a program to develop heavy T-28 tanks, which could easily overcome any defense, even such a strong one as the Western Wall or the Siegfried Line.
The main armament of the tank was supposed to be a 105 mm gun, but again located not in the turret, but in the hull itself. In fact, the Americans were not developing a tank, but a tank destroyer. The gun was located in the hull between the tracks and covered with powerful 305 mm armor. As a result, the vehicle was reclassified as a self-propelled gun and received a new designation T-95.
The combat weight of the vehicle was 86 tons, so to reduce the pressure on the ground, it was decided to use 4 tracks: in pairs, 2 on each side. At the same time, the external tracks of the self-propelled gun were protected by side screens 100 mm thick attached to them and could be removed and towed behind the vehicle on a cable.
Removing the tracks also made it easier to transport the T-95, as it significantly reduced the width of the vehicle from 4.56 m to 3.15 m. A total of 2 such vehicles were manufactured, which were used only for testing. One of them can still be seen in the Patton Museum at Fort Knox, Kentucky.
Object 279
At the beginning of 1956, the Main Armored Directorate of the USSR Ministry of Defense formulated the basic tactical and technical requirements for a new heavy tank, which was supposed to enter service at the turn of the 50-60s. In particular, the weight limit was supposed to be 50-60 tons, at the same time it was planned to equip the tank with a new 130 mm gun. The terms of reference for the development of the tank were issued by the 2nd Design Bureau: Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant and Leningrad. Kirov. The selection was to take place on a competitive basis.
In the 1950s, the Soviet army faced a difficult situation with heavy tanks: 4 models were in operation. The IS-2 tank left over from the Great Patriotic War no longer met the requirements of the time (mainly in terms of security) and in the future was only suitable for service as bunkers. The IS-3 tank had low reliability, so it was not popular among the troops, and in terms of armor it differed only slightly from the T-54 medium tank adopted for service.
The existing IS-4 tank was a protected and powerful vehicle, but it cost 3 times more than the IS-3, while not satisfying the military’s mobility requirements and, like the IS-3, it suffered from technical problems. All three existing heavy tanks had a 122-mm D-25T rifled gun as their main armament, which by that time was already noticeably outdated.
Along with them, the T-10, which was produced in a huge series for this class of equipment, tried to take the place of the main heavy tank. This tank suited the military with its performance qualities, but could not stand comparison with its NATO counterparts - the British Conqueror and the American M103, at least until modernization to the T-10M level.
The new tank being created was supposed to replace all existing vehicles and lose the main drawback of the T-10 - weak armor protection - and effectively fight all existing and future tanks of a potential enemy. In 1957-1959, 3 prototypes were presented, but only one of them, “Object 279,” was created anew, becoming one of the most unusual and daring models in the entire history of world tank building.
Design work on the project was headed by L.S. Troyanov, who had already made his mark by creating the IS-4 heavy tank. Unlike the projects of competitors (Object 770 - ChTZ and Object 277 - another project of the Kirov plant), its heavy tank was intended for use in conditions where the enemy used nuclear weapons and in difficult terrain for vehicles.
The tank design had a classic layout. But the original design solutions used led to the fact that the armor volume of 11.47 cubic meters was actually the smallest among all heavy tanks of those years (can be attributed to shortcomings). The tank hull was a cast structure of 4 massive parts connected by welding. Spaced steel screens with a curved profile were installed on the sides of the tank. These screens were designed to provide additional anti-cumulative protection, while at the same time giving the body a streamlined shape.
The tank was distinguished by extremely powerful armor. The frontal armor had a normal thickness of 192 mm (a number of sources indicate 269 mm, which seems overestimated), had a slope of 60 degrees and a rotation angle of up to 45 degrees. In fact, the given armor thickness was equivalent to 384-550 mm. The tank sides were protected by 182 mm armor sloped at about 45 degrees (equivalent to 260 mm armor). This level of armor guaranteed the tank's invincibility when fired from any tank gun available at that time from any distance.
The tank's turret was hemispherical, solid and flattened. The turret had a uniform armor thickness of 305 mm, and a slope of 30 degrees (equivalent to 352 mm). Thanks to this, “Object 279” received a record level of security, which was achieved without the use of combined armor. At the same time, the mass of the tank was 60 tons, which seems even trivial in comparison with such German developments as the Maus or the E-100.
The crew of the heavy tank consisted of 4 people. Three of them were located in the turret (commander, loader and gunner), and the fourth, the driver, was located in the front of the hull in the center. Its hatch for boarding and disembarking from the tank was also located here.
The main armament of the tank was supposed to be a 130-mm M-65 rifled gun. The gun was paired with a 14.5 mm KPVT machine gun. This weapon was developed in the second half of the 50s to arm promising heavy tanks and tank destroyers. The weight of the gun was 4060 kg, and the length was approximately 60 calibers. Its features were the presence of a slotted muzzle brake, auxiliary blowing of the barrel with compressed air and an ejector.
The muzzle energy of the barrel was 15-16 MJ, and the 30.7 kg armor-piercing tracer projectile left it at a speed of 1000 m/s. The muzzle energy of the gun is 1.5 times higher than that of modern 120-125 mm smoothbore guns.
The process of feeding ammunition to the gun was partially automated. The joint operation of the semi-automatic cassette loader and the loader made it possible to achieve a rate of fire of 5-7 rounds per minute. Along with this, a more complex loading system was developed, which would allow the rate of fire to be increased to 10-15 rounds per minute. At the same time, to pay for the very dense layout, the tank's ammunition load was quite modest - only 24 rounds of separate loading and 300 rounds of machine gun ammunition.
The tank was supposed to use fairly modern aiming and observation devices at that time: a TPD-2S stereoscopic sight-rangefinder with independent stabilization, a two-plane electro-hydraulic stabilizer "Groza", a TPN night sight combined with an L-2 IR illumination device, as well as a semi-automatic OMS. Many of the listed devices appeared on production cars only in the late 60s.
Two diesel engines were considered as the main one for the tank: 2DG-8M (1000 hp at 2400 rpm) and DG-1000 (950 hp at 2500 rpm). Both engines had horizontal cylinders (in order to save space in a low tank hull) and could provide the tank with highway speed of 50-55 km/h. The vehicle's power reserve was 250-300 km. Instead of a mechanical transmission, the tank received a single-flow three-stage hydromechanical transmission. The planetary gearbox is partially automated.
The main highlight of the project was the chassis, which was located on 4 tracked movers located under the bottom of the hull. On each side of the tank there was a block of 2 caterpillar propulsors, each of which included 6 dual non-rubberized road wheels and 3 support rollers. The drive wheel was rear-mounted.
This chassis had no analogues in the domestic tank industry. The chassis components were mounted on 2 supporting structures, which also served as fuel tanks. The tank's suspension was hydropneumatic. The design of the chassis provided the tank with an almost complete lack of ground clearance, the impossibility of landing it on the ground, and a fairly low specific pressure of 0.6 kg/cm 2 .
Based on the results of tests carried out in 1959, the tank had a number of serious shortcomings in the chassis:
— loss of efficiency when driving on viscous soil,
- low agility,
— complexity of maintenance and repair,
— impossibility of reducing the overall height of the tank,
- high labor intensity of production.
Even then it became clear that the “Object 279” was not destined to become a production tank. The most highly specialized, ambitious and expensive among all three prototypes, it had to give way to them. But these plans were no longer destined to come true.
July 22, 1960 during a demonstration of new heavy equipment at the Kapustin Yar training ground Khrushchev categorically forbade the military to accept any tanks weighing more than 37 tons.. Thus, the USSR put an end to the entire heavy tank program. However, despite this, “Object 279” remained one of the most powerful tanks in the world for many years, until the appearance of the T-80U tanks in service.
“Object 279” is a very original Soviet project of a heavy tank for nuclear war conditions...The emergence of atomic weapons required the military to reconsider both the strategy and tactics of warfare. But the role of tanks has only increased. After all, as it turned out, of all types of military equipment, tanks turned out to be the most resistant to the effects of all damaging factors of a nuclear explosion. Of course, improvements were required... Object 279 is a tank optimized for operation in a full-scale nuclear war. Its design has two “highlights”: an original chassis with four tracks, and a body in the shape of an elongated ellipsoid.
The cast hull was complemented by anti-cumulative shields, which gave the tank an unusual shape, reminiscent of a “flying saucer.” According to the designers, this was supposed to prevent the tank from capsizing when exposed to a powerful shock wave.
The four-track undercarriage gave the heavy tank unique maneuverability: when overcoming obstacles, it was almost impossible to plant it “on its belly,” and the ground pressure of the 60-ton vehicle was only 0.6 kg/sq.cm.
It was assumed that such super cross-country ability would be needed to pass through the destruction zone near the epicenter of an atomic explosion. In addition, to protect against Soviet tank armies, the Europeans were seriously planning to use nuclear land mines to destroy reservoirs and river channels to flood and swamp the area.
But the original design also had its very significant drawbacks: large power losses, turning resistance increased by 12 times compared to the “classic”, difficulty in maintenance and repair. Object 279 was manufactured and tested, but for many reasons it did not become a production vehicle. Now the unique tank is in the tank museum in Kubinka...
From behind the scenes of military developments, rumors are heard that this unique machine will still receive the right to life, having undergone serious modernization in the conditions of the modern world. Well, let's hope so! Tactical and technical characteristics of the Object 279 tank:
Dimensions:
length – 10.2 m (without trunk 6.77 m)
height – 2.5 m
width – 3.4 m
Weight – 60 t
Armor:
forehead – 93-269 mm
side – 100-182 mm
tower – 217-305 mm
Weapons:
M-65 gun 130 mm caliber
KPVT machine gun 14.5mm caliber – 1 pc.
Ammunition – 24 rounds
Engine– diesel 16-cylinder H-shaped four-stroke DG-1000 or 2DG-8M
Power reserve – up to 250 km
Speed – up to 55 km/h
Crew – 4 people
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